Over the past month, you have sent to Webb Analytics the names of your favorite business books. Here, just in time for the start of the holiday gift-giving season, are your recommendations, including quotes from some of the people who made the suggestions.
We'll start with the classics and then move to some currently popular books, followed by a couple more obscure choices.
* Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap ... and Others Don't, by James Collins
* The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, by Steven Covey ("Not a straight business book but great psychology that can build better and stronger leaders.")
* Entrepreneurial Leadership: The Art of Launching New Ventures, Inspiring Others, and Running Stuff, by Joel Peterson
* Sales Economics: The Science of Selling, by Rick Davis
* Upstream: The Quest to Solve Problems Before They Happen, by Dan Heath ("As a manager, I spend a lot of time reacting to problems and issues throughout the day. Upstream shows you how create systems to handle issues before they become a problem. One of the reoccurring themes from the book is that 'Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets.' So, if your company keeps having a problem with X, it’s because that’s how your system is designed. Zoom out your focus and address the system that’s giving you poor results.")
* The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of Leadership, by James Hunter ("It all boils down to one simple rule: To treat people the way you would want to be treated. The Golden Rule, be the boss you wish your boss would be, the parent you wish your parent had been more fully for you, the neighbor you wish your neighbor would be. ... We are afforded positions of leadership and it's our duty to ensure we serve those that serve us and the organization.")
* Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action, by Simon Sinek
* 5 Minute Selling: The Proven, Simple System That Can Double Your Sales ... Even When You Don't Have Time, by Alex Goldfayn
* The Discipline of Market Leaders: Choose Your Customers, Narrow Your Focus, Dominate Your Market, by Michael Treacy and Fred Wiersema
* Raving Fans: A Revolutionary Approach to Customer Service, by Ken Blanchard and Sheldon Bowles
* Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity, by David Allen
* Birth of the Chaordic Age, by Dee Hock (Hock is the founder of Visa. "I read it in 1999 and I am rereading it, I believe the need to understand his principles are stronger today than when it was written.")
And then there's this:
* Asian Figures, by W.S. Merwin ("I’ve absorbed many best-practices for person-to-person interaction from ... Asian Figures. It’s long out of print now; I’ve thought about bringing it back into print as a business advice book, an Art of War type book for those literary types in the LBM sector. Each page of the book is a koan, or a haiku-like piece of ancient advice, hundreds/thousands of years old, from Asian sources.")