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THE BEST BOOKS OF 2014
WHAT IS ?
A library of over 250 books
A blog
A series of printed books
iphone and ipad apps
One-page summaries
One-sentence summaries
Training programmes
Keynote speeches
A fertile source of new ideas
LEADERSHIP
PHIL ROSENZWEIG
Left Brain Right Stuff
To make the best decisions,
leaders need a blend of clear
detached thinking (left brain)
and courage to take action
(right stuff).
PHIL ROSENZWEIG
Left Brain Right Stuff
To make winning decisions, leaders require two skills:
1. Left brain: a talent for clear analysis (logic)
2. Right stuff: the willingness to take bold action (bravery)
• Success calls for calculation and courage, action as
well as analysis. The best questions are:
• Are we making a decision about something we
cannot control, or are we able to influence
outcomes? If you can’t, don’t bother. Equally, many
managers underestimate the effect they can have.
• Are we seeking an absolute level of performance, or is
performance relative? Are we trying to do well, or to
do better than our rivals. Constantly looking at the
competition can be irrelevant, but needing to exert
control and outperform rivals is the hardest thing.
• Are we making a decision that lends itself to rapid
feedback, so we can make adjustments and improve
a next effort? If not, think harder to reduce error.
LEADERS EAT LAST
Simon Sinek
Effective leaders manage the
people, not the numbers –
making them feel safe and
keen to follow.
LEADERS EAT LAST
Simon Sinek
• Proper leaders run headfirst into the unknown & put
their interests aside for the greater good. They would
sooner sacrifice what is theirs to save what is ours.
• This makes followers feel safe (a primal need), which is
why they work tirelessly to see their leaders’ visions
come to life. In a circle of safety, we feel we belong.
• The title refers to the tradition in the US Marines in
which, at mealtimes, the junior people are served first.
The true price of leadership is the willingness to place
the needs of others above your own.
• Our needs are based on the chemicals we crave:
Endorphins – mask physical pain in ‘the runner’s high’,
Dopamine – creates a good feeling and is a perpetual
incentive for progress
Serotonin – the leadership chemical - pride from respect
Oxytocin – friendship, love and deep trust – the
cornerstone of teamwork
CONSIGLIERI
Richard Hytner
Being a successful no.2 can
be just as rewarding as being
No.1.
CONSIGLIERI
Richard Hytner
• This book is all about leading from the shadows, and it
celebrates the role of the right-hand man, or consigliere
(the name given to the closest adviser to mafia heads).
• Not everybody can be number one and, perhaps more
importantly, not everyone wants to be.
• Although it is easy to disparage the role of those who are
‘No.2’, these people often determine the fate of
companies and countries.
• As (top leaders) and Cs (consiglieri) share similar qualities
founded on trust, credibility, confidence and emotional
intelligence.
This is expressed as an equation: LQ = TQ(C+C) x EQ, where:
LQ = Leadership Quotient
TQ = a multiple of your credibility times your confidence
EQ = Emotional Quotient
Those with leadership aspirations should try both roles if
possible before settling into one or the other.
BREVITY
BRIEF
Joseph McCormack
You can make a bigger
impact by saying less – map it,
tell it, talk it, and show it.
BRIEF
Joseph McCormack
• You can make a bigger impact by saying less.
• Most communications are unfocused and unclear.
• Most people are inundated and highly inattentive.
• Being brief isn’t a nicety, it’s a necessity.
• People who struggle with brevity suffer variously from
cowardice, (over) confidence, callousness, comfort,
confusion, complication, and carelessness.
• Audiences that are mind-filled rather than mindful suffer
from inundation, inattention, interruption & impatience.
• To communicate effectively and efficiently:
1. Map it – map out the argument, then condense and
trim volumes of information from it.
2. Tell it – use narrative storytelling to explain the message
in a clear, concise and compelling way.
3. Talk it – the TALC system helps controlled, productive
conversations: Talk, Actively Listen, Converse.
4. Show it – use visuals to attract attention and capture the
imagination.
TALK LEAN
Alan Palmer
Talking lean means combining
directness with politeness to
develop quicker results and
better relations.
TALK LEAN
Alan Palmer
• You can benefit from shorter meetings, quicker results
and better relations by following a method
• How would you like to be spoken to? People want:
• Content: clear, direct, straight to the point, simple,
precise, concise, concrete
• Manner: polite, calm, respectful, courteous, warm,
with humour if possible.
• Most meetings and conversations are opened without
reference to real intentions. Changing this makes
everything work better. Start at the end & work back.
