We all wish we could sharpen key management skills-like writing more effective emails or proposals, focusing to-do lists on what really matters, giving more persuasive presentations, or dealing with a boss who makes you want to scream. But who has the time? The HBR Guides can help. In the HBR Guide to Getting the Right Work Done

Contrived. Disingenuous. Phony.

Inauthentic. Do your customers use any of these words to describe what you sell--or how you sell it? If so, welcome to the club. Inundated by fakes and sophisticated counterfeits, people increasingly see the world in terms of real or fake.

They would rather buy something real from someone genuine rather than something fake from some phony. When deciding to buy, consumers judge an offering's (and a company's) authenticity as much as--if not more than--price, qua...

The dangerous work of leading change--somebody has to do it. Will you put yourself on the line?To lead is to live dangerously. It's romantic and exciting to think of leadership as all inspiration, decisive action, and rich rewards, but leading requires taking risks that can jeopardize your career and your personal life.

It requires putting yourself on the line, disrupting the status quo, and surfacing hidden conflict. And when people resist and push back, there's a strong temptation to play i...

How to be human at work. The HBR Emotional Intelligence Series features smart, essential reading on the human side of professional life from the pages of Harvard Business Review