My business books of 2024

I wouldn't call myself an avid reader, but in 2024, I have stuck to the habit of reading at least a little every day. I try to alternate between business and fiction books. Some books are incredibly easy to read, while others progress more slowly because they are so dense that it feels wrong to rush through them just to “check them off.”

Below is a list of books I’ve read with my comments on each. I’ll clarify upfront that these comments were written primarily for myself, but I decided to share them here in case someone finds these short summaries interesting.

Today, I’ll focus on business literature since I consider fiction more of a form of entertainment and less a source of profound insights.

HOW TO LEAD (DAVID RUBENSTEIN)

To be honest, I’m not particularly fond of books about “success stories” because they often lead to the trap of following misleading cause-and-effect relationships. Such books exclude stories of people who share many traits with the successful protagonists but, despite similar patterns, end up with nothing—or worse.

However, this book piqued my interest for a different reason. It profiles a wide range of leaders from various fields of life and business. I was curious to explore what unites their approaches, principles, and backgrounds and to see how much of this aligns with my own understanding. Here are the key takeaways I highlighted for myself:

Education

Each leader’s story eventually intersects with education. There are no dropouts or tales of dramatic university exits here. Harvard University is mentioned in nearly every third interview. This made me think about the importance of absorbing the wisdom of previous generations, much of which is embedded in the curricula of renowned educational institutions. Careful consideration of one’s educational path—and that of one’s children—becomes a more practical conclusion from this observation.

Effort

Work = time × effort. This basic formula from physics applies equally to leadership success. The book underscores the persistence and passion that all these leaders share. For me, this wasn’t a new realization—it’s something I’ve understood for a long time. Passion is one of the main qualities I encourage in colleagues and partners alike.

Integrity

I’ve never understood how someone can work for a tobacco company while simultaneously lecturing their friends about the dangers of smoking. “It’s different,” such people might say, but for me, it’s not. Integrity is something I deeply value. Even from a pragmatic perspective, it’s hard to know when to trust someone who is fundamentally inconsistent. In this book, I saw a strong desire among the leaders to maintain their integrity, actively participate in business life, contribute to community development, and support others. This was evident in their internal principles and substantial philanthropic efforts.

Ability to Negotiate

Last but not least: the ability to build consensus. Each leader’s story involves interactions with a wide range of people—from civil society, businesses, and government. It’s evident that finding common ground and considering all interests is essential. Leadership thrives in this context.

PRIMAL LEADERSHIP (DANIEL GOLEMAN, RICHARD BOYATZIS, ANNIE MCKEE)

I think the topic of emotional intelligence is more relevant than ever. War, uncertainty, lack of resources... the best opportunity to either show your emotional stability or to collect a “bingo” of the most inadequate actions towards yourself, your loved ones or your team.

That's probably why I started reading this book about three years ago. And what? 20 pages were read without realizing the content. It didn't come up because there was no urgent need for it. Now the situation is different. I soaked up most of the chapters like a sponge, but I will still highlight the key thoughts with which I closed the last page.

We need to test ourselves and people

We can “feel a person” a thousand times, act on experience, but no one has canceled psychology and professional psychoanalysis. It's strange that having this tool (DICS, EIT...), I personally paid little attention to it. And in vain. Especially when working with top management and recruiting. I really liked the case when we tested particularly successful company managers to understand what kind of people are needed for a particular role.

The “resonance effect”

Again, it seems to be an obvious thing, but, as they say, it needs to be said. It is important to feel the team, that is, to find such forms of interaction, such activities and approaches that would be understood and echoed. Then a stronger bond is established between the leader and the team.

A comfortable goal

This is an interesting idea that focuses on the need to create a goal/objective/idea that will not only not cause discomfort and rejection, but will also not require much effort. At first I was a little surprised by this wording, but then I realized that it is worth adapting the goal, creating or giving everyone in the team the opportunity to create their own goal. All of them (in total or in parallel) should fit into the desired vision of the company. A bit complicated, but I hope it's clear :)

EI can be developed

In fact, at the beginning of the book, I got acquainted with the components of EI (self-perception, self-control, perception of others, and relationship management) and various forms of management styles. There are many free or inspirational ones (mentoring, friendship, etc.) and a few authoritarian ones. I can't say that the latter are a nightmare. Probably because they are not close to me. However, they should also be developed in order to interact and resist similar approaches from the other side. Like knowledge of martial arts.