• Three elements interlock to make this work:
1. My meeting objective.
2. What I did to prepare the meeting.
3. My state of mind.
• Three things affect levels of understanding:
• Unsaid: things that are thought or but not mentioned.
• Said: uttered, but counterproductively.
• Ineffective listening: rigorous listening to yourself.
INNOVATION
THE INNOVATION BOOK
Max McKeown
It is possible to become a
competent innovator by being
aware of powerful techniques
and approaches that have
succeeded elsewhere.
THE INNOVATION BOOK
Max McKeown
• This is a workbook that explains how to manage ideas
and execution for outstanding results. It provides a
comprehensive overview of the innovation genre.
• An innovator’s approach involves collecting ideas,
transforming them into something else, exploring them in
detail, and nurturing them through to execution.
• You need a healthy dissatisfaction to achieve this – an
unwillingness to accept traditional limitations, a restless
desire for novel experiences, and a frustration with things
as they currently are.
• It takes a fair amount of pain to make progress.
Unnecessary pain: avoidable mistakes/uncaring
application.
Industry pain involves existing structures that hold things up.
People pain is where individuals struggle to make progress.
Necessary pain is the total effort to develop and make room
for the new (and better) idea.
• Quitting can be winning. Knowing when to give up and
try something else can save a lot of wasted effort.
THE FIRST MILE
Scott Anthony
The first mile of any innovation
is fraught, but it can be
successfully navigated by
following a diligent process.
THE FIRST MILE
Scott Anthony
• The first mile is where an idea moves from an idea on
paper to existing in a market. This stage is the one most
commonly afflicted with failure. It’s where danger lurks.
• Less than 1% of ideas launched by big companies end
up working.
• The ideas aren’t the problem – it’s the process. The
author proposes one called DEFT:
Document: write down the answer to these questions: is
there a need, can we deliver, do the numbers work, and
does it matter?
Evaluate: multiple perspectives, & what the unknowns are.
Focus: work out the deal killers and path dependencies
(uncertainties that affect subsequent strategic choices).
Test: learn and adjust, use small teams, design tests
carefully, savour surprises.
Fill out the 4P model: population, purchase frequency,
price per transaction, penetration. This piece of maths
gives a feel for likely success.
COLLABORATION
A BIGGER PRIZE
Margaret Heffernan
Persistent competition is
frequently divisive, so we are
more likely to achieve better
outcomes by collaborating.
A BIGGER PRIZE
Margaret Heffernan
• We do much better when we work together.
• Competition for fame, money, attention, status, and
more doesn’t work very well. It regularly produces
what we don’t want.
• Many individuals and organisations are finding
creative, cooperative ways to work together. Some
call that soft, but it’s arguably harder
• Examples of unproductive competition include:
Sibling rivalry – children are 93% more naughty when a
sibling is born
Education – by making pupils chase grades rather than
learning experience - product is prized over process
Status – our sensitivity to power and rank is immediate,
unconscious and persistent
Sport – relentless competition stops you being who you
are, and winning at all costs comes at a price
Business – anything successful is now cloned, reducing
originality
BEHAVIOURAL ECONOMICS
THINK LIKE A FREAK
Levitt & Dubner
Understand and decipher
incentives and measure results
accurately, and you are much
more likely to solve problems.
THINK LIKE A FREAK
Levitt & Dubner
Thinking like a freak involves three relatively simple ideas:
1. Incentives are the cornerstone of modern life.
Understanding or deciphering them is the key to
understanding a problem and how it might be solved.
2. Knowing what to measure and how to measure it can make
a complicated world less so.
3. Conventional wisdom is often wrong. As a result, you should:
Think like a child: saying “I don’t know” is very powerful and
liberating. There’s no need to be embarrassed by how much
you don’t know – often it leads to a better way.
Think like a rock star: David Lee Roth’s famous backstage rider
banning all brown M&Ms disguised something far more
inspired. Van Halen’s show required major resources and
detailed planning from the venues they played – if the
promoters hadn’t read the detail on page 40 of the contract,
then everything else needed checking too.
CREATIVITY
HEGARTY ON CREATIVITY
John Hegarty
To be an effective creative
person you need constantly to
absorb varied stimuli,
reinterpret what you see,
identify a simple emotional
truth, and re-present it in a
fresh way.
HEGARTY ON CREATIVITY
John Hegarty• The blank page is the greatest challenge facing the creative
person. Start small, with anything
• An idea is ‘a thought or plan formed by mental effort’.
• Originality is dependent upon the obscurity of your sources.
There’s no such thing as pure originality.
