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Thursday, November 10, 2005
Ng: Top 12 business books
By Wilson Ng
Wired Desktop
Here are the 12 business bestseller books I have read in the last 10 years. They emphasize the importance of staying on your feet, proper utilization of information in planning and implementation of plans that are designed to preserve the company’s competitiveness in the ever-changing business environment.
I placed asterisks to show how I rate each publication, with five having the highest rating.
**** 1. Gerstner, Louis (2002), Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance, New York: Harper Business — Gerstner, IBM’s chief executive officer from 1992 to 2002 shares insights on how he was able to get things moving and thereby saved IBM.
**** 2. Bossidy, Larry with Ram Charam (2002), Execution - The Discipline of Getting Things Done, New York: Crown Business — Bossidy was chairman of Honeywell. He and Ram share insights on how to get a job done, and define the true meaning of leadership in terms of ability to execute.
***** 3. Welch, Jack (2001), Straight from the Gut, New York: Warner Books — Welch, voted most influential CEO of the 20th century, shares his experiences of over 20 years in leading GE to become the world’s most valuable company. Excellent in providing vision and stresses value of teamwork, training and raises the need to reward performance.
***** 4. Goldratt, Eliyahu (1992), The Goal, A Process of Ongoing Improvement, 2nd edition, MA: North River Press — Dr. Goldratt’s book introduced the Theory of Constraints and changed the way I looked at productivity. A must-read on improving every day operation processes.
*** 5. Allen, David (2001), Getting Things Done, New York: Penguin Books — Author shares tips on how to reassess goals and stay focused in changing situations to be able to implement breakthrough methods for stress-free performance.
**** 6. Treacy, Michael and Wiersema, Fred (1995), The Discipline of Market Leaders, MA: Addison Wesley — Provides an excellent guide on how to bring value to the products and services of the company to the market, and how proper focus (instead of trying to do everything) on the right goals and great execution will enable a company to get better returns.
7. Grove, Andrew (1996), Only the Paranoid Survive, New York: Doubleday — Stresses that proper recognition and response to threat is essential to survival in the modern day business.
**** 8. Gates, William (1999), Business and the Speed of Thought, NY: Warner Books — Contains many of the best tips on how to respond to change and how to use knowledge management and the right information systems in managing a corporation from the founder of Microsoft. A must for people in management and technology jobs.
**** 9. Johnson, Spencer (1999), Who Moved My Cheese — A simple parable about the management and acceptance of change, which became a runaway bestseller. We easily forget about the principles we have learned, and this is a book that is easy to read and reread every now and then to remind us.
**** 10. Walton, Sam (1992), Sam Walton, Made in America, NY: Doubleday — An autobiography on how Sam Walton built the world’s biggest company and successful retailer. Contains many homespun wisdom and practical tips. His 10 rules on running a successful company at the last chapter alone is probably one of the best five-page practical advice on how to start a small company and make it into successful one that employs over a million associates.
**** 11. Hayward, Steven (1997), Churchill on Leadership, CA: Prima Publishing — This is a must for management. And nobody else has exhibited greater foresight and fortitude in leading Europe during World War II than Winston Churchill. The way he managed the country can be applied to managing corporations.
***** 12. The World is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century (2005), Thomas Friedman, NY: Farrar, Straus and Giroux — Excellent commentary by a veteran New York columnist. The book has been selling quite briskly. More important than the number of copies is who is reading it — and it seems top businessmen including, Bill Gates, and top policy makers and government officials in the United States and most parts of Asia are raving over the book. It discusses how technology and globalization is changing not only the way we live, but the way we conduct our business, our relationships and the wealth of nations. Highly recommended for you to understand how to interact better in this rapidly changing 21st century. Highly impactful, yet could be understood by a non-technical reader.
(November 10, 2005 issue)
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