Books That Will Change Your Life and Career - Business Insider

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9 Classic Books That Will ChangeYour Life And CareerFAISAL HOQUE , CONTRIBUTORDEC. 8, 2014, 4:43 PM

The appetite for booksthat inspire us, move usforward, and give us

practical guidance seemsto be only increasing.The publication of new business books alonetops 11,000 every year an overwhelming choicefor readers.

The ones that tend do well these days seem to

be grounded inhumanity.

Perhaps that's becausecreativity, innovation,leadership,ent repreneursh ip they all begin within us; each is very much a human process.

So naturally, the more we humanize the way we think and work, the more progress we

can make in these arenas. If we understand the mental and emotional drivers of innovation and creativity, we can be more innovative and creative.

Today's authors and thinkers have the privilege of standing on the shoulders of giants.Their works, a diverse arrangement of titles and backgrounds, have inspired me tounderstand what's behind things like mindfulness, creativity, innovation andleadership, and I believe they will inspire you, too:

"The Power of Myth " by Joseph Campbell

"Sit in a room and read and read and read. And read the right books by the right people. Your mind is brought onto that level, and you have a nice, mild, slow-burning rapture all the time." Joseph Campbell

When we talk about myth, we tend to marginalize the word to mythologize is to
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make grand, yes, but also to make unreal and un-relatable. Campbell, the comparativemythologist and student of Carl Jung, spent a lifetime explaining how the mythic may be the most real thing we have for myths are simply the ways we organize meaningin our lives.

"The Power of Myth" comes from a series of interviews he did with Bill Moyers at theconclusion of his career. By the end, we see the way Campbell structured meaning inhis life.

" As a Man Thinketh " (1902) by James Allen

"Thoughts of doubt and fearnever accomplish anything, and never can. They always lead to failure. Purpose, energy, powerto do, and all strong thoughtscease when doubt and fear creep

in. Self-control is strength. Right thought is mastery. Calmness is power." James Allen

James Allen was a Britishphilosophical author known forhis inspirational books andpoetry a pioneer of the self-

help movement. Born inLeicester, England, into a working-class family, his mothercould neither read nor write while his father, William, was afactory worker. In 1902, Allenpublished his third and mostfamous book "As a Man

Thinketh."

In more than a century it has become an inspirational classic, selling millions of copies worldwide and bringingfaith, inspiration, and self healing to all who have encountered it. It stimulates readersto seek perfection through the purity of thought. It helps us transform our thoughtsinto concrete actions that can result in the achievement of anything that we deeply desire in our heart.

"The Courage to Create " (1975) by Rollo May

"This passion for form is a way of trying to find and constitute meaning in life. And
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"creative destruction."

Schumpeter saw the shifts occurring in the world in his day, the movement away fromrigid standardization and toward the fluidity that we now know. He argued thatevolving institutions, entrepreneurship, and technological change are at the heart of economic growth. He also said that the incentive to innovate is what makes capitalismthe best economic system.

"The Human Side of Enterprise " (1960) by Douglas McGregor

"All managerial decisions and actions rest on assumptions about behavior...We canimprove our ability to control only if we recognize that control consists in selectiveadaptation to human nature rather than in attempting to make human natureconform to our wishes." Douglas McGregor

Douglas McGregor, an American social psychologist, in "The Human Side of Enterprise" originated some of the most innovative thinking on management

education and practice. In this book McGregor challenged many of the prevailingmanagerial assumptions about worker motivation and behavior. He proposed hisfamous X-Y theory.

McGregor's ideas suggest that there are two fundamental approaches to managingpeople. Many managers tend towards theory X, and generally get poor results.Enlightened managers use theory Y, which produces better performance and results,and allows people to grow and develop.

"Maslow on Management " (1998) by A.H. Maslow "One can choose to go back toward safety or forward toward growth. Growth must be chosen again and again; fear must be overcome again and again." Abraham Maslow

Coordinated by Maslow's daughter, Ann Kaplan, this book contains a series of Maslow's journal notes from the early 1960s. Considered to be a seminal work onhuman behavior in the workplace, it offers Maslow's theories on such issues as how toencourage people to express their creativity, the importance of psychological health,and leadership ideas that are commonly accepted notions in management circles atthe end of the twentieth century.

