Today, I got in the mail two copies of the Japanese translation of The 100 Best Business Books of All Time from my good friends at Portfolio.
The Japanese title is “The 100 Best Business Books of The American CEO” (playing off the authors from business book retailer 800-CEO-READ).
Our Japanese publisher Kodansha has done a great job with the book. There was some concern initially about being able to include all 100 books because of translation costs and book length. And it is understandable, the Japanese version comes in at 516 pages versus the American version at 316 pages. I even went as far as developing a shorter list with a new table of contents. It is wonderful to see they decided to include all the selections.
There are some nice details. Kodansha maintained the “Where to Next?” section with the choose your own adventure feature. They assigned a number to each book to help with organization, providing the number in the table of contents and then in the page header. The best part though is the addition of the cover art from the Japanese versions of these books. They kept the American version at the front of the review and added the local versions at the end.
Authors always talk about how cool it is to see their books printed in other languages. I have to agree. It is WAY cool.
In 2003, I was working with my father in his small sheet metal fabrication shop. We were struggling to keep customers and attract new ones. I read Purple Cow from a milk carton and it changed my life and the trajectory of our company.
Lightning does strike twice.
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I keeping changing my mind as I think what Linchpin is about. Seth Godin is certainly writing about work, how it is changing and the opportunities that will create, but it is also about art and change and gifts.
The first part is available in any number of books. The Spring 2010 business book season is full of them. Dan Pink’s Drive, The Heath Brothers’ Switch and 37 Signals’ Rework are all about doing, what gets us to do things, and how we get ourselves to do things different. That is covered in Linchpin as well.
It’s the second part, the ‘what’ we should do, that deserves attention. Here Seth does what he always does: expands the meaning of words. Art is not a painting hanging on the wall in a museum, but rather “a personal gift that changes the recipient.” Art creates change, whether stump speech or chocolate cupcake, stone arch or science fair experiment. Everyone can see themselves as artists.
Artists give gifts, Seth says. On this point, most readers will struggle, but Seth comes back to it multiple times. We think of gifts with wrapping paper and bows, given on special occasions. Seth is not talking about the holiday reciprocity with we have come to expect. He says those expectations cripple art and creates an arms-length quid pro quo. Give without expecting anything in return.
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Linchpin has done the same for me that Purple Cow did. Books are often about timing and hearing what you need to hear at the right point in time. I write this review as I start off on a new path in my life, and Seth told me a bunch of things that I needed to hear or maybe just needed to be reminded of.
(You can also listen my interview with Seth Godin here.)
Today, I finished the main work for the ebook I have coming out in two weeks. Feels really good.
But I sent it out to some good friends for feedback, so we’ll see how I feel after that.
I also picked up Hipstamatic, an iPhone app that allows you to choose lens and films from plastic cameras of years past. I took a picture of the whiteboard I was working from, so you can get a little preview of both the app and the ebook.
Matthew May writes a post yesterday listing his five selections for Books That Defined The Decade. He describes his list as “big idea” books [that] stand out because not only did they help us better understand the world, they gave us a new lens through which to view it.”
Matthew is directionally correct, but let me offer a different list for consideration.
Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell was published in February 2000. This American Life Host Ira Glass has said that we are living in the Golden Age of non-Fiction writing. I don’t think Tipping Point marked the arrival of this Golden Age, but the publication of his first book surely heralded the work and growing popularity of many writers including Michael Lewis, Susan Orlean, Chuck Klosterman, and Michael Pollan.
Good To Great was published in Oct. 2001. Jim Collins certainly had the momentum of Built To Last, but the book could have just as easily gotten lost in the aftermath of 9/11. Collins provides the management algorithm for the 21st century and his research hasn’t been without question, but Good To Great is hands down the business book of the decade.
Thomas Friedman belongs on the list, but I would choose his 2005 book The World Is Flat as the book of note. Lexus and The Olive Tree was certainly important in reporting the developments from the field, but The World Is Flat marked the arrival of a new state; the description for how the planet would operate going forward. The World Is Flat might also be the title of the decade (Never Eat Alone is a close second). Interesting that Freakonomics and Gladwell’s second book Blink also arrive in 2005.
Dan Pink described the trend in Free Agent Nation, but more importantly identified the work we should be doing in A Whole New Mind. Design, Symphony, Story, Empathy, Play and Meaning. When Oprah says “Last spring I read a book I just couldn’t put down,” you have hit on something. Interestingly, A Whole New Mind also came out in 2005.
The final spot I would give to the folks at Gallup. Now, Discover Your Strengths and StrengthFinders 2.0 have created a cultural conversation around the need to pursue and enhance strengths while minimizing the criticism of weaknesses. The robust tools for identifying those strengths have made the meme that much more powerful. Marcus Buckingham deserves credit for driving that message as well during his time at Gallup and in his recent projects..
A couple final points…My list doesn’t exactly overlap with May’s given my emphasis on books that impacted business and his on big ideas.
Freakonomics is a great read and has plenty of stories to talk about at a cocktail party, but little we can take with us into our daily lives.
James Surowiecki certainly identified what Web 2.0 would bring and I loved the book, but still missed creating a greater cultural wake after The Wisdom of Crowds published in (again) 2005. I remember James say at SXSW in 2006 that Malcolm had outsold him 10 to 1. It could be that we like reading about individuals that we can mirror ourselves in versus amorphous collectives and group phenomenon that we have a hard time identifying with.
Do yourself a favor and start by reading Seth Godin’s post titled The Lesson From Two Lemonade Stands, it is going to be a classic that people refer back to.
When I said last month people will start pirating books as more ereaders are purchasing and as publishers push back publications date, this is one example of how easy it is.
Each year I read more business books than most people read in a lifetime. My experience allows me to help readers know what to read, do book scouting for publishers...
Curent Project
Fixed to Flexiblee-book. Four Simple Lessons About Cost, Price, Margin and The Options Available to the 21st Century Business
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