EI is more important than IQ

I've guessed this before, but the book doesn't mention a number of studies that confirm that productivity increases precisely because of the improvement of the leader's individual AI and the team's collective AI.  

REWORK (JASON FRIED, DAVID HEINEMEIER HANSSON)

I didn't really get into this book because it is aimed more at startups. I was expecting more advice on management and governance issues. The book is simple, logical, but for me it is largely filled with well-known (sometimes even personally lived) theses.

Keep it simple

There is no need to complicate an already complex world - you should try, test hypotheses, launch pilots, make mistakes, get up again, and so on.

Bureaucracy, corporate culture, budgets, forecasts, and other myths

I liked the approach to the perception of all the well-known corporate myths that greatly hinder business development (even for a startup). Sufficient freedom in decision-making, basic forecasting/assumptions, and normal human behavior are great substitutes for strict rules, endless financial justifications, and pretentious corporate culture.

Marketing is everywhere

This is something that caught my eye because I have always believed that every team member from any department is a carrier of the company's values/vision/goals/image. That is why it is a mistake to pay attention to marketing only in terms of department/analytics/market. The more holistic the marketing function is, the more widely it is represented in EVERY department, the higher the synergy of interaction between teams will be.

Personal search for employees

Here I immediately took note and made a post about finding people for my team. It's because people really don't want to see corporate mailboxes with thousands of CVs, but a specific, motivating request from a manager explaining “what do I want?” And also focusing on a motivational letter... I've never done this or asked anyone to write one.

DELIVERING HAPPINESS (TONY HSIEH)

I would say that Tony's book is an ode to customer service and everything related to it. This approach is tracked and reflected both in the work of Tony and his team with the company's external clients and with internal “clients” - that is, with employees. I had very similar feelings when I read Phil Knight's book The Shoe Salesman. There was a lot of inspiration, a lot about the feeling of significance. Once again, I was convinced that only an inspired team (and not one that is afraid of being fired) is capable of great results.

Corporate culture

I was impressed by Tony's frank and systematic communication with the company, explaining every action, providing general information so that every employee understands the situation of the company. I also noticed that Zappos' culture was even written in a document, which indicates a responsible approach to the selection of people and the climate in the team.

Recognizing mistakes

One of the very important traits that, at least in my opinion, is worth noting in Tony. If something goes wrong, it's important to recognize it and change your approach.

Like-minded people

I have noticed that throughout the entire development process, it is important to have like-minded people in key positions. At some point, it is important to give them more authority and, if possible, a share of the business for a common understanding that “everything is at stake.”

Long-term vs. short-term

I liked Tony's focus on long-term cooperation and his attitude towards suppliers, his willingness to meet halfway and understand the difficult situation.

We do the key things in business ourselves

This is probably the most important thing I took away from the book. The entire business, including its operational activities, is built on a number of processes. The key ones, i.e. those where a significant amount of added value is created, should be managed by the company. Those that have a weaker position in value creation can be outsourced. An example is Zappos' work with warehouses and eLogistics, whose problems almost jeopardized the online retailer's main service: ultra-fast delivery.

WHO: THE A METHOD FOR HIRING (GEOFF SMART, RANDY STREET)

I am writing this review with a long delay, and after reading the next book, so I will really describe what is exactly stuck in my memory.

So, the book describes a practical method (A-method) of recruitment and selection, which is as follows.

