Message Not Received: Why Business Communication Is Broken and How to Fix It is now shipping. Huzzah!

I received my first copy on Friday. (Golf clap.) Now the hard work begins: marketing. I never know how one of my books will do. Very few authors do.

At least I’m bringing a bit more perspective these days. This isn’t my first rodeo. I know enough about books and publishing not to make predictions. As the physicist Niels Bohr once said, “Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.” It’s one of my favorite quotes. With any book you’re throwing the dice; with this one, I feel that they are loaded.

For a bunch of reasons, my previous three books have done better than my first three. The Age of the Platform remains my most popular book, and I’m glad that I followed my instinct on that one. Like music and movies, book sales adhere to a long tail. It’s pretty presumptuous of me to think that I’ll move 15,000 copies or more. Very few business books do. In short, the odds aren’t exactly in my favor.

Still, based on the feedback I’ve received and conversations I’ve had about the book, I’m guardedly optimistic. (Evidently, the secret to happiness is low expectations.) I’m getting the sense that the subject matter immediately resonates with people. We all know people who communicate poorly at work. They use far too much jargon and seem hellbent on setting records for e-mails sent in a day.