Good morning.
Still working on your summer reading list? As part of our survey of Fortune 500 CEOs, we asked them to tell us the best book they have read in the last year. The result is an eclectic mix, with only one book getting more than one mention—Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers, cited by two of the CEOs. Worth noting it was published in 2011…which suggests our chiefs don’t have a lot of time for outside reading.
Below are some more recent books that were mentioned.
The Founder’s Mentality, by Chris Zook and James Allen
Thrive, by Arianna Huffington
OGO, by David Novak
When Breath Becomes Air, by Paul Kalanithi
Barbarian Days; A Surfing Life, William Finnegan
The Gatekeepers, by Chris Whipple
Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion, by Gregory Boyle
The Undoing Project, by Michael Lewis
Empire of the Summer Moon, by S.C. Gwynne
Earning It, by Joann Lublin
Hillbilly Elegy, by J.D. Vance
I’d add two books by Yuval Harari, Sapiens and Homo Deus. The first is the best book I’ve read in a decade.
We also asked the CEOs to name the best business or management book they had ever read. Number one on that list? Good to Great, by Jim Collins.