Melbourne Business School's Summer Reading List for 2021
Want to keep your brain busy over the holidays? Here are the books, podcasts and data visualisations that had an impact on our staff during 2021.
Books
A World Without Email: Reimagining Work in an Age of Communication Overload by Cal Newport
Recommended by Jill Klein, Professor of Marketing: "Cal Newport offers a variety of road-tested practices to help us escape the tyranny of our inboxes and achieve a calmer, more intentional, and more productive working life."
Breaking the Banks by Joseph Healy
Recommended by John Gurskey, Director, Careers: "Joseph is co-founder of Judo Bank which is now valued over $1 billion dollars and soon to go public. It is an interesting and informative read of Australia's banking system and what has gone wrong with it. Joseph also outlines what he believes needs to be done to fix the banks and lending processes and outcomes."
Chatter: The Voice in Our Head by Ethan Kross
Recommended by Julia Bunjevac, Principal Consultant – Learning Consulting: "Harness your inner coach, rather than inner critic. This book helps you understand the science behind your inner chatter and you will walk away with a toolkit to help you have the right conversations within yourself."
Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow by Yuval Noah Harari
Recommended by Alex Lazarus-Priestley, Strategic Learning Advisor: "Published in 2017, Homo Deus is the history of where we are going as a species. The prescience of the first chapters are striking. Weaving through health, data, digitisation and technology as the answer to our mortality, to correlating our treatment of animals to how we might be expect to be treated ourselves on the quest to superior intellect and age defying bodies, through to challenging ideas of how we protect our morality and our planet, it's is a warning that we should read to open our minds and challenge our own assumptions – possibly, before it's too late."
Invisible Women: Data Bias in a World Designed for Men by Caroline Criado Perez
Recommended by Ellen Sullivan, Associate Director, Digital Learning: "Built on studies from around the world, and written with energy, wit, and intelligence, this is a groundbreaking exposé that investigates the root cause of gender inequality and will change the way you look at the world."
Pipeline to the Future: Succession and Performance Planning for Small Business by Stephen Drotter and John Prescott
Recommended by Ian Harper, Dean: "Guiding principles with examples based on real-life experience make the advice in this book clear and easy to apply for leaders of small businesses preparing for their likely future."
The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Fight Bias by Dolly Chugh
Recommended by Jen Overbeck, Associate Professor of Management: "A terrific, level-headed discussion of how bias affects us all and what we can do about it. The chief argument is that we can paralyse ourselves when we fall short of the 'good' person we mean to be, and that we can make a lot more progress if we accept ourselves as 'good-ish'."
Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know by Adam Grant
Recommended by Caron Beaton-Wells, Dean, Internal: "A must-read for anyone interested in lifelong learning and in particular the skills of rethinking what you think you know!"
Unscaled: How AI and a New Generation of Upstarts Are Creating the Economy of the Future by Hemant Taneja
Recommended by Don O'Sullivan, Professor of Marketing: "Taneja offers a compelling view on the future of business and the role of scale in competitive advantage, with interesting insights. Although not the main focus, his perspective on how AI-based businesses will reshape customer relationships appealed to the marketer in me."
Other media
Atlas of Economic Complexity by Harvard Growth Lab (data visualisation)
Recommended by Damir Mitric, Learning Design Manager: "Harvard's Atlas of Economic Complexity lays bare the need for business to evolve and align with fields such as health and STEM in a more productive way."
How's Work by Esther Perel (podcast)
Recommended by Nora Koslowski, Executive Director, Organisational Learning Group: "Esther Perel talks with duos who work together, reshaping how we think about workplace relationships. I enjoyed this podcast because it perfectly captures the negotiations and complexities of managing your personal, family life and your professional life – amplified through the trials and tribulations of a pandemic!"
Unlocking Us by Brené Brown (podcast)
Recommended by Aviva Berzon, Associate Director – Learning Consulting: "Researcher and New York Times best-selling author Brené Brown brilliantly translates her work on shame, vulnerability, courage, and empathy in this podcast, as she explores what it means to be human with curiosity, wisdom and humour."
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