Book Club 2018 Highlights

Never Split the Difference

Summary: Learn the negotiation techniques used by FBI hostage negotiators to better understand the dynamic of human connections and achieve the results you're looking for.

Review: Highly Recommended

You should read this if:

• An email has been ignored and you want a response
• You want to negotiate like a pro
• Save money at every store with a sales person (I saved hundreds on deck furnature using the simple techniques here)

The Culture Code

Summary: This book dives into several teams, groups and organizations that have constructed strong, self-sustaining cultures. It explores the how and why and what the results were.

Review: Highly Recommended

You should read this if:

• You want inspiration on how to improve your work culture
• You are struggling to achieve mutual trust with a teammate coworker

Turn the Ship Around!

Summary: Relive the turnaround story of the USS Sante Fe, a submarine that went from last to first. At the center point of that transformation? A system of trust and "deliberate action"

Review: Highly Recommended

You should read this if:

• You want increase the autonomy and scalability of your team
• Your team struggles with implementing change

Honorable Mentions:

Thinking in Bets

Understand the process of using probability in decision making

Five Dysfunctions of a Team

A fictionalized story of a "magic" CEO that takes over a company along with all the drama. This is a "how it should work" story. Interesting, but fictional.

This Is Marketing

I read this one as a primer on how to market the work I'm doing internally. Seth's writing is abstracted pretty well, so it applies pretty universally.

Other books

Concious Coaching (Brett Bartholomew) - Heavier on the athletics side

Principles (Ray Dalio) - Woof. This was a lot to parse, and pretty curious. At the end, I found that much of it only really applies in Ray's world.

Making Work Visible - This is probably great for some teams with this sort of challenges. Didn't turn out to be that applicable.

Thinking in Systems - Solid stuff for folks that don't already think this way. The appendix is almost worth the purchase.

One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey - Turned out to be pretty dated. Avoiding work has application, but not an entire book's worth.