Books
On this site, you will find my reviews about some of the more interesting, inspiring or useful books, that I read. Broaden your mind.
Cultures and Organizations
Summary: This is the bible of cultural competence. It is the only book, I read twice in my life, and I enjoyed it so much. Cultural behaviour of almost all people in the world will be examined scientifically in this book, from USA, Britain, Germany to Peru, China and Indonesia, from African, Arabic to Asian and Northern European, from Western to Eastern cultures, the circles can be drawn in different radiuses.
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Narrative: When you learn about others, you learn about yourself. The authors explain cultural differences by using five main dimensions, which are 1. power distance, 2. collectivism vs. Individualism, 3. femininity vs. Masculinity, 4. uncertainty avoidance and 5. long term vs. Short term orientation. Additionally, there are the dimensions of exclusionism vs. Universalism, indulgence vs. Restraint and monumentalism vs. Flexhumility. The book closes with a brief excursion into human anthropolgy. Eye opening and mind blowing.
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Why I recommend: In todays world, chances are high for anyone working in any sort of organisation, to have frequent touch points with someone from a different cultural background. This book will give you so many different perspectives, angles and explanations, to understand the other. Its a must read for everyone. It will take some time to read it, as its 400 pages with not to big font and you wiIl have to concentrate here and there to capture the flow, but I like very much, that this book is based on scientific research and the authors also explain to which extend the validity of the emperically derived data has limits.
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I have read it the first time after I have worked and lived 1 year abroad. I've read it a second time, after I had lived and worked 10 years abroad on 4 different continents. And reading through it was so enjoyable then, as it complemented my own experiences so well and yet, it offered so many more insights and learnings, its unbelievable.
Scaling Up
Summary: The book contains a plethora of concepts and practical guides for growing leaders and growing companies. In general it is a guide to how to be more efficient and more effective.
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Narrative: In its core, the book is structured in four main categories; people, strategy, execution and cash It explains, that operational activities for top management, should be reduced by 80% and instead the senior team rather focuses on market facing activities.
Each section provides a lot of concepts and practical guides in how things should be done. The book talks about, Team Building, Meeting Rhythm, communication rhythm, hiring and coaching people, as well as how to align all employees to company's values and goals in order to drive execution and results.
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Why I recommend: It's a good overview about the important areas of growing a company; people, cash, strategy and execution. It may require some professional experience before you understand all concepts in this book well. I recommend buying it as a hard cover, as there are many tables and illustrations inside, that may not be visualised on Kindle or Audible versions.
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Also for more infos you can check: https://scalingup.com/
Hacking Growth
Summary: This is book explains in detail concepts of growth hacking that will affect customer acquisition, retention and revenue growth and is suited best, in my opinion, for everyone who works in a digital company as the level of data accumulation and measurability of customer facing actions are higher than in traditional companies.
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Narrative: The core problem is, that marketers “are always asking for money but can rarely explain how much incremental business this money will generate.” The book explains, how the creation of cross-functional teams combines the talents, that break down the traditional department silos along with the use of qualitative research and quantitative data analysis to gain deep insights into user behaviour and preferences; as well as the rapid generation and testing of ideas leads to revenue growth.
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Why I recommend: Many examples of growth hacking methods are provided in this book, that makes it easy to read and understand. You will read about how the author and other famous silicon valley startups experimented with many iterations of marketing copy, page designs, tested links and features in order to adapt nimbly to the ever-changing needs and desires of customer and thereby engage, activate and win customer over so they keep coming back for more. The book builds upon the Lean Start Up methodologies of validated learning.
The First 90 Days
Summary: The book provides a good overview about the various aspects one has to consider, when joining a new organisation successfully. You will have to learn everything from an organisations norms, values, behavioural expectations, power distribution, existing alliances, what information you can get from which type of people, what are decision making processes and how to deal with you new team.
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Narrative: Inform yourself well before you go to an interview and join the company. Then, stay close to your immediate superiors and identify what is expected from you, set priorities and think about early wins to impress and add value quickly. Then build supporting alliances and understand the decision making process and other general tactics.
