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Paperback
292 pages
ISBN 9780060523800 Published Dec. 2003
HarperBusiness
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Posted Feb. 8, 2009 3:32 p.m. by todd-sattersten
In 100 Best - 800 CEO Read Blog
There are only a few people in the media who know business books as well as Jack and I. Hardy Green, an associate editor at BusinessWeek, is one of those people.
We met with Hardy in New York two weeks ago and he quickly commenced with critiquing our selections for The 100 Best. He has also written a great piece for BusinessWeek.com titled, "What Makes a 'Best' Business Book?" that captures his thoughts on the omissions and gaffes in the book.
The way we see it Green's argument is two-fold.
His first criticism is that we have overlooked too many histories and narratives; the most glaring omissions being Barbarians at the Gate by Burrough and Heylar and Liar's Poker by Michael Lewis. He points out the imbalance between the 21 books in the categories of biographies, narratives, and "big ideas" to the 29 management titles when he combines our strategy, leadership, and management chapters.
His second point is one of recency. He asks, "What about something like The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty by Julia Flynn Siler (Gotham Books, 2007)? What about entries on Silicon Valley or the digital world, such as Planet Google: One Company's Audacious Plan to Organize Everything We Know by Randall Stross (Free Press, 2008)?," His preference for more current titles seems to speak to his perspective as an editor at weekly business magazine.
We love the work Green does for the business book category, but we obviously disagree.
First, he seems to overlook books we've included within other chapters when he tallies the count of narratives versus management manuals. Contained within our entrepreneurship chapter is the wonderful incubation story of The Republic of Tea . Or sitting squarely in the leadership chapter is the GE history Control Your Destiny Or Someone Else Will by Tichy and Sherman. Who Says Elephants Can't Dance? by former IBM CEO Lou Gerstner appears in our strategy chapter. The Tipping Point, Why We Buy, and Orbiting the Giant Hairball also all fulfill Green's hope for books promoting a more thoughtful synthesis of business.
In fact, we could provide Green with even more titles that could have been included if we were to have used his criteria. How about Father, Son, and Company by Thomas Watson Jr.? Or Charles Fishman's The Wal-Mart Effect? Or Typo, the wonderful and woeful tale of David Silverman's adventure trying to revive a typesetting company in rural Iowa. All would have been wonderful additions--and they are in the book. We recommended these and 292 other books as further reading at the end of the reviews and in sidebars sprinkled throughout the book.
In regards to his request for more current titles, Green surely knows publishing well enough to know that this book was finished almost a year ago, months before the current economic mess. If we were to update the book today, we would love to recommend the Michael Lewis edited compilation Panic to our readers. And we may have looked past some accessibility problems to suggest Nassim Nicholas Taleb and either his Fooled by Randomness or The Black Swan.
Many of the narratives Green would like to see more of have a short shelf-life given the speed as which the world moves. Do we still have the same interest in Ebay or Starbucks that we had a few years ago? We solved this problem by producing an online chapter of industry narratives for which the sidebar on page 262 is a jumping-off point. Barbarians at the Gate appears in this additional section along with Where The Suckers Moon, The Box, Oil on The Brain, and Better. We feel the selections show both ingenuity and recency and exist in an online form that is more easily updated.
All this leads to a bigger point: You can't solve all of the problems of business with 100 books. The scope and variety of challenges, both personal and organizational, require a larger inventory of titles. Of course, we needed to make tough decisions about what was included in The 100 Best and we'll be judged--by Hardy Green and others--on our taste and discernment, but the structure and format of the book clearly shows our hope that by reading our book you will be encouraged to read more business books.
Maybe, after reading the review of a book you are familiar with, you will read the additional books we recommend. Or maybe you'll choose your own adventure by following a 'Where To Next?', jump to a book you never expected...and read it. Or maybe you'll become so enraged that we have overlooked one of your favorites that you go back and read it again to ensure its position in your personal 100 Best. In any of these instances, our book will have accomplished its task.
If you are interested in continuing the disucssion, jump over to BusinessWeek and leave your thoughts with the others already there.