Although Maslow is most famous for his hierarchy of needs theory, this book fortoday's leaders develops ideas on enlightened management that puts emphasis on theindividual worker and posits that everyone prefers to be a prime mover rather than ahelpless pawn in the workplace.

"The Functions of the Executive " (1938) by Chester Barnard

"At a crisis in my youth he taught me the wisdom of choice: To try and fail is at least to learn; to fail to try is to suffer the inestimable loss of what might have been."
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Chester Barnard

Chester Barnard attendedHarvard University between1906 and 1909 where hemajored in economics;however, he did not obtain adegree.After rising throughthe ranks at AT&TCorporation, Barnard became president of New Jersey Bell between 1927and 1948. "The Functions of the Executive" presents thefunctions and methods of operating executives informal organizations. It was

one of the first to provide acomprehensive theory of cooperative behavior.Barnard was the first toinsist that an organizationcan only survive throughcooperative systems.

In many ways ChesterBarnard is the Peter

Drucker of pre-World WarII and the Jack Welch of the1920s and 30s. Many of the concepts and ideas of Chester Barnard are essential to theteachings of Peter Drucker. For example, his emphasis on defining the purpose of a business the purpose of a business is not to make a profit. Rather, profit is anessential condition for survival. His insight into what it takes to manage a largeorganization was light years ahead of his time.

"Sdhan: The Realisation of Life " (1913) by Nobel Laureate

Rabindranath Tagore"We can look upon a road from two different points of view. One regards it asdividing us from the object of our desire. In that case, we count every step of our journey over it as something obtained by force in the face of obstruction. The othersees it as the road which leads us to our destination, and as such, it is part of ourgoal. It is already the beginning of our attainment, and by journeying over it, wecan only gain that which within itself it offers to us." Rabindranath Tagore

Rabindranath Tagore was a Bengali "Renaissance man" who reshaped his region's

literature and music. He became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize inLiterature in 1913. Compiled and translated by Tagore from his Bengali lectures, the book consists of eight essays, in which Tagore answers some of the most profoundquestions of life: Why did God create this world? Why would a Perfect Being, insteadof remaining eternally
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concentrated in Himself, gothrough the trouble of manifesting the universe? Why does evil exist? Do love and beauty have a purpose?

Tagore masterfully brings the

spiritual truths behind theseprofound questions to light, withhis lucid explanations of theSanskrit verses of the Upanishads(Indian spiritual texts dating back to 800 B.C.) and the eternalteachings of Jesus and Buddha.

"The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying "(1904) by SogyalRinpoche

"We are fragmented into somany different aspects. We don't know who we really are, or what aspects of ourselves we should identify with or believe in. Somany contradictory voices,

dictates, and feelings fight forcontrol over our inner lives that we find ourselves scattered everywhere, in all directions, leaving nobody at home." Sogyal Rinpoche

This 400-page (yet surprisingly easy to read) book is a manual for life and death and asource of inspiration from the heart of the Tibetan tradition. "The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" is a compilation of Tibetan Buddhism exploring topics such askarma, rebirth, the nature of the mind, and finally on how to train your mind throughmeditation.

Over 3 million copies have been printed in 34 languages, and the book is available in80 countries. The first half of the book is about living and the other half is aboutdying. Contrary to the title, this book is not just for Buddhists. The author takes allreligions and even atheists into account and the teachings are by no means specific toa religion. It is about the human journey and how everything is interconnected.

Serial entrepreneur and author Faisal Hoque is the founder of SHADOKA and othercompanies. His newest book is " Everything Connects: How to Transform and Lead in the Age of Creativity, Innovation and Sustainability " (McGraw Hill, Spring 2014).

Copyright (c) 2014 by Faisal Hoque. All rights reserved. Follow him onTwitter @faisal_hoque .

* Copyright 2014 Business Insider Inc. All rights reserved.
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Books That Will Change Your Life and Career - Business Insider