Evans does 'happy hustle' for Icon

Icon books will publish a book about “fulfilment beyond the 9 to 5”, How to Have a Happy Hustle, from productivity expert Bec Evans next May.

The book is the first from innovation expert Evans, who co-founded the start-up, Prolifiko, a digital coach that helps writers to be productive. According to Icon, How to Have a Happy Hustle is designed for anyone who is looking for fulfilment beyond the 9 - 5 career-track - either in a side-hustle alongside a main job or in a startup - focusing on practical skills and mindset. Using examples from successful innovators, Evans will explain how to use feedback to improve ideas, understand the psychology of being productive, find the best problems to solve and gain motivation to follow through on ideas, even in the face of set-backs and failures.

Kiera Jamison, commissioning editor at Icon, bought world rights excluding USA and Canada to How To Have a Happy Hustle: The Complete Guide to Making Your Ideas Happen from Michael Alcock at Alcock and Johnson for an undisclosed sum. Icon will publish in May 2019.

Evans was formerly head of innovation at Emerald Publishing, is a judge for The Bookseller's FutureBook Awards 2018 (for which the conference of which takes place next Friday) and focuses in her work on innovation, startups and productivity. She was selected as one of Business Cloud’s Top Female Founders of Tech in 2017 and mentors students on entrepreneurship at Leeds University Business School.

She said: “Ideas are the easy bit; what people struggle with is making them happen. Working with people taught me that everyone has the ability to be creative – they just need to skills to make it happen. This book helps people get off the starting blocks by sharing the ‘secrets’ of innovation.  Whatever your background or experience, whether you’ve got a great idea you don’t know how to develop, or a problem you’d like to solve, these tried-and-tested techniques will help you to innovate and thrive.”

Jamison said: “Bec’s approach really resonated with us, as we’re sure it will with readers looking to develop their ideas. We often tend to think of start-ups as created by these exceptional innovators who have a Eureka-moment and then wild success, but the reality entails a lot of graft to find, develop and launch the right idea. In the book, Bec guides us through every step: from coming up with and testing ideas to launching and growing them, and – most importantly – enjoying the process.”