• We are all artists, but some of us shouldn’t exhibit. Modern
technology allows us all to publish - it doesn’t mean we should.
• Complexity destroys profitability. The power of reduction
means taking a complex thought and reducing it down to a
simple, powerful message.
• What the heart knows today, the head will understand
tomorrow. When it comes to creativity, instinctive feeling wins.
• Ideas are often at their best when inspired by anger, or an
unexpected juxtaposition, (zig when they zag)
• Creative people are transmitters – absorbing diverse, random
messages, and reinterpreting and them in new and fresh ways.
• Creativity isn’t an occupation – it’s a preoccupation.
• Remove your headphones - inspiration is all around us.
THE SPARK
Greg Orme
You can foster a more
creative organization by
adopting ten helpful habits.
THE SPARK
Greg Orme
• The 10 habits of successful creative leadership:
1. Start an electric conversation – passionate people provide the rocket fuel
2. Break the management rules – too many of them stifle innovation
3. Lead with creative choices – hear the weak signals and develop them
4. Become a talent impresario – fill your company with creative talent
5. Know why you do what you do – you need an inspiring sense of purpose
6. Connect through shared values – this philosophy binds everyone together
7. Build a business playground – a lively atmosphere at work yields more ideas
8. Balance focus with freedom – learn to deal with creative tensions
9. Demolish idea barriers – outward-facing collaborative cultures work best
10.Encourage collisions – create space where people bump into each other unexpectedly
ECONOMICS
MONEY BLOOD & REVOLUTION
George Cooper
Economic growth is generated
by a circulatory flow of wealth
through society – upward from
the private sector and
downward by the state.
MONEY BLOOD & REVOLUTION
George Cooper
• Economics is a broken science, believing in multiple,
inconsistent things at the same time - a subject in crisis.
• Meanwhile mathematical models are becoming more
complex but their predictive ability is not improving.
• There are 5 stages in a scientific crisis:
1. Discrepancies show – the prevailing paradigm begins
to fail the empirical test.
2. Disagreements start – experts look for small ad-hoc fixes
to their theories.
3. Revolution – a new paradigm emerges that resolves
many of the problems of the field.
4. Rejection – backlash starts & the old guard say it’s
rubbish.
5. Acceptance – younger, open-minded students adopt
the new paradigm and become leaders in explaining it.
• The economy is like a circulatory system (like blood
flow). It helps to reconcile the role of the state
(downward flow) and the private sector (upward).
PERSONAL APPROACH
FREE!
Chris Barez-Brown
Life and work are intrinsically
linked, so if you want to live an
extraordinary life, your work
needs to resonate with a
strong sense of purpose.
FREE!
Chris Barez-Brown
• The message of this book is Love your work, love your life.
• Life and work are intrinsically linked, so if we want to live
an extraordinary life, our work needs to be extraordinary.
• And that means it needs to resonate with a strong sense
of purpose.
• Work is your slave, not the other way round. No one
makes you work - the choice is yours.
• Reflection time is crucial to build in to each working day.
• There’s no such thing as bad people, just bad actions.
• Be nice to people and it will be nicer for you.
• You have to love yourself before you can love others.
• Our self-worth should never be dictated to by other
people’s opinions.
• With a blank sheet how would you design your job?
• We have on average 27,350 days on the planet, and
10,575 will be spent at work.
• Vergaderziekte is Dutch for ‘meeting sickness’. Try to
have fewer of them.
BUSINESS GENIUS
James Bannerman
Sharpen your skills and have an
immediate effect on your business
by making a series of small changes
to your approach in a range of situations.
BUSINESS GENIUS
James Bannerman
• Sharpen your thinking three main areas:
1. Yourself: boost your focus, confidence, resilience and
time management
2. Your business: drive, grow and hone your competitive
advantage, innovation and collaboration
3. Your impact: develop your influence, creativity,
negotiation and leadership skills
• If you want someone to agree with you, work out what
type of person they are and make the right case:
• Results (orientated): don’t bore them with details. Make
snappy points.
• Emotions: show genuine interest in feelings. Give help &
support.
• Abracadabra: give it some magic. Make it interesting
and sparky.
• Data: make research, facts, & figures perfectly precise.
HOW TO USE
• Be inquisitive
• Make the time
• Understand the lines of argument
• Take a view
• Inform your work
• Enjoy the debate
• Ask Kevin to speak or train
KEVIN DUNCAN
More detail at:
www.greatesthitsblog.com
Ask Kevin to speak or train:
07979 808770
Twitter: @kevinduncan