Qualitative preparation for the search

In my opinion, this is probably the main stage at which either the logical requirements are formulated or the process does not matter anymore. Here, the customer, i.e. the manager/company, forms a request for a job profile, describing as accurately as possible what competencies the candidate should have. These include hard skills, soft skills, emotional intelligence, and managerial style (if the candidate is selected for a managerial position). In this process, I remember a cool approach to analyze successful employees in similar positions, describe the key characteristics that, in my subjective opinion, make them successful, and use this data to formulate a search for new ones. In the book, this is the stage of creating a hiring card, i.e. a detailed description of an awesome candidate (A-candidate).

Interviewing

Here we need to dive deeper into primary, secondary, and functional interviews. Primary - for the superficial selection of exactly unsuitable candidates (can be done by phone). Secondary - interviews with those who have passed the primary and here we are talking about previous experience, collecting feedback from previous jobs. I liked the question: what was the most difficult thing about your previous position and what your previous manager would say about you. A functional interview can be a case study, i.e., one that is more related to the candidate's functional competencies, thinking, analysis, and decision-making.

Conclusions

I liked the structured approach to the process of recruiting people to the team. In fact, it's a big problem to work with the wrong people, because we face plenty of resistance and obstacles from the outside, in a competitive market, in changing political and economic circumstances. Therefore, when there is an opportunity to reduce the risk of mistakes and time loss, it is worth using it.

GOOD TO GREAT (KIM COLLINS)

For me, this book was something, I'm sorry to say, worn out and just another in the “Successful Success” series. I probably would never have bought it. Actually, I was given it as a gift, and only then did I start to figure out what was what. Literally after reading the preface, I realized that this is not just someone's thoughts about something with dubious conclusions. This is a thorough research work based on a fairly well-described analytical approach. The goal of the team with which Mr. Collins worked was to identify great companies and compare them to powerful companies from the so-called “comparison list.” One can argue a lot about what criteria were applied to both the first list and the second list, but in the end, this is a private study that definitely has a right to exist.

The group studied the approaches, characteristics, and management features of both types of companies to formulate the key factors that influenced the transformation of the selected companies from just good businesses to truly great things over the years.

The book is full of very cool conclusions and/or observations. I am writing “conclusions” because this is a research. Here are the ones that I have highlighted for myself:

The hedgehog concept and the pendulum effect

Of course, this is the main core around which, according to the authors, a great company is built. It would probably be better to refer to the concept of three circles (“what the company/person or business does best”, “what drives and brings pleasure”, and “the business model that makes it all happen”). It's hard to disagree that focusing on these three elements and striving to subordinate all company activities to them is definitely a long-term sustainable strategy. In general, the book talks a lot about the turmoil in which many good companies have been or are in. That is, it is when some temporary difficulties force the company's management to take drastic, often rash actions, although the situation requires resilience and persistence in current approaches. Here I partially agree. In our changing world, we need to be both flexible and consistent. These are not mutually exclusive concepts, if flexibility refers to customer service or freedom in decision-making, while company values, working conditions with partners, compliance with quality characteristics, i.e., what other businesses directly depend on and what is the core of the company's offer, should be subject to approaches of consistency.

5th generation leaders and managing expectations

These points are not combined in the book, but rather separated at the beginning and end. However, in my opinion, it is their combination that is important. Generation 5 leaders are purposeful, discreet, non-public professionals whose ambitions are directly related to the company and do not go beyond it. They say little and do more. On the other hand, CEOs of large companies, public businesses, those who manage hundreds or thousands of people in teams cannot be out of communication. Their words are relied upon by other market participants, shareholders and stakeholders, as well as employees of the business itself. And it is precisely about communication and expectations management that was discussed in the last chapter. For me, this was a revelation that I will definitely explore separately. It's important to keep a balance between what motivates the team, what encourages investors to join the business, what encourages colleagues to support you, and what is really achievable and not like a soapbox. Good companies, unlike the great ones, promised a lot, set PUBLICly crazy goals, and as a result, when they did not achieve them, they lost trust. And the loss of trust, or even faith, is a strong challenge that throws a company back to the beginning of its existence. There can be no talk of greatness in the near future. In short, combining the approaches of Level 5 leaders and managing expectations is the main takeaway from this book.