Books recommended by Global Business Leaders

Of the 16 books recommended in this article, I would like to read at least these few:

Woo, Wow, and Win

Service Design, Strategy, and the Art of Customer Delight

Authors: Thomas A. Stewart and Patricia O’Connell

One Sentence Summary: This book promotes the concept of designing your company around service and offers strategies based on the idea that the design of services is different from manufacturing.

Recommended by: Andy Polansky, CEO of Weber Shandwick


Technology as a Service Playbook

How to Grow a Profitable Subscription Business

Authors: Thomas Lah and J.B. Wood

One Sentence Summary: A guide to decision making and execution around the “as-a-service” model, with the intent of putting a company on a path to profitable growth by changing how “offers” are designed, built, marketed, sold, and serviced.

Recommended by: Stephanie Newby, CEO of Crimson Hexagon


Delivering Happiness

A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose

Author: Tony Hsieh

One Sentence Summary: The CEO of Zappos explains how he created a corporate culture based upon the concept that there is value to happiness, both for employees and customers.

Recommended by: Chris Nassetta, CEO of Hilton Worldwide


Freakonomics

A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything

Authors: Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner

One Sentence Summary: A set of amusing case studies illustrating that economics is the study of how people get what they want or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing.

Recommended by: Jeremiah Owyang, CEO of Crowd Companies

A gratitude journal to combat the worst f**king year

John Oliver called 2016 the worst f**king year. I feel like this outlook is very dramatic and shows the emotional intelligence of those who hold that view. 

In response to this, the author of this article kept a gratitude journal and was able to realise some incredible revelations about his life. 

https://apple.news/ATSjc5ee0Q8i5Ti3PWbmESg

What do you think? Regarding the photo: I’m so very grateful to have had an incredible opportunity to climb into the enchantments near Seattle for my friends’ 40th birthday. 

Simon Sinek on Millenials in the Workplace

I am researching Millenials in the Workplace and how to develop better employees. A friend of mine sent me this video last night and wanted my take.

He breaks down ‘4 pieces or characteristics that lead to happiness’ as:

  1. Parenting
  2. Technology
  3. Impatience
  4. Environment

The main point he tries to get across is that Millenials are entitled and lazy, and it’s not their fault, but the fault of the parents who were following terrible parenting advice.

Five Leadership Hacks

“To me, a hack is a clever or unexpectedly efficient means of getting something done. A good hack should feel like cheating because the value created by the hack feels completely disproportionate from the work done.

With this definition in mind, I present five leadership hacks I regularly use. These are not practices designed to redefine your leadership philosophy. They are hacks.”

  1. Two minutes early for everything.
  2. The clock faces you.
  3. Office Hours.
  4. Three questions before any meeting.
  5. Continually fix small broken things.

In reading this, I really appreciated the five hacks, but number four and five especially stood out to me. Three questions before any meeting or else it doesn’t happen: brilliant. He resolves to have three questions which need to be answered in order to prove the value of that meeting taking place.

The last hack is the easiest and it’s the best: fix small broken things. Always. It takes seconds to clean that whiteboard, to plug in the clock in the conference room, and to stop, lean down, and pick up a piece of trash. Seconds.

The value created isn’t just the small decrease in entropy, it’s that you are actively demonstrating being a leader. I understand the compounding awesomeness of continually fixing small broken things.

Read the whole article here