Books

by Adam Smith The Wealth of Nations was published 9 March 1776, during the Scottish Enlightenment and the Scottish Agricultural Revolution. It influenced a number of authors and economists, as well as governments and organizations. Analyzing the relationship between work and the production of a nation’s wealth, Smith, a Scottish philosopher by trade, wrote the book to upend the mercantilist system. Buy the book here

by Alfie Kohn The basic strategy we use for raising children, teaching students, and managing workers can be summarized in six words: Do this and you’ll get that. We dangle goodies (from candy bars to sales commissions) in front of people in much the same way we train the family pet. Drawing on a wealth of psychological research, Alfie Kohn points the way to a more successful strategy based on working with people instead of…

by Daniel H. Pink Whether we’re employees pitching colleagues on a new idea, entrepreneurs enticing funders to invest, or parents and teachers cajoling children to study, we spend our days trying to move others. Like it or not, we’re all in sales now. To Sell Is Human offers a fresh look at the art and science of selling. Daniel H. Pink draws on a rich trove of social science for his counterintuitive insights. He reveals the new…

by George Land Grow or Die was originally published in 1973. Dr. Land’s theory of transformation has become a cornerstone in the strategic planning and organizational transformation of corporations. At the root of the principle lies a single concept: growth – the most basic and universal of drives through which all biological, physical, chemical, psychological, and cultural processes are intrinsically equivalent. Buy the book here

by Peter  M. Senge As Senge makes clear, in the long run the only sustainable competitive advantage is your organization’s ability to learn faster than the competition. In The Fifth Discipline, Senge describes how companies can rid themselves of the learning “disabilities” that threaten their productivity and success by adopting the strategies of learning organizations—ones in which new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, collective aspiration is set free, and people are continually learning how…