Tom's Essential Resources for Writers
Posted Nov. 17, 2006 7:52 a.m. by kate
In Publishing Industry - 800 CEO Read Blog
Tom Ehrenfeld is hosting a writing workshop for business book authors later this month. So we asked him what books he would suggest a business author read.Here's his list:
The Elements of Style by Strunk and White.
I guard my copy of this little masterpiece as closely as Linus does his blanket (or, for that matter, as crazily as Mark David Chapman did with The Catcher in the Rye.) Every single person who cares about the craft of writing should keep this book within arm's reach. Last year Penguin Press published an illustrated version, which contained drawings by Maira Kalman, that were vibrant, evocative, and had nothing whatsoever to add to the core ideas of the book. Stick to the real thing.
Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer by Roy Peter Clark.
This terrific recent book breaks down its lessons into short focused chapters. Clark illustrates his smart strategies with vivid writing samples that engage and instruct. A new classic.
On Writing by Stephen King.
If only all books about writing were written as well as this one. While he indulges in material about the life of the writer, King stresses the most important fact about what writers do: they write.
52 McGs: The Best Obituaries from Legendary New York Times Writer Robert McG. Thomas.
[Editor's note: this book is out of print.]
Obits are typically a short format, yet Thomas writes with such precision and flair that his stories feel as full as a grand epic. Read these pieces as a primer on how concise writing can be animated with style and grace.
Floating Off The Page: The Best Stories from the Wall Street Journal's "Middle Column" edited by Ken Wells.
Like obits, the page one stories in the Journal must conform to formal restrictions. Yet when written by masters, as so many Journal writers seem to be, the pieces never feel formulaic. In fact, formal elements are handled so effortlessly that only upon re-reading these gems does one notice how well the articles open with a great lead, come upon a nut graf, and end with a bang.
Another Life by Michael Korda.
The most low-brow high-brow you'll read. Korda's memoir of a life in publishing is ridiculously addictive (I read it on a beach.) His tales of dealing with everyone from Jacqueline Susann to Ronald Reagan provides a terrific overview of the publishing business as it has evolved in this country.
Publishing Confidential: The Insider's Guide to What It Really Takes to Land a Nonfiction Book Deal by Paul B. Brown. [Editor's note: This is also out of print.]
Brown, a former writer and editor for several business magazines and a veteran business ghostwriter, has produced one of the smartest and funniest resources on the process of publishing. His book takes a chance by having his editor Ellen Kadin insert "snide editorial comments" into Brown's material, and it works beautifully.
Putting Your Passion Into Print by Arielle Eckstut & David Henry Sterry.
This extensive resource balances a punchy sense of humor with a wealth of useful, insider-y information on the process of getting a book published. Eckstut is an agent with one of the leading agencies, and this guide reflects a deep knowledge of what works.
Moneyball by Michael Lewis.
The definitive "takeaway" book for business readers. Ostensibly, this is a baseball book. Lewis writes about how one smart general manager, Billy Beane of the Oakland Athletics, challenged generations of conventional wisdom about how to scout talent by implementing a fundamentally different approach to assessing the promise of young players. By capturing this approach so fully, Lewis sheds deep insights into the broader topic of organizational change, showing what happens when an individual introduces an entirelynew way of judging the potential of individuals. A great read with deep resonance.
Who Says Elephants Can't Dance by Lou Gerstner.
Who says business books can't be fun? Gerstner ran one of the biggest and most successful turnarounds of all time, taking IBM from a tailspin in 1993, to a leading place in the economy at the end of the decade. And just as impressively, Gerstner wrote (sans collaborator) a book about how he accomplished this feat. The writing may not be pretty. But it's good and clean and clear.
A Ghost's Memoir by John McDonald.
If Charlie Kaufman, screenwriter (of films such as Being John Malkovich and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) were ever to adapt a business book, he would choose McDonald's memoir. Remember, this is a book about the making of a book. Not just any book, of course, but one of the most important business works of the past century, Alfred Sloan's My Years with General Motors. McDonald was an editor at Fortune Magazine when the recently-retired Sloan invited him to act as his ghost. Looming anti-trust challengesled the GM board to suppress the book from publication, and it took more than five years after the work was completed before Doubleday published it. McDonald captures the story of producing and eventually publishing this book with a dry intelligence that suits the story perfectly.
