My Top Reads of 2024

Business Books -

Rewired by Mckinsey

This book form Mckinsey is a great summary of the Why, What and How of Digital Transformaiton. Great read and a grea title. Successful Digital Transformations need true ‘Rewiring’ of organizations. I resonated with this book lot more as I felt it validated lot of my own thinking ??? some of which I penned in below articles.?

Digital Strategy as Platform Ecosystems

Three Cs to Accelerate the FlyWheel of Digital Transformation

Reflections from co-creation of Digital Strategies

Scale by Geoffrey West

Driven by my love for systems thinking this book got me interested as it speaks about the science of complex systems and the universal rules that guide them. It is a fascinating read about how there are mathematical patterns ( scaling laws ) ?underlying systems of all sizes and in connections between life, society, cities and economy.

The Power Law by Sabastina Mallaby

Thanks Mohit Mittal for the recommendation. Great read for those interested in the startup and venture capital world. Sebastian Mallaby explores the rise of venture capital and how it has shaped the modern tech landscape. He brings out the "power law" dynamic, where a few outlier successes drive most of the returns in venture capital.

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Self Growth –

Pre-Suasion by Robert Caldini

Great follow up book on ‘Influence’ by Robert Caldini. All of us need to get work done using influence in professional and personal lives. Pre-susasion goes a step further to tell you various insights on how human mind operates and one can “prime” your audience to create favourable outcomes.

The Great Mental Models by Shane Perish

This is a amazing series by Shane Perish. I got introduced to his blog “fs.blog” after reading the “Almanac of Naval Ravikant”. This book provides a powerful toolkit of timeless thinking concepts that would help improve our decision-making and problem-solving abilities. One has to read these book series multiple times until the toolsets become a part of our cognitive repository.

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch

Another book I picked as a recommendation from Naval Ravikant. Great story of Prof Randy Paush on how he learned and steered through various phases of life, and what matters most when you see your end in sight. Titled "Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams," his last lecture has many timeless lessons but what stood out most for me was “living life to the fullest”.

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Spiritual -

The Bhagavad Gita : God talks with Arjuna by Paramhansa Yogananda

Thanks Phanimitra B for the recommendation. This set of two books took me the longest to complete. They are overall a difficult read, but a great commentary by Yogi Paramahansa Yogananda on Bhagwat Gita. The book at times repeats on recommendations to ‘Kriya Yoga’, which I personally don’t practice, still a great read if you have the patience. “Long Read Alert”

Krishnamurty to Himself by J Krishnamurty

Thanks Parag Agarwal for this recommendation. This journal Krishnamurty wrote in his last few days. Brings out the essence of his learnings, thinking and meaning of life and death.

The Art of Living by Willim Hart and S. N. Goenka

I was fortunate to get introduced to Vipassna meditation last year. Read this book as a reminder of the lecture series one goes through during the ten day Vipassna course. Great and simple read even for those who have not done Vipassna.