Postcards from the Digital Age
My Summer Re-Reading List
This is the time of year when the book review
sections of newspapers and magazines fill up with lists of what
you should read during the summer when you supposedly have less
to do. Their lists are always lists of new and interesting books.
Mine isn't.
I offer
you my "re-reading list." To make this list a book needs to
be good enough to read again and again. I've been reading a
couple of these for more than thirty years.
This
is also business reading list, so the book has to have content
that helped me in my business life. And, because I'm sharing
this list with you, every book on it must be available from
Amazon.
Those
are the criteria. Here's the list.
I read
Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography for the first time when I
was 20 and in the Marines. It's the book on this list I've been
re-reading the longest. My favorite part is "The Arduous Project
of Arriving at Moral Perfection." That got me started tracking
my performance every day, a practice I still follow.
There's
another organizing book on this list and it happens to be the
one I've most recently read for the first time. It's Getting
Things Done by David Allen. It outlines a simple, workable,
and effective system for staying on top of what you have to
do without driving yourself crazy.
Over
the years I've read several books about what makes a great company.
The ones I go back to over and over Built to Last, by Jerry
Porras and Jim Collins and Good to Great, by Collins alone.
The first one tells you what great companies look like. The
second tells you how to transform your company into a great
one.
You
can't succeed in business if you don't communicate. I've read
several "personality type" books over the years, but the one
I keep going back to was written by a friend of mine, Tony Alessandra.
The Platinum Rule will help you communicate with folks in a
way that they like and that's like to work.
Of
course, if you're in business, part of the reason you communicate
is to persuade people. The single best book on how to do that
is Influence: Science and Practice by Robert Cialdini. Actually
it's not a single book, since Cialdini has writer several versions
of the same book under different titles, but that's the one
I re-read.
We
also communicate in a social network and a book that gave me
immense insight into how those networks function is The Tipping
Point by Malcolm Gladwell. There are other good books on this
topic, but Gladwell's is short and very well-written.
There's
much talk of strategy in business but the only real study of
business strategy that I've found helpful is The PIMS Principles
by Buzzell and Gale. PIMS stands for "Profit Impacts of Marketing
Strategies." The book is about what strategies make a real difference
based on years of research with many business units. Hint: the
best one is perceived value in the target market.
Other
than that book, I find most books on business strategy long
on jargon and analysis and short on useful information. That's
why, like most businesspeople, I read military strategy books
for insight. My choices are different than most, though.
I like
B. H. Liddell Hart's Strategy for because it reviews hundreds
of actual military campaigns to identify the elements of a winning
strategy. I'll pass on The Art of War, even though I know lots
of folks swear by it. Instead, I prefer Warfighting: The Strategic
Doctrine of the US Marines. It's short, but written in a straightforward
western style that I find more helpful than Sun Tzu's elliptical,
oriental style.
I began
with the book I've been re-reading the longest. The book I think
is the very best on this list is one I've been re-reading almost
as long. I still have my original hardcover version that dates
from the late sixties.
My
vote for the Best Business Book to Re-Read goes to Peter Drucker's
The Effective Executive. Even after re-reading all or part of
it hundreds of time over thirty years and practically memorizing
parts of it, I can still find something helpful every time I
dip into this marvelous, short, wisdom-drenched work.
That's
my list, boys and girls. Got any suggestions for me from your
own re-reading list? Have a great summer re-reading the books
that make a difference.
Top of page
Here's where you can go to find out more about
the books on my re-reading list.
8 June
2004
Reprinting
and Reposting This Column
You
may reprint or repost this article providing that the
following conditions are met:
- The article
remains essentially unaltered.
- Wally Bock
is shown as the author.
- The notice
Copyright 2004 by Wally Bock or similar appears on the article.
- Contact information
for Wally is included with the article. You may refer readers
to this Web site as a way to meet this requirement. Please
link to http://www.bockinfo.com/
- Here is the
wording we suggest when linking to this site. "The article
you've just read can be found on Wally Bock's extensive
Resource Web site along with many other articles and resources."
Any
other reprinting or reposting requires specific permission which
is almost always granted. Click
here to request permission if necessary.
Top of page
