What were the Best Business Books of 2008?

[Arik Johnson]

I just put up a list of my favorite business books from 2008 on my blog and thought I'd cross post it here for discussion. Did I miss any that people are particularly broken-hearted about? Here's the link as a standalone in case you'd care to forward.

http://arikjohnson.com/2009/01/02/my-favorite-books-for-business-2008/

Happy New Year,

- Arik

P.S. - I'm hoping to gear up a big membership drive for the CI site between now and SCIP Chicago, so any ideas you have to get the word out are much appreciated.

[Ellen Naylor]

Hi Arik,

Here is the Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/Advanced-Presentations-Design-Creating-Commun...

I bought a copy right away since I so appreciated his sensitive perspective on presentation creating taking into the mind the personality and motivation of those you will be talking to. He presents a 10 step "extreme presentation" process. Cheers, Ellen

[Marcus Emne]

Thanks for a good list, I have to read The Game Changer and I would probably never have found the book presentationzen if not for your list.

A few thoughts, books are for teaching, entertainment and inspiration. Web cast as well, and to me TED has taken a quite big part of the time that I could spend in reading. Now, what would a list like yours look like in 5 years from now, given that we list media that fulfilled the teaching and inspiring aspect?

Best regards,
Marcus

[Adrian Alvarez]

Hi Arik,

I have to say that I admire you. I did not have the time to read as many books, as you. Maybe I read 10 in total and honestly not all are good... I liked the one on War Gaming of Ben, which by the way of comparison is much, much better than the one of Booz Allen and the one of the Swiss guys (this is specially bad considering that it is priced at or over US$100)... I have run some war games of my own and found Ben's book to have practical advice on how to actually run them, while the one of Booz only tells you summaries of the findings of the war games they ran, which is fine with me, but they do not give you much advice on how to conduct the war game, which is what the reader would like to read, at least my wish was to see if I was missing something... The good of the Booz Allen is the fact that it is not expensive... Instead of purchasing the one of Swiss guys, I believe it is better to read the articles at CIM and save you the 100 bucks.

I read another book, which I found very good. It is an old one called strategy as action, which explains how to gain you succeed by using your interactions with competitors, depending on your resources position... It is not a new book, but was new to me and I found their approach as interesting...

Best regards,

Adrian

[Claudia Clayton]

Hi Arik
I realize this is a dialog about books, but since one of the participants brought up the issue of pace, one way I stimulate my brain quickly is by reading Fast Company magazine. They have a web site too. Even when the innovations have nothing to do with my business categories, I get amazing ideas and see the most creative businesses doing new things. Overall, it helps me understand trends and sometimes even contains information pertinent to projects. And I can actually get myself to read it in my "free" time.

[Eric Camastro]

Snowball:Warren Buffet Biography
The Deciding Factor: The Power of Analytics to Make Every Decision a Winner
Science Lessons: What the Business of Biotech Taught Me About Management (Gordon Binder-Amgen CEO)
Drugs: From Discovery to Approval (Rick Ng)
The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression (Amity Shales)

[Carlo Velten]

I really like the perspective of Gunter Dueck - chief technologist of IBM. In his latest book he outlines a new way of doing business embedded in a sociological framework that envision a world with less stress. Nice read -http://tinyurl.com/mp7323
only problem -the book has not been translated to english yet - great job opportunity for writers:-)