4 Jan 2007
[Book Review]: Co-Leaders: The Power of Great Partnerships
Co-Leaders by David A. Heenan & Warren Bennis Published by John Wiley & SonsWorldCat • LibraryThing • Google Books • BookFinder Over the years, I’ve learned that leadership and building great companies is all about the team, rather than a single rock star individual CEO. I met Warren Bennis in the late 1990′s at the CIO conference and this book really helped to shape my thinking, including my post in the Entrepreneurial Toolkit series The Power of Two (or Three).. Although focused more on larger traditional companies, it contains lots of great case studies of how great leadership is defined by great teamwork.
5 Jun 2004
[Book Review]: Six Degrees: The Science of a Connected Age
Six Degrees by Duncan J. Watts Published by W. W. Norton & CompanyWorldCat • LibraryThing • Google Books • BookFinder Duncan Watts is an academic researcher, and pioneer, in the new integrated science of social networks. While the book is a bit drier than the more journalistic and populist The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell, it is well worth the read because it both drills deeper into this important area and avoids Gladwell’s factual errors. Understanding the timeliness of the breakthroughs in our understanding of this science coupled with a digitally connected technology platform to implement these ideas will show people who think MySpace and Facebook are just fads that they are, in fact, harbingers of more fundamental changes to.
12 Feb 2007
[Book Review]: The Soul of a New Machine
The Soul of a New Machine by Tracy Kidder Published by Back Bay BooksWorldCat • Read Online • LibraryThing • Google Books • BookFinder Way back in 1981, I identified strongly with Tracy Kidder’s description of the intensity of non-stop, passionate, 24×7 product development. The hacker culture, harnessed to corporate product development, predates the many Silicon Valley stories of Netscape or today’s Google. Having gone through a “burn out” process in developing Coherent, this book gave me great perspective that has stuck with me to this day.