The 100 Best Business Books of All Time by Jack Covert and
Todd Sattersten gives an overview of books available on the market. These are books that cover
various genre such as how to improve yourself, leadership, strategy, sales and
marketing, rules and scorekeeping, management, biographies, entrepreneurship,
narratives, innovation and creativity and big ideas. Each book listed has
approximately 1-3 pages in order to describe what a person should find if they
made a purchase.
It isn’t a necessary interesting reading but if you are a
big book reader you can quickly browse through various titles available. I find
this to be more of a bathroom or coffee book in the sense that the few pages
needed to describe each work can be quickly read. It is also beneficial to
browse around by jumping back and forth versus reading from cover to cover. Three
books that I find of interest are:
1.)Flow by Mihaly Csikszenthmihalyi discussed the concept of
pursuit of happiness from Aristotle to Thomas Jefferson. Flow is a concept entailing when people are totally focused and completely un-self-conscious.
Research helps determine that these moments occur when a person feels they have
adequate skills to cope with challenges. Such moments are goal directed,
rule-bound action systems that provide adequate self-feedback. It can be
defined as “a state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing
else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do
it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.”
Flow (1991). The
psychology of optimal experience. Harper Perennial.
2.)On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis discusses how
through circumstance, grit, and pure willpower people can become leaders. It is
through the constant search of life and its meaning that such leaders find
unique prescriptions. Such leaders have the capacity to express themselves
through humanistic psychology concepts like those by theorists Abraham Maslow. According to
the book great leaders don’t set out to be leaders but become them based upon
the full expression of themselves.
On Becoming a Leader (2003). The Leadership Classic. Basic Books
3.)Competing for the Future by Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad
discusses how most executives focus on the present but do not focus enough on
the future. When making budget and strategic decisions they constantly seek to
solve problems in the present by looking at short-term gains while damaging
long-term prospects. For example, an executive may try and cut costs and raise
return on investments by laying off employees but fail to find higher levels of
revenue. Such managers are considered “denominator managers” because they are
more reactive to their environments instead of creating environments. The
authors state, “Seeing the future first may be more about having a wide-angle
lens than a crystal ball.”
Hamel, G. & Prahalad, C. (1996) Competing for the Future. Harvard Business School Press.
No matter what your interest and focus you will certainly
find some books to read within the pages. It is a nice guide to some of the best
business books available on the market and certainly I have a plan to buy a few
after I get through the one’s I am reading now. You can keep it in your library
to create your wish list of market offerings.
Covert, J. & Sattersten, T. (2009). The 100 Best
Business Books of All Time. NY: Penguin Group
Pages: 339
Cost: $16
