2023 in Review
2023 has been a whirlwind for business, economics, and finance. From the shutdown of three major banks to the trial of cryptocurrency wunderkind Sam Bankman-Fried, from high-profile strikes in the entertainment and auto industries to the ongoing artificial intelligence gold rush, there's been a lot in the news to keep Questrom's fields of study front of mind. For this list, we're looking over some highlights in the BU Libraries catalog published in the last year. These books discuss the companies, people, and ideas that have shaped our world so far - and provide insights into what awaits us in 2024 and beyond.
Featured Reading
The Coming Wave : Technology, Power, and the Twenty-First Century's Greatest Dilemma
Location: Online
As co-founder of the pioneering AI company DeepMind, part of Google, Mustafa Suleyman has been at the center of this revolution. The coming decade, he argues, will be defined by this wave of powerful, fast-proliferating new technologies. In The Coming Wave, Suleyman shows how these forces will create immense prosperity but also threaten the nation-state, the foundation of global order. As our fragile governments sleepwalk into disaster, we face an existential dilemma: unprecedented harms on one side, the threat of overbearing surveillance on the other. Can we forge a narrow path between catastrophe and dystopia? This groundbreaking book from the ultimate AI insider establishes "the containment problem"--the task of maintaining control over powerful technologies--as the essential challenge of our age.
Unscripted: The Epic Battle for a Media Empire and the Redstone Family Legacy
Location: Online
In 2016, the fate of Paramount Global hung precariously in the balance. Its founder and head, ninety-three-year-old Sumner M. Redstone, was facing a very public lawsuit brought by a former romantic companion, Manuela Herzer--a lawsuit that placed Sumner's deteriorating health and questionable judgment under a harsh light. When his daughter, Shari, took control of her father's business, she faced the hostility of boards and management who for years had heard Sumner disparage her. Les Moonves, the popular CEO of CBS, felt particularly threatened and schemed with his allies on the board to strip Shari of power. But while he publicly battled Shari, news began to leak that Moonves had been involved in multiple instances of sexual misconduct, and he began working behind the scenes to try to make the stories disappear.
Right Kind of Wrong : The Science of Failing Well
Location: Online
A revolutionary guide that will transform your relationship with failure, from the pioneering researcher of psychological safety and award-winning Harvard Business School professor Amy Edmondson. In Right Kind of Wrong, Edmondson provides the framework to think, discuss, and practice failure wisely. Outlining the three archetypes of failure--basic, complex, and intelligent--Amy showcases how to minimize unproductive failure while maximizing what we gain from flubs of all stripes. She illustrates how we and our organizations can embrace our human fallibility, learn exactly when failure is our friend, and prevent most of it when it is not. This is the key to pursuing smart risks and preventing avoidable harm.
Best Business Books of 2023
Good Power: Leading Positive Change in Our Lives, Work, and World by
One of the world's most respected leaders, former IBM CEO Ginni Rometty overcame childhood and financial struggles to embark on a groundbreaking career that took her from entry-level engineer to eight years as the first woman CEO of an iconic global company. Forty years in business and public advocacy taught Rometty the transformative power of leadership that blends authenticity, relationships, and curiosity with vision, rigor, and conviction. In her personable yet direct voice, Rometty reveals experiences that taught her how to orchestrate change for clients, companies, and communities. Her lessons and stories offer a blueprint for how we can all drive meaningful change in positive ways-a concept she calls "good power." Good power is a purposeful, practical approach to problem-solving, available to anyone, at any time. It's a choice. The book begins with raw, vivid memories from Rometty's youth and early professional life as she reflects on the trauma and role models that influenced how she later thought about good power. Rometty then shares how she strived to use good power during her career and as a transformative CEO. Five principles-be in service of many stakeholders, build belief among skeptics, make tough choices, champion tech ethics and inclusion, be resilient-show how to navigate tension and build trust on the path to real change. She also shows how good power can scale to address urgent societal issues, even in our polarizing times. She encourages us to make a difference in ways that matter and recounts her own journey leading the skills-first hiring and training movement, providing proven solutions to connect more people to better jobs to create a more equitable future. Inspiring and edifying, Good Power offers a new approach to change that our world needs now.
