2016 Reading Review - Autobiographies, Memoirs, and Lessons Learned
2016's reading list included a number of great biographies and memoirs. The many hours spent immersed in these books actually made the work commute on the train thoroughly enjoyable. The two most influential books completed last year that don't fit on this list were Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown and The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business by Patrick Lencioni.
Here are some of the highlights from 2016's reading.
Leading: Learning from Life and My Years at Manchester United by Alex Ferguson (with Michael Moritz).
"Regarded by many players, managers and analysts to be one of the greatest and most successful managers of all time." - Wikipedia
A very enjoyable book. Much of the material took time to digest and internalize, so completing the book took all of 2016 (and it merits repeated reading). The lessons learned and pragmatic advice are applicable across roles and organization types, not just leadership and management. The “human element,” and nuances of working through people, pervades every topic.
“When you meet new people and try to assess the most vital component – their character – you are only making an educated guess. Sometimes you are right and sometimes you are wrong. The only real test of character comes with the passing of the years and watching them perform – particularly when they are going through a bad spell or recovering from a setback.”
“You have to consider the human element of life and the way that circumstances and chance can upset everything – even the most accurate and clearly reported data.”
How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big: Kind of the Story of My Life by Scott Adams
Since 1989, Adams has taken the absurdities of corporate life and personified them through humor in his comic strip, Dilbert. While expectations for this book were high, it still managed to surprise to the upside. This is not your typical self-help book. There are a lot of lessons learned as well as many practical insights into human nature. My Kindle metrics state that I highlighted 194 passages in this 256 page book. At the time of this writing, the stories about the failed Dilberito food products stand out in my mind.
“I have cultivated a unique relationship with failure. I invite it. I survive it. I appreciate it. Failure always brings something valuable with it. I don’t let it leave until I extract that value. I have a long history of profiting from failure.”
"In each of these examples, the quality of the early products was a poor predictor of success. The predictor is that customers were clamoring for the bad versions of the product before the good versions were even invented."
“Happiness has more to do with where you’re heading than where you are.”
The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown
This one reached in and tugged at my heartstrings. It was both heartbreaking and inspiring. A great narrative on a successful team.
"Finding a four leaf clover isn't a matter of luck, it's a matter of keeping your eyes open. The only time you don't find a four leaf clover is when you stop looking for one."
"No other sport demands and rewards the complete abandonment of self the way rowing does. Great crews may have individuals with exceptional talent but they have no stars. The team effort, the unified symphony, is all that matters. Races are won by teams."
Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike by Phil Knight (with J.R. Moehringer)
Immensely enjoyable read. Highly recommended. The book primarily tells the story of Nike (formerly known as Blue Ribbon) before it went public in 1980. An American success story about selling product out of the trunk of your car, bootstrapping, and running a company on a shoestring (pardon the pun). Aside from being very well written, people will probably enjoy this book because they will see many of the characteristics they want to believe about themselves, or at least aspire to.
“Driving back to Portland I’d puzzle over my sudden success at selling. I’d been unable to sell encyclopedias, and I’d despised it to boot. I’d been slightly better at selling mutual funds, but I’d felt dead inside. So why was selling shoes so different? Because, I realized, it wasn’t selling. I believed in running."
"Seek a calling. Even if you don’t know what that means, seek it. If you’re following your calling, the fatigue will be easier to bear, the disappointments will be fuel, the highs will be like nothing you’ve ever felt. I’d like to warn the best of them, the iconoclasts, the innovators, the rebels, that they will always have a bulls-eye on their backs. The better they get, the bigger the bull’s-eye. It’s not one man’s opinion; its a law of nature."
"Taking a chance on people… that's what it's all been about."
Cable Cowboy: John Malone and the Rise of the Modern Cable Business by Mark Robichaux
Lessons about building a business, leverage, and alignment of interests with shareholders. Malone behaved like an owner with a long-term view. He "believed that wealth creation was a noble, moral achievement" and created a lot of value for those shareholders who had the wherewithal to stand by him over the long run. The book follows his career and uphill climb as he helped to build an industry.
"When more than 25 percent of the value of your stock is something that you haven't done yet, get real nervous - real fast."