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Why I recommend: Perfect guidance not only for anyone who is joining a new company / organisation, but it is also a good read for anybody already working in an organisation for long time. There is special added value for anyone in a leading position. Every onboarding process is a critical moment for both the person who joins, but also for the organisation. I have seen many examples, where talent and all the efforts that went into the hiring process has been wasted, because the first three months onboarding were not done properly, especially from company side, which was hiring side. It's an advantage for both the employee but also the manager, who hires, to know the traps, that exist for the one who joins.
Non Zero
Summary: The book explains human history and the evolution of civilization in a philosophical way through the lens of using game theory.
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Narrative: The interaction of two groups (can be business, politicians, countries) are defined by mechanisms of increasing complexity with a greater reward for cooperations, so called "non-zero-sum benefits" (win-win-outcomes), where both participants benefit. Accordingly, while technology advances, the complexity of how governments, organisations, institutions etc, interact with each other, mankind willingly or unwillingly draws bigger circles of cooperation, which ultimately makes war with each other unlikely.
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Why I recommend: Game theory lays one foundation for explaining the dynamics of decision making processes between groups of humans that interact with each other. I would not exaggerate by saying, that especially in international politics or business interactions, the consideration of zero-sum games and non-zero-sum games are always on top of mind of the participants. No wonder, that former US president Bill Clinton recommended for everyone reading this book.
The Learn Startup
Summary: The concept of Lean is centered on value adding activities and reducing everything else. The Lean Startup Methodology is an iterative process, originating from agile software development and focuses on creating a minimum viable product and receiving customer feedback along the way for further gradual improvements.
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Narrative: The books comes down to two things, how to work with Minimum Viable products (MVP) and "validated learning". Whereas, the MVP approach is very central to software development, it can also be applied to other areas, however the second aspect of "validated learning" is the more important one in my opinion, as it is more universal in applying to so many other areas. Its a general approach to how to derive to effective decisions.
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Why I recommend: Well, the application of validated learning is a standard practise in software development. But it may still be a ground breaking concept for everyone in more traditional non-software development areas, where opinion based decision making may be more pertinent. Understanding and applying validated learning, this alone, makes it worth absorbing the book. It may be even given a status of a standard literature, especially for anyone in software development. The drawdown is, that reading the book may feel a bit lengthy and repetitive as the author talks in great length about his stages in the start up industry various
Building a Story Brand
Summary: Customer don't want to hear the company’s story, they want to hear something that resonates with their own story, something they can identify with. Pretty websites don't sell things. Words sell things. If we haven't clarified our messages, our customers wont listen.
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Narrative: The backbone of this book is "how to tell a story!". What are the elements of all stories and how to apply this to Marketing copy. Marketing messages should be simple, relevant and repeatable explaining why our customer need our products in their lives. The book is not too long and has a simply structure, that goes one by one, through the 7 elements of a story.
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Why I recommend: It is said, that sometimes an image can say more than thousand words. But in advertising words sell things. Words stick in the minds of the people. And its in the minds of the people where brands are formed. The memory of the human brain memorises situations better when emotionally touched. So how to emotionally touch the consumer, so that a brand message is better memorised? By thinking about what a customer want to hear and how to emotionally touch, you actually clarify for yourself who do you want to target and what your main message will be.
Hooked - how to build habit forming products
Summary: I enjoyed reading this book a lot, as it provides practical guidance combined with explaining the human psychology behind it. As this book almost only deals with creating digital products, it may also only be in interest of readers working in the digital industry. It is especially interesting for leaders, business owners, marketers and product designers to read it.
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Narrative: Habit forming products are created by looping the user into cycles of triggering action, giving rewards and making the user invest into the product. The clue is to link giving rewards with asking the user to perform certain actions, which ultimately leads into the user investing time and consideration into the product and thereby making the user experience of the product better and better over time, which in turn makes the user come back.
The book cites and explains the various types of triggers, rewards and motivators that drive our desire to act, as well as mentions the importance of finite and infinite variability for the performance of a product.