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
All In on AI: How Smart Companies Win Big With Artificial Intelligence by
A fascinating look at the trailblazing companies using artificial intelligence to create new competitive advantage, from the author of the business classic, Competing on Analytics, and the head of Deloitte's US AI practice. Though most organizations are placing modest bets on artificial intelligence, there is a world-class group of companies that are going all-in on the technology and radically transforming their products, processes, strategies, customer relationships, and cultures. Though these organizations represent less than 1 percent of large companies, they are all high performers in their industries. They have better business models, make better decisions, have better relationships with their customers, offer better products and services, and command higher prices. Written by bestselling author Tom Davenport and Deloitte's Nitin Mittal, All-In on AI looks at artificial intelligence at its cutting edge from the viewpoint of established companies like Anthem, Ping An, Airbus, and Capital One. Filled with insights, strategies, and best practices, All-In on AI also provides leaders and their teams with the information they need to help their own companies take AI to the next level. If you're curious about the next phase in the implementation of artificial intelligence within companies, or if you're looking to adopt this powerful technology in a more robust way yourself, All-In on AI will give you a rare inside look at what the leading adopters are doing, while providing you with the tools to put AI at the core of everything you do.
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
Real-Time Leadership: Find Your Winning Moves When the Stakes Are High by
The best leaders, in the biggest moments, know how to read the situation, overcome their reflexes, and respond in the best way possible. You can too. The hardest part of leadership is mastering the inevitable high-risk, high-stakes challenges you will face. Whether you're making a split-second decision when your business is hit sideways or finding the best strategy to navigate business-critical long-term circumstances, how can you be at your best in the most crucial moments? It starts with overcoming your leadership reflexes and reactions to find the optimal response to any situation, which you can learn to do. Leadership coaching legends David Noble and Carol Kauffman show you how with their innovative new framework-MOVE-which equips you to slow down high-stakes situations before they speed you up. You'll learn to master the moment, generate options, and quickly evaluate them before acting. As you get better and better using the framework, you'll find you can recognize these moments as they arrive, like a great quarterback who can read defenses at the line of scrimmage, or a great conductor who anticipates what's needed to deliver a great performance. Noble and Kauffman are a dream team who bring decades of experience coaching thousands of leaders, along with a deep base of research, to show why their unique 2-on-1 coaching method works and how it's done. The framework comes to life through the personal stories of real leaders dealing with their own crucible moments. It's a compelling and demystifying look at how leadership coaching delivers results. When the stakes are highest, how can you be at your best? Start by learning this powerful and innovative framework so that you can read and respond-and keep moving forward.
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
Elon Musk by
#1 New York Times bestseller From the author of Steve Jobs and other bestselling biographies, this is the astonishingly intimate story of the most fascinating and controversial innovator of our era--a rule-breaking visionary who helped to lead the world into the era of electric vehicles, private space exploration, and artificial intelligence. Oh, and took over Twitter. When Elon Musk was a kid in South Africa, he was regularly beaten by bullies. One day a group pushed him down some concrete steps and kicked him until his face was a swollen ball of flesh. He was in the hospital for a week. But the physical scars were minor compared to the emotional ones inflicted by his father, an engineer, rogue, and charismatic fantasist. His father's impact on his psyche would linger. He developed into a tough yet vulnerable man-child, prone to abrupt Jekyll-and-Hyde mood swings, with an exceedingly high tolerance for risk, a craving for drama, an epic sense of mission, and a maniacal intensity that was callous and at times destructive. At the beginning of 2022--after a year marked by SpaceX launching thirty-one rockets into orbit, Tesla selling a million cars, and him becoming the richest man on earth--Musk spoke ruefully about his compulsion to stir up dramas. "I need to shift my mindset away from being in crisis mode, which it has been for about fourteen years now, or arguably most of my life," he said. It was a wistful comment, not a New Year's resolution. Even as he said it, he was secretly buying up shares of Twitter, the world's ultimate playground. Over the years, whenever he was in a dark place, his mind went back to being bullied on the playground. Now he had the chance to own the playground. For two years, Isaacson shadowed Musk, attended his meetings, walked his factories with him, and spent hours interviewing him, his family, friends, coworkers, and adversaries. The result is the revealing inside story, filled with amazing tales of triumphs and turmoil, that addresses the question: are the demons that drive Musk also what it takes to drive innovation and progress?