The Age of Heretics: Heroes, Outlaws, and the Forerunners of Corporate Change by Art Kleiner. [Editor's note: This is also out of print.]
This masterpiece of business analysis proves that when you let one of the best ghostwriters of the past decade loose on his own material, he can illuminate a compelling business idea with insightful writing. Kleiner reports on how our modern managerial mindset was largely created by groups of "heretics"-revolutionary thinkers who led corporations to enact fundamental change in how they discussed and thought about their people and their purpose.
Our additions:
The Savvy Author's Guide to Book Publicity By Lissa Warren.
One Great Insight Is Worth a Thousand Good Ideas: An Advertising Hall-of-famer Reveals the Most Powerful Secret in Business By Phil Dusenberry. This is the paperback version of Then We Set His Hair on Fire.
Found Essential - Purple Cow
Posted Aug. 11, 2006 3:45 a.m. by jack
In Marketing - 800 CEO Read Blog
Todd has been posting all of his Lost Essentials this week. I thought I would confirm what he said yesterday. We both loved Purple Cow. I realized that I wrote this pre-Todd which means pre-blog. Here is my Jack Covert Selects on Purple Cow.
***
Purple Cow: Transform Your Business by Being Remarkable by Seth Godin, Portfolio. 140 Pages, $19.95 Hardcover, May 2003, ISBN 159184021X
The one and only time I offered a money-back guarantee was with Lou Gerstner's story of the IBM turnaround, Who Said Elephants Can't Dance? However, I just finished a book that is so powerful, it is compelling me to offer the same money-back guarantee again! The book is Seth Godins latest, Purple Cow. It is absolutely laser-focused on a subject that is near and dear to all of us: how to sell/market our products. The title comes from a story Seth tells about when his family was traveling in France and marveling at the pretty cows. After awhile, there were so many cows that they became boring. This brought to Seth this idea: "A purple cow, though. Now that would be interesting. (For a while.) The essence of the Purple Cow is that it must be remarkable." To help you understand what he means by remarkable, he states that the opposite of remarkable is "very good." Not bad or mediocre, but very good. He states that he doesn't think that there is a shortage of remarkable ideas; he thinks that what is missing is the will to execute the ideas. He says:
"My goal in Purple Cow is to make it clear that its safer to be riskyto fortify your desire to do truly remarkable things. Once you see that the old ways have nowhere to go but down, it becomes imperative to create things worth talking about."
The case studies used in the book are perfectly selected. Although I had heard some of the stories before, many were new to me. At the end of each case study/story he has a "takeaway" which is a group of questions that should be used to stimulate discussion or idea generation. The case studies range in length from a couple of paragraphs to a few pages and are written in a breezy, casual style that draws you into the book and makes you want to keep turning the pages. I dont think I have ever used the term "page-turner" to describe a business book, but this book is special and deserves the designation.
MUST READ: Then We Set His Hair On Fire
Posted Sept. 28, 2005 10:10 a.m. by todd-sattersten
In History and Biographies - 800 CEO Read Blog
I only do this once a season.
If you pick up one book this fall, it should be Then We Set His Hair On Fire. I raved about it earlier this month, and still haven't found anything else that caught my attention like this book. It reminds us of Who Says Elephants Can't Dance by Lou Gerstner. Spending a career at BBDO, Phil Dusenberry has spent time with all the big brands. He knows the brand stories behind GE, FedEx, and Pepsi. He talks about the power of finding great insights about your company and its products. On top of it all, it has been written in a wonderful narrative.
Here are the 8cr favorites from the book:
Here are some others who have had something to say about the book:
- USA Today - Grab a refreshing glimpse of how advertising works
- Fortune - He Brought Good Ads to Life
- Wall Street Journal - The View from Madison Avenue
