Showing results by author "Instaread" in All Categories

In his memoir Into the Magic Shop, Dr. James R. Doty describes how simple meditative techniques have had a profound effect on both his personal and professional paths. His account traces his evolution from troubled child to struggling student to distinguished neurosurgeon, including his tenure as the CEO of a billion-dollar company. From the vantage of his current role as the founding director of a compassion-research center at Stanford University, he reflects on the ups and downs of his life so far.

Most companies rely on manipulations to attract customers and employees; they use short-term motivators that do not inspire or encourage loyalty. Customers who are not inspired will stop buying the product as soon as the company cannot keep up the manipulative strategies, and employees are less motivated and less productive when they are not inspired.

Patrick Lencioni's The Five Dysfunctions of a Team is about the reasons teams fail to work together for the collective good of an organization and ways to overcome these problems....

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less is a self-help book by Greg McKeown. The book outlines a minimalist approach to tasks and obligations by focusing on truly important goals and learning to turn down opportunities that do not directly contribute to meeting those goals. The modern fixation on multitasking and having it all has paradoxically resulted in accomplished, motivated people doing many relatively unimportant things poorly while neglecting their true goals....

Bessel van der Kolk, MD, explores the ways in which trauma rewires the brain and changes the way people experience the world. Trauma affects the mind and body immensely and prevents those affected from living in the present. Van der Kolk, who has researched trauma since the 1970s, first became interested in trauma after meeting with Vietnam veterans who had a very hard time living their lives after returning from the war.

PLEASE NOTE: This is key takeaways of the book and NOT the original book.

Team of Teams by General Stanley McChrystal is an examination of the process he began of restructuring the Joint Special Operations Command management style, from a rigid command structure to a cooperative team comprised of smaller specialized teams. While fighting Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), General McChrystal noted how the United States and coalition militaries were efficient war-fighting machines, but they were not adaptable or effective against the seemingly disordered AQI.

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us (2011) is a book about human motivations. Many of the prevailing ideas about why humans make decisions and operate the way they do aren't true or, at least, they are incomplete. Businesses, schools, and organizations are stuck in outdated, unexamined beliefs about human motivation. These beliefs are rooted in the idea of extrinsic motivation - that people make decisions based on external rewards and punishments.

Lilac Girls, Martha Hall Kelly's debut, is a World War II-era novel based on real people and events. The novel tells the intertwined stories of three women: Caroline Ferriday, a New York socialite and philanthropist; Kasia Kuzmerick, a Polish prisoner at the Ravensbrück concentration camp for women; and Herta Oberheuser, a Nazi doctor at Ravensbrück.

Please note: This is key takeaways and analysis of the book and not the original book. The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich is a manifesto calling for workers everywhere to rise up and flee their cubicles in pursuit of a life guided by their passions and not their paychecks. It offers a practical, step-by-step guide that can be followed by people who are not independently wealthy but who don't want to be slaves to their jobs until retirement.

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara tells the story of Jude St. Francis and the people in his life. Jude, left partially disabled by a terrifying injury as a teenager, is distraught about his past and hides most of that past and himself from others, even those closest to him. The relationships he forms as a young and older adult sustain him longer than he ever expected to live, but in the end, Jude has faced too much abuse and heartache to go on.

Leaders Eat Last by Simon Sinek advocates for a leadership style that focuses on serving others rather than pursuing shareholder goals or personal interests. Modern trends in leadership prioritize profits and executive bonuses over creating a healthy environment for employees. Leaders who think of themselves as serving their employees like family can increase job satisfaction and engagement, which reduces stress and increases productivity because employees feel secure.

Will Traynor, a 35-year-old quadriplegic, hired 26-year-old Louisa Clark as a personal assistant. As they grew close, he gave her six months to change his mind about assisted suicide. Will, a wealthy businessman, grew up privileged in the historic castle towering over rural Stortfold. His father was in charge of the castle while her dad was a groundskeeper. Will had to live with his parents after his accident.

Getting to Yes by Roger Fisher, William Ury, and Bruce Patton is a guide to using principled negotiation techniques, rather than positional bargaining that makes for less successful negotiations. Positional bargaining occurs when two people argue over a particular concession, usually reaching an arbitrary compromise. In those instances the agreement usually does not address the interests of both negotiators. Principled negotiations find more creative, wise outcomes to conflicts....

Set nearly 20 years after the events in To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee's classic American novel, Go Set a Watchman looks at the earlier book's beloved characters in a different and sometimes shocking light. Inside this Instaread Summary & Analysis of Go Set a Watchman you'll find a summary of the book, introductions to the important people in the book, and analysis of the themes and author's style.

Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few by Robert B. Reich examines the intersection of economics and politics in order to make sense of income inequality and wealth disparity in the 21st-century United States of America....

Platforms connect two types of users in order to exchange something of value. This is different from the traditional pipeline model of business where something of value is created by transferring it from producer to producer with the consumer receiving it at the last step. Platforms are dominating production processes particularly because they reduce the costs of value creation, consumption, and quality control.

The Intelligent Investor: The Definitive Book on Value Investing by Benjamin Graham, with commentary by Jason Zweig, is a thorough guide to the principles of portfolio creation, cost management, stock and bond picking, and stock ownership for the defensive, long-term investor....

The Goal: A Process of Ongoing Improvement by Eliyahu Goldratt and Jeff Cox describes a process by which an unprofitable manufacturing operation can be made profitable. It conveys proven factory turnaround principles through a fictional story....

Deep Work describes a method of engaging with one's professional efforts in a full and immersive manner to produce better results. This type of focused effort does not require longer hours. Instead, a seasoned practitioner can accomplish more in a shorter time frame. Furthermore, the product of this working style will be of a higher quality than what others produce when they attempt to work while succumbing to the noise of distractions around them, particularly those related to technological overload.

Jeannette Walls chronicles all the heartbreak, deprivation, humor, and love of her childhood in The Glass Castle, a memoir of growing up dirt-poor on a cross-country odyssey with her charismatic, but alcoholic, father and her codependent mother.