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
How Big Things Get Done by
The secrets to successfully planning and delivering ambitious, complex projects on any scale-from home renovation to space exploration-by the world's leading expert on megaprojects. Nothing is more inspiring than a big vision that becomes a triumphant, new reality. Think of how the Empire State Building went from a sketch to the jewel of New York's skyline in twenty-one months, or how Apple's iPod went from a project with a single employee to a product launch in eleven months. These are wonderful stories. But most of the time big visions turn into nightmares. Remember Boston's "Big Dig"? Almost every sizeable city in the world has such a fiasco in its backyard. In fact, no less than 92% of megaprojects come in over budget or over schedule, or both. The cost of California's high-speed rail project soared from $33 billion to $100 billon-and won't even go where promised. More modest endeavors, whether launching a small business, organizing a conference, or just finishing a work project on time, also commonly fail. Why? Understanding what distinguishes the triumphs from the failures has been the life's work of Oxford professor Bent Flyvbjerg, dubbed "the world's leading megaproject expert." In How Big Things Get Done, he identifies the errors in judgment and decision-making that lead projects, both big and small, to fail, and the research-based principles that will make you succeed with yours.
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
The Case for Good Jobs: How Great Companies Bring Dignity, Pay, and Meaning to Everyone's Work by
Imagine you are a leader in a large company, and you volunteer at a local soup kitchen, helping the needy who can't afford warm meals. On your way out, the director stops you and says, "I just need you to know that many of the people visiting our services are actually your employees." This really happened. The leader was shocked. He assumed that because the company paid market rate, the company was doing right by its employees. But market rate isn't a living wage. Market rate doesn't make good jobs. Many leaders want to provide good jobs. They want to pay more, provide dignity and meaning in people's work, and give them opportunities for growth. But they don't know how to start, or they don't think it can be done without hurting the bottom line. Most want to win with customers but are hobbled by a host of service and operational problems largely driven by high employee turnover-and that is partly driven by the low pay. It is indeed a vicious cycle, and Zeynep Ton is here to show the way out: why good jobs combined with strong operations always lead to good outcomes for the business. And why, more than ever in a post-pandemic world, failing to provide good jobs will catch up with you and threaten your business. Ton, the preeminent voice of the good jobs strategy, lays out plainly what most companies and leaders are doing wrong-and how to get it right. She shows that by choosing good jobs, companies are positioning themselves for future success. Practical, prescriptive, and often provocative, Leading with Good Jobs is essential reading for leaders of any company that wants to-needs to-choose excellence
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
Limitless: The Federal Reserve Takes On a New Age of Crisis by
The marble halls of the Federal Reserve have always held secrets; for decades the Fed did the utmost to preserve its room to maneuver, operating behind the scenes as much as possible. Yet over the past two decades, this elite world of bankers and economists speaking a language that only monetary experts could understand has been forced to change its ways. Amid rising inequality, weakening global economic prospects, and a pandemic, the central bank has entered into a new era of transparency and activism that has changed its role in modern society in subtle but remarkable ways.
Limitless tells the inside story of this deeply impactful transformation, and what it means for ordinary Americans. Focusing on characters such as the Fed chairman Jerome Powell; the Vice Chair for Supervision Randal Quarles; Vice Chair Lael Brainard; the Minneapolis Fed president Neel Kashkari; and the long-ago Fed Chair Marriner S. Eccles—and driven by the rising tension between Main Street and Wall Street—this is a page-turning account of the modern Fed’s inner workings during a crucial inflection point in history.
Location: OnlinePublication Date: 2023
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