Required Reading

post # 339 — March 27, 2007 — a Careers post

If you do a business degree, they will often assign you books on marketing, managing, organizational behavior and strategy. But many “classics” never get assigned because the topics they cover are seen as too “basic.”

For example, there are lots of people (like me) who took many courses on “Management” but never really had to think about supervising another human being.

This is not just about younger people getting their first education: it’s also relevant when large professional firms first start offering management training to senior officers appointed to managing positions for the first time.

Such organizations often arrange special executive education courses at elite universities, when what their new managers really need is to read The One-Minute Manager.

Rather than learning advanced topics such as market positioning, segmentation, etc., surely we should start by helping people understand what it feels like to sit across the table from someone who you are trying to get to hire you? Something like Dale Carnegie’s How to Win Friends And Influence People.

Yet the One-Minute Manager and Dale Carnegie are rarely assigned texts (unless I’m out of date with what’s happening.)

Here’s my question for all of you: what are the essential but neglected (basic) business books that YOU think people should read that tend not to get assigned in formal courses? Where wouldyou recommend that people read to START to understand management, marketing, and other business essentials?