Reading (and Listening) Routine

Note: I've since updated this list. Find the latest version of my Reading Routine here.

One of the most common questions I get is about what I'm reading and absorbing regularly to stay up-to-date on organizational design, culture change, and the world of work. Honestly I'm not crazy consistent on the sources I tend to read, it probably varies week to week and month to month. Sometimes I'm all about newsletters other times I go through a strictly podcast phase. That said, here's a starting list as the folks and reads that come immediately to mind:

?Frequent Inspiration

• 5 Ally Actions: A weekly digest of practical ways to bring action to your allyship in the workplace on a regular basis.
• Exponential View: Weekly newsletter, podcast and community by Azeem Azhar all about figuring out what the near future holds and "exploring how our societies and political economy will change under the force of rapidly accelerating technologies and other trends." Incredibly well put together and always leaves me feeling smarter.
• Austin Kleon: Austin's blog is filled with doodles, writing, and interesting takes on a variety of things. Following him gives me consistently fresh perspectives and little doses of inspiration + I really love the "minimum viable" approach he takes with creativity and artistic output. Such a helpful lesson to learn over and over again.
• Software Lead Weekly: "A weekly newsletter by Oren Ellenbogen with the best content found around people, culture and leadership in tech." I find the content in this newsletter to be really well curated. I usually run across at least a few off-the-beaten-path and insightful articles.
• You Are Not So Smart: "The central theme of You Are Not So Smart is that you are unaware of how unaware you are." A great podcast on fresh research around how our brains operate, and how that often deludes us. The learnings to take away are all about building humility in yourself and coach it in others.
• The Academy by NOBL. At NOBL we have a weekly internal Friday wrap up meeting where we share our learnings from the week and, more often than not, a version of those learnings then ends up becoming a newsletter topic in the days or months to follow. The newsletter has basically become a diary of what NOBL is thinking about, plotting, designing, building, and learning every week and the ritual itself of internal sense-making and external sharing has become a really precious source of motivation and inspiration for me. I hope following along with us does some of the same for you.

Deep Dive Go-To's (The first places I check when I want to absorb as much as I can on a particular topic)

• Org Hacking: "Compiling and synthesizing thoughts on everything that involves humans and organizations." I really appreciate the deep dive reads Itamar Goldminz puts together on various organizational design and culture concepts. I'll usually poke around on his site when I'm looking to supplement my knowledge of the research on a particular topic with varied academic takes.
• Greater Good Science Center Workplaces: "Science-based practices to make work better"
• First Round Review: A publication built for leaders to help them learn how to build better companies.
• HBR (Surprise!): Leadership & Managing People
• Rands Leadership Slack: The Rands Leadership Slack exists to help longtime, new, and aspiring leaders to learn through conversation and sharing of ideas.

Favorite Case Studies

• The New Norm by Invisibilia: This podcast episode tells the story of an incredible change case study led by Claire Nuer: how oil workers in the deep south tried a social experiment to transform the entrenched macho culture of an oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico.
• The Woman Ending Harassment at the Grand Canyon by Outside Online: A really well told story of the culture of bullying and harassment among the Grand Canyon staff and the first female superintendent who led the charge in healing old wounds. The part that always gets me:

For many years employees at Grand Canyon were part of a dysfunctional family that put the chain of command before common sense and safety. They simply shrugged off the constant craziness as part of the job. They were, after all, “paid in sunsets”.

• #144 Dark Pattern by Reply All: "We discover an invisible maze, designed to trick millions of people out of their money." Dark patterns are persuasive techniques used by companies online to trick people into buying and signing up for things. This episode is a really fascinating exploration of one example of these dark patterns in TurboTax's UI.
• LaDonna by This American Life: "A security guard at the airport notices something going wrong on the tarmac, and takes it upon herself to fix it. It’s way harder than she expects." A very inspiring and frustrating listen about making change inside organizations.
• Patagonia: Yvon Chouinard by How I Build This: In 1973, Yvon Chouinard started the company to make climbing gear he couldn't find elsewhere. Over decades of growth, he has implemented a unique philosophy about business, leadership and profit.

Tools

• I like the Product Hunt Google Chrome plug in for staying up to date on the most upvoted digital and physical products on a daily basis.
• I use a combination of Kill the Newsletter + Feedly to turn every newsletter into an RSS feed so that it doesn't clog up my inbox