"More than anyone else, John Malone was responsible for transforming TCI from a tiny firm that was teetering on bankruptcy into a media colossus, and he had done so not by focusing myopically on the next quarter's earnings and kowtowing to Wall Street; instead, he had done it by focusing on the long term and building asset value. TCI grew so big so fast that by 1988, the company generated $850 million in cash; though it had no earnings, it had more cash flow than ABC, CBS, and NBC combined."
"Only a decade earlier, TCI was a tiny company with a rural base of subscribers, shackled with costly, floating-rate debt and a liquidity problem. Between 1973 and 1989, Malone closed 482 deals, an average of one every two weeks. TCI had become a national titan and the biggest cable operator in the United States. From the low point that TCI stock had hit in late 1974, a year after Malone joined the company, up to the summer of 1989, TCI shares had posted a stunning rise of 55,000 percent. Hell, the payoff actually ran to 91,000 percent, from a low of $1 to $913, if investors held on to every stock that TCI had spun off, then tracked Malone's own buy-and-sell decisions."
Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
This book prompted a discussion with a colleague: was Steve Jobs more of a tyrant or a steward? This quote (not from the book) was our bar for measurement: "The opposite of a good steward is a tyrant. The objective of the tyrant is to enrich (or empower) himself at the expense of those around him (including the groups that he feigns to serve). The steward seeks to improve/grow/help the things for which they are responsible and generally recognizes that if they do well for those they serve, their own personal well being will turn out just fine."
Decision Points by George W. Bush (with Christopher Michel)
A memoir about making important decisions with imperfect information, both before and during his Presidency. The chapters that stood out were Personnel (chapter 3), Hurricane Katrina (chapter 10), and the Surge in Iraq (chapter 12). These provide insights into his lessons learned on the topics of leadership, getting the right team, behavior in times of crisis, and doing what you believe is right.
Worthy Fights: A Memoir of Leadership in War and Peace by Leon Panetta (with Jim Newton)
The first half of the book reviews his years of public service in Congress (1977-1993), as the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (1993 – 1994), and the Whitehouse Chief of Staff during the first Clinton Administration (1994 – 1997). His praise and criticism of decisions and people on both sides of the aisle is rather balanced (with one notable exception).
"A little note on Washington Politics: When the vice president of the United States is assigned the job of mediating a dispute and announces his decision, your job is to accept it."
The second half of the book recaps his years as Director of the CIA (2009 – 2011) and Defense Secretary (2011 – 2013). It is recommended reading, if for no reason other than as a reminder not to take liberty for granted.
Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Stephen Ambrose
A detailed account of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and the leadership that led the first American expedition across the western portion of the United States. It concludes with an interesting narrative of how Meriwether Lewis’ capabilities as a military leader did not translate into success in the field of politics.
"Well led men working together can do far more than they ever thought they could, especially if they are in life-threatening situations, which was exactly where Lewis intended to lead them. He dared to do so because he knew they had more in them than they thought and he knew how to bring out the best in them."
"But if he was a near-perfect army officer, Lewis was a lousy politician. He was entirely unsuited to the job… As governor, Lewis proved incapable of resisting the temptations of high office, incapable of managing different factions, incapable of compromise."
When I Stop Talking, You'll Know I'm Dead: Useful Stories from a Persuasive Man by Jerry Weintraub (with Rich Cohen)
I listened to this one as an audiobook. Having the author as the narrator added flavor to the stories. From humble beginnings, Jerry Weintraub’s determination and audacity eventually led him to manage Elivs Presley, Bob Dylan, Frank Sinatra, Led Zeppelin and later produce movies such as The Karate Kid and Ocean's Eleven (plus its sequels). The stories that stand out in my mind include figuring out how to produce shows in Chicago, negotiating with Walt Disney, and producing a particular Elvis concert in Miami Beach. I should say that some of his methods raised an eyebrow (and I do not condone them).
A few books that were on the original list and have yet to be read:
- Scipio Africanus: Greater Than Napoleon by B. H. Liddell Hart
- Creative Capital: Georges Doriot and the Birth of Venture Capital by Spencer E. Ante
- Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catcall (ok, this is technically the biography of a company, but a very successful one...)
- Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing