To Sell is Human – Daniel Pink
In a wonderful, gentle way Pink shows that there’s nothing wrong with selling and that we all do it, probably more than ever.
Ultimately he concludes that by being humble, humane and seeking to find mutual benefit in any ‘sale’ we are all able to be a better version of ourselves. One could argue the book is simply a digestion of many well known studies and truisms. But that’s to undervalue the power of the work Pink has done in organising these ideas into a clear and helpful narrative structure which certainly gave me the opportunity to rethink how I approach some interactions.
Black Box Thinking – Matthew Syed
Much of it feels familiar – perhaps because the examples are now well trodden business lore, which they probably weren’t when this first came out. But it still feels powerful and relevant. Syed’s essential argument is how we treat and react to failure is fundamental to whether we can learn and improve. Contrasting aviation and medical professions is compelling. It’s very easy to agree with the book’s core prescription, very much harder to follow-through, especially in complex organisations.
The Secret Barrister
Learn about English legal system and huge strain it is under. How successive reforms which seemed sensible to outsiders actually harmed a system we hope we’ll never need, but assume will be sound should we need it. This isn’t just about austerity, it’s a broad and deep critique on how we have failed to care for the justice s system. This book does a superb job of accessibly exposing the issues.
Don’t Hold My Head Down – Lucy-Anne Holmes
Wow, what a frank, open and funny tale of a woman exploring her sexuality. When that woman happens to have been the founder of the ‘No More Page 3’ campaign you realise this is going to be very special, and it is.
The People vs Tech – Jamie Bartlett
Excellent, highly readable defence of politics and democracy over Silicon Valley tech utopia. Really effectively and concisely brings together many of the key concerns around how big tech can put the wester democratic ideal at risk. Lots of good policy suggestions too… Other than the oxymoron of “secure online voting” !
Bad Pharma – Ben Goldacre
I’ve long followed Ben’s work, he has a brilliantly personal writing style. But I felt remiss in not reading any of his books, so here we go. I should disclose our orbits have slightly touched through work we’ve both done with the Open Knowledge Foundation and Open Rights Group. In fact, the word ‘open’ is the lodestone.
Bad Pharma is a great piece of activism, mandate for change and a searing analysis of how so many people in industry, medicine, professional bodies, regulators, publishers and more allow appalling behaviour to persist which result in death and harm to patients. It’s as simple as that. People knowingly let vast swathes of medical trial data be hidden, abused and mis-reported. Regulations are regularly skipped, skirted around or ignored with little or no consequence. Nearly every doctor in the world gets their ongoing professional education sponsored and curated by the pharma industry, with huge negative consequences on the cost and efficacy of prescribing. And most of this could be avoided with sunlight – openness and rigour at every step of the drug development and approval cycle.
At moments the book is utterly depressing but it comes through with a positive message and clear actions we can all take to challenge this situation. And Ben is working hard on brilliant work to improve things to, such as alltrials.net and more…
One more thing…
I don’t tend to mention my fiction reading here, but two epics I recently hugely enjoyed were Haruki Murakami’s Killing Commendatore and Henning Mankell’s A Treacherous Paradise.
Jason Kitcat 