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Why I recommend: As a leader, its important to identify the right directions. If you are going into the wrong direction, running faster does not bring you closer to your goals. To put it simply, the methods explained in this book, tend to provide guidance in how to grow your product without overspending your marketing. Hooked plays on a similar playground like Growth hacking and the lean startup, but all three books complement each other in my opinion.
Confession of a pricing man, how pricing effects everything
Summary: This book is a great overview and introduction on everything around pricing. You will get a lot of concepts and variables that affect setting prices for products.
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Narrative: Pricing has a direct impact on the profitability of a company. Setting prices successfully, can lead to a quick profit-loss bottom line improvements. Setting prices wrong may put your company at risk.
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Why I recommend: Although I would not count this book among the truly great literature, but prices and understanding pricing are far too important factors in every business, that cannot be ignored. Therefore, I had to list a book about pricing among my recommendations. And, the book delivers with countless real life examples of pricing experiments and provides various concepts around pricing, i.e. value to customer, demand curve, price positioning, price as in indicator of quality, price anchors and "Magic of the Middle, premium pricing, luxury pricing, and many more.
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Furthermore, the book is written by one of the worlds leading pricing experts, who has done not only scientific research but also applied his research to many of the worlds top companies through his own corporate consultancy.
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You wont go out of this book with a clear roadmap in how to set the prices for your business, but you will have a better understanding on the topic and new perspectives how to approach pricing and what variables to consider.
The intelligent investor
Summary: Value investing is an investment strategy that targets undervalued stocks of companies that have the capabilities as businesses to perform well in the long run.
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Narrative: The book give quite hands on concepts, methods and calculations, how to structure a portfolio and what to look at when investing in stocks, based on fundamental data available, such as General Long-Term Prospects, Financial Strength, Capital Structure, Earnings stability, Dividend Record, P/E ratio, price to book ratio and the management of a company. Ideally you identify stocks, that have a Margin of Safety at the moment of investment.
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Why I recommend: I would say, its "The Book", that every professional in the investment industry has read. Its the foundation for value investing and its one of the earliest books with a structured analysis on investing and stock markets (published 1949). Read this book and you get an idea of the depth of fundamental analysis, of how to be conservative in your investment choices as the first rule of investments is "never loose money!". You may respectfully remember, when you do you your next trade. I read the fourth edition, which was published in 2003 and contains commentaries, where Benjamin Grahams work has been applied to what happened in recent years on the stock market and those commentaries makes the reader easier to related to each topic.
Luxury Essentials
Summary: The book gives a short and quick overview into the world of luxury consumers, how to entice them, what to strategies and tactics can be applied and in general lots of concepts and perspectives are mentioned and explained by examples.
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Narrative: The author introduces the concept of Added-Luxury-Value, which is composed of enhanced self-esteem, self-perception, attractiveness, social power and expertise and which can become the major value component of a luxury product’s total value for a consumer. In order to achieve Added-Luxury-Value, a variety of concepts can be applied such as "legend building", like building a brand legend around craftsmanship and heritage, keeping the "Cycle of Desire" alive, integrating into corporate culture a "Surprise Management" and "Dream Maintenance" for the consumer.
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Why I recommend: If you are a marketer or brand owner targeting a luxury consumer segment, then you should know that this is a different game than marketing in the mass and mastige consumer segments.
The Art of War
Summary: "The Art of War" is a timeless Chinese military literature by Sun Tzu, and is primarily a collection of strategic principles and guidelines around the concept of effective warfare. He emphasises the importance of thorough planning, understanding one's enemies and oneself, and adapting tactics to different situations. Sun Tzu's teachings extend beyond the realm of war, offering wisdom applicable to various areas of life. The book's concise and powerful aphorisms have made it a valuable resource for military strategists, business leaders, and individuals seeking guidance in navigating challenges and achieving success.
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Narrative: “The Art of War" evolves around the importance of intelligence, leadership, tactics, and adaptability and the need for careful planning, understanding the enemy's weaknesses, exploiting opportunities, and ultimately securing victory through superior strategy.
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Why I recommend: This book is of those classics with timeless wisdom. Although primarily focused on warfare, the principles discussed in the book can be applied to business, negotiations, personal development, and decision-making.