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Books for communicators

On this episode of the Inside PR podcast, Gini Dietrich, Martin Waxman and Joseph Thornley talk about books that had lasting impact on us and that we would recommend to others:

What Would Google Do, by Jeff Jarvis, an annual read for Gini. Always inspiring. “It’s fun to watch the progression of my own business since I first read that book,” says Gini.

Spin Sucks, by Gini Dietrich. Martin says, “I’m not sucking up. I put it on the reading list for my social media course.”

Bowling Alone, by Robert Putnam, “A book written about how people were losing their social connections as they cocooned during the television age,” says Joe. A must-read to understand what social media freed us from.

Alone Together by Sherry Turkle. The other side of the social media and handheld device revolution. When can we be alone in a crowd?

Disruptive Power, by Taylor Owen. A contemporary take on how these trends have led to the era of non-hierarchical collective action.

Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman. Kahneman writes in an accessible fashion about how and why we make unpredictable decisions. A primer on behavioural economics that we can all understand.

Built to Sell, by John Warrillow and Bo Burlingham. Gini found this book invaluable in helping her to conceive of how to turn here services business into a process driven company that is scalable and less dependent on her personally.

The Art of Strategy, by Avinash K. Dixit and Barry J.J. Nalebuff. Martin read this book when he was selling his business. It helped him sort through his thinking about what strategy really is and how it differs from tactics and how to manage through situations in which people are acting on very different strategies.

These books made a difference in our thinking. And we return to them repeatedly. So, we recommend them without hesitation.

#IPRMustKnows

Also, on this episode, we cover:

• A recent study underlines the persistent problem of people not being able to discern the distinction between native advertising and  editorially-independent news on publishers’ websites.
• Snapchat adds to its content with a deal with Turner to develop original shows for Snapchat based on TBS programs.