BKBIGSEM.RVW 950421 %A Paul Karasik %C 2600 Tenth St., Berkeley, CA 94710 %D 1992 %G 0-07-033185-5 %I McGraw Hill, Inc. %O 510-548-2805 800-227-0900 lkissing@osborne.mhs.compuserve.com %P 256 %T "How to Make It Big in the Seminar Business" "How to Make It Big in the Seminar Business", Karasik, 1992, 0-07-033185-5 On the inside front cover, in bold print, this book states that "[if] you possess knowledge or information that can be of value to someone else, then you qualify to share in the profit currently being reaped in the seminar business." Six lines later, it tells you to choose a topic with a built-in market. Are we hedging yet? Chapter one tells you to choose a topic that you love--then tells you that the public will decide whether it is any good. Computer topics are specifically singled out as a "hot" area--but in the extensive list of seminar companies, the best technical training companies are noticeable by their absence. What topics *do* get listed? Motivation. Karasik, himself, presents primarily motivational seminars. These are high energy, high personality events with low content. Karasik cites a story about temporarily "taking over" a seminar he had come to as a participant--not possible with a real tutorial activity. Motivational, or "personal development", seminars are more akin to entertainment than to teaching. This is recognized implicitly in the assignment of as much space to choosing the best day as to course design, and ten times as much space to promotion. Will the promotional tips work? Sure, if you have the advertising budget. Will this book give you an edge? No. Remember, this is basically a printed version of a motivational seminar on how to give motivational seminars. copyright Robert M. Slade, 1995 BKBIGSEM.RVW 950421 ============= Vancouver ROBERTS@decus.ca | Lotteries are a tax Institute for Robert_Slade@sfu.ca | on the arithmetically Research into rslade@cyberstore.ca | impaired. User rslade@vanisl.decus.ca | Security Canada V7K 2G6 |