You’ve got an overflowing inbox and Dropbox docs, Twitter alerts and Slack chats—who needs one more thing to read? These new business books, of course, which offer doable, real-life advice for success. To save you (or your assistant) from skimming all six, we’ve boiled them down to their most effective advice.
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The Most Effective Pro Tips From The Year’s Best Biz Books
The Motivation Myth/Astroball/Bad Blood
Ask a Manager: How to Navigate Clueless Colleagues, Lunch-Stealing Bosses, and the Rest of Your Life at Work
Author: Alison Green
Best for: Anyone who’s been frustrated by a colleague or faced an awkward situation at the office. (So, every employee ever.)
Pro tip: Speak up about problems in a calm, direct and collaborative way. Use your social and professional capital (i.e., length of employment, seniority, relationship to your boss, how accommodating you’ve been to colleagues, etc.) to determine whether you’re in a position to speak up in the first place.
Crushing It: How Great Entrepreneurs Build Their Business and Influence and You Can, Too
Author: Gary Vaynerchuk
Best for: Aspiring influencers, the social media unsavvy or anyone trying to wrangle their business’s online presence.
Pro tip: The key to success is quickly, confidently and consistently generating as much (free) online content as possible. Want to get ahead of the Next Big Thing? Create a one-minute briefing from your brand for voice-first platforms like Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant.
Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup
Author: John Carreyrou
Best for: Those in the trenches of tech startups—or those who love to hate them.
Pro tip: Don’t lie to your clients or investors. (Duh.) Whether you’re suffering through an open-concept office or enjoying the free snacks, it’s a dishy escape.
Astroball: The New Way to Win it All
Author: Ben Reiter
Best for: Sports fans, and managers trying to build a team with chemistry.
Pro tip: Combine cutting-edge analytics and old-fashioned gut instinct to create a winning team. No matter how much talent is in the roster, all organizations have “fault lines” that hinder teamwork; essentially, a team needs chemistry to function at top capacity.
The Third Door: The Wild Quest to Uncover How the World's Most Successful People Launched Their Careers
Author: Alex Banayan
Best for: Those on the corporate ladder’s bottom rung, or career changers.
Pro tip: Looking someone in the eye is the best way to get a sense if he or she is genuine. (So, skip that email and set up a meeting.)
The Motivation Myth: How High Achievers Really Set Themselves Up to Win
Author: Jeff Haden
Best for: People burned by self-help books.
Pro tip: Instead of waiting for some internal kick-start to go chase your dreams, you can gradually create your own motivation by pausing to celebrate after each small step.
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