My dozen for the year of 2021
2021 is a year of resurgence. The year enabled me to explore the depths of the Himalayas to the grandeur of the middle east, experiment with intermittent fasting and the pandemic reiterated the need to have a strong community to support life endeavors. In order to further cement the reading habit, I read the daily stoic every day (A page a day) along with my monthly book reading.
Below are some of the important learnings:
Below is a summary of my most memorable parts of each book, some interesting titbits, and a score for the book as per the criteria:
1. No Filter by Sarah Frier
Category: Business
Length - 10
Vocabulary - 10
Impact - 10
Overall - 10
The Instagram story in this book describes the scale a product can reach when it's simple. All the decisions in the story of Instagram (at least till the founders were present) have been of simplicity driving technicality and business outcomes. It also gives you a preview into the mind of the master strategist Mark Zuckerberg and that there are no loyalties in silicon valley.
“leadership philosophy: to ask first what problem they were solving, and then to try and solve it in the simplest way possible.”
2. Influence by Robert Cialdini
Category: Psychology
Length - 8
Vocabulary - 7.5
Impact - 9
Overall - 9
Professor Robert Cialdini studies our evolutionary traits and defines the Scarcity (artificial scarcity in time or inventory to boost sales), Social Proof (Friends, Neighbors buying the same product, reviews online), Authority (People with high titles and names pushing the sale), Liking (Show similarity, mirroring traits, appearance), Exchange (Evolutionary need to respond in kind) and Escalating Commitment (Small commitment leading to larger ones, Project POC, Low first month subscription fee) Principles which aid in the sales process. (SSALEE)
“We all fool ourselves from time to time in order to keep our thoughts and beliefs consistent with what we have already done or decided”
3. Calling Bullshit by Cart Bergstrom and Jevin West
Category: Data
Length - 9
Vocabulary - 8
Impact - 9
Overall - 9
With the advent of the internet age, information and data exploded onto the scene leading to the dissemination of fake news and disinformation artists. Understanding prosecutor`s fallacy, knowing the difference between percentage changes and numerical changes, analyzing the input data to any analysis, understanding the selection bias are some of how the author tries to educate the reader to fight misinformation
“Remember Goodhart’s law? “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.”
4. Stuff Matters by Mark Miodownik
Category: Material Science
Length - 9
Vocabulary - 9
Impact - 9
Overall - 9
Material science and its chemistry is one of the complex subjects to navigate, The professor has a gift for exciting us with his unique storytelling skills by delving into multidimensional depths about materials which tells the unique ability of humans to understand the materials around us and to manipulate them
“In a very real way, then, materials are a reflection of who we are, a multi-scale expression of our human need and desires.”
5. Can't Hurt Me by David Goggins
Category: Autobiography
Length - 6.5
Vocabulary - 9
Impact - 8
Overall - 8
The memoir shows us the importance of hard work and how to work hard. The book talks a lot about mental toughness and how one can take inspiration from pain to achieve life goals. The 40% rule (Breaking the average 40% comfort zone barrier), Converting difficult situations to become uncommon amongst men and the Kaizen technique are some of the highlights of the book. The length of the book could be shorter.
“Pain unlocks a secret doorway in the mind, one that leads to both peak performance, and beautiful silence”
6. The Man's Guide to Women by John Gottman and Julie Schwartz Gottman
Category: Psychology
Length - 8
Vocabulary - 9
Impact - 8
Overall - 8
The Ph.D. authors explore the science from understanding, dating, romancing, making love, living, and then finally loving a woman for a lifetime. The evolutionary science behind why women love shopping, having a larger friend circle, living in fear, and relationship trust are a few of the interesting points of the book.?
“Approximately 40 percent of the time, when a woman brings up an issue, men have no clue what she is talking about”
领英推荐
7. The Daily Stoic by Ryan Holiday
Category: Psychology
Length - 10
Vocabulary - 7
Impact - 8
Overall - 8
A passage for every day in a year teaches us stoic philosophy by discussing topics about clarity, emotions, awareness, unbiased thought, pragmatism, acceptance, duty, and various others. The different kinds of prayer (How to pray rather than to pray for "what"), carpe diem, control and choice (what we control and what we don't), and several others have had a profound impact on me embracing the stoic philosophy.
Try praying differently, and see what happens: Instead of asking for 'a way to sleep with her', try asking for 'a way to stop desiring to sleep with her'. Instead of 'a way to get rid of him', try asking for 'a way to not crave his demise'. Instead of 'a way to not lose my child', try asking for 'a way to lose my fear of it.' - Marcus Aurelius, Meditations
8. No Rules Rules by Reed Hastings & Erin Meyer
Category: Business
Length - 9
Vocabulary - 9
Impact - 8
Overall - 8
A look into the incredible culture that makes Netflix thrive in the information age where product time cycles shrink to keep the business innovating. Very few companies can vouch for a culture like Netflix which has high talent density with radical candor and no controls from approving budgets to signing important contracts on behalf of the company giving accountability and ownership to employees.?
“Netflix treats employees like adults who can handle difficult information and I love that. This creates enormous feelings of commitment and buy-in from employees.”
9. Principles by Ray Dalio
Category: Business
Length - 6.5
Vocabulary - 8
Impact - 8
Overall - 8
"Employing radical truth and radical transparency" is the central principle around which all other management principles arise to codify management and run it efficiently. The book is the algorithm for the effective management of any conglomerate. Two-minute rule (hunger for feedback), dot collector to gather feedback in meetings, baseball cards to codify strengths of employees are a few interesting business strategies successfully employed at Bridgewater associates.
“I learned that if you work hard and creatively, you can have just about anything you want, but not everything you want. Maturity is the ability to reject good alternatives in order to pursue even better ones.”
10. Amazon Unbound by Brad Stone
Category: Business
Length - 6
Vocabulary - 7
Impact - 8
Overall - 7.5
The book uncovers the details behind the exponential expansion of Amazon in the last decade and the stories behind novel products like Alexa, amazon go, AWS, global expansion in emerging economies, etc. it also uncovers the evolution of Bezos himself who transformed from a geeky technologist to a fit disciplined billionaire with global ambitions.
“We all know that if you swing for the fences, you’re going to strike out a lot, but you’re also going to hit some home runs. The difference between baseball and business, however, is that baseball has a truncated outcome distribution. When you swing, no matter how well you connect with the ball, the most runs you can get is four. In business, every once in a while, when you step up to the plate, you can score 1,000 runs. This long-tailed distribution of returns is why it’s important to be bold.”
11. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Category: Adventure Fiction
Length - 9
Vocabulary - 7
Impact - 8
Overall - 7.5
This book needs no introduction, read by millions is about a simple story of a Shepard boy who travels across the Egyptian desert in search of treasure and endures a fascinating adventure which teaches him and us life lessons and wisdom. The climax of the book is where all the wisdom unfolds.
“Everyone seems to have a clear idea of how other people should lead their lives, but none about his or her own.”
12. The Almanack of Naval Ravikant
Category: Self Help
Length - 8
Vocabulary - 7
Impact - 7
Overall - 7
A compilation of health, wealth and happiness wisdom of naval ravikant. The viewpoints of knowledge workers functioning like athletes (train, rest and reassess) instead of employees, Optimistic contrarianism, optimizing time instead of money are few nuggets of wisdom which were quite influential.
“Escape competition through authenticity.”
Awesome Rohit Acharya ??