[Top 5] The Best of 2015...By James Altucher.

I don’t want to overwhelm you... I usually write lists of 10. Ten things I’m grateful for. Ten ideas a day. The New Year is weird. It’s a scam. But it inspires you. You start making lists. Reflecting and writing resolutions. Days later, you’re still on the couch. And it fades. Maybe next year? But you can stop that from happening. I had a lot of great interviews this year. Authors, astronauts, drug dealers-turned-philanthropists, entrepreneurs and vegans. I learn from these people. When you listen, you will, too. So here is what I want you to do...read through these, find the one that will help you the most today, and listen to it. Learn from it. You'll also learn about yourself. And from there, you have possibilities. A starting place... A New Year of your own. -

1. Freeway Rick Ross: How to Manage Your Employees When They’re All Carrying Guns

He’s the CEO of cocaine. But that’s not why he inspires me. He ran the world’s largest drug empire better than any company I’ve ever run. If you have a startup, a full-fledged business, an Etsy shop, an idea—anything from which you’re trying to make money—and you don’t listen to this interview, you’re taking a risk. And if you fail, you might deserve it. If I had the business acumen of Rick Ross, I’d be a lot better off. Or maybe I’d be in jail. But that’s the other reason why this interview is so powerful. He graduated from jail. Jail was like school for Rick Ross. Jail became an opportunity. He taught himself how to read. He was a grown adult, unable to read and unafraid of change. He changed. Really, he proves that you can be at your best even when you’re at your worst. He’s a philanthropist now. He’s a writer. He inspires me. He’ll get you high. No drugs necessary. -

2. Make the Impossible Possible – The Power of a Space Oddity

I hope you had a good year. Even though New Year’s is a scam. What’s so different about next week? Last week was nice. And two weeks from now could be good. You can start over anytime. I’ve said this before: Every day, I have to start from scratch. This interview will help you do that. It will teach you to believe in your dreams. Because when you hear astronaut Chris Hadfield talk about “the world in its completeness,” you believe. And that little bit helps. Chris says, “You will not reach the potential you’re capable of—which to me is the ultimate risk, the ultimate loss—if you let yourself be minimized by fear.” Listen to Chris Hadfield and you’ll find yourself believing in you more than you thought possible. And then you’ll start from scratch. -

3. Dan Ariely: Dishonesty, Irrationality, and Money

People aren’t rational. We lose focus in love, in business and in how we spend money. And we experience a lot of pain. But that can change. I learned a lot about rationality from Dan Ariely. He’s the author of three bestselling books that have helped me: “Predictably Irrational,” “The Upside of Irrationality” and “The Honest Truth About Dishonesty.” Dan started studying pain at 19. He couldn’t leave the hospital for three years. He had burns over 70% of his body. His skin was soft. The tissue was exposed. Every day, the nurses tore off his bandages. They did it quick. And he begged them to do it slowly. “They were doing it because their gut intuitions were wrong,” he says. “There was something inside them that told them the right approach was the ripping approach.” From that point on, he started thinking about all kinds of cases in which we think we know what's right, but our intuitions are wrong. That’s why there’s power in knowing how you think. Because then you can think about how to think differently. Dan says, “Think about something as mundane as shaving, and ask yourself if you can make the experience better. If you start calling it ‘my moment of caring in the morning’ it might better the experience than if you called it ‘my daily nuisance’ right?” He’s right. Some experiences don’t need to be as painful as we make them. Listen now and you’ll learn how to have less pain. -

4. Rich Roll: Stop Killing Yourself

He used to drink vodka tonics in the shower before heading to work. He was a lawyer, an alcoholic, and 50 pounds overweight. Now, he’s “an accomplished vegan ultra-endurance athlete.” “You realize gradually you’re living someone else’s life,” Rich says. But that’s why, if you’re lucky, you have a moment of clarity. This episode can be your moment of clarity. -

5. Art of Manliness

I’m about to sound like your father. I’m sorry. I’m going to tell you what it takes to achieve something great. If it weren’t for the times I spent sitting in a foam-padded closet, this podcast wouldn’t exist. For Brett McKay, founder of the website, The Art of Manliness, it’s the same story. I know a lot of listeners are going through something. You’d like to pursue a passion or build a business on the side or build a website. We talk about this. We talk about how he went from having a hobby to being a “founder.” He makes a lot of things clear. Like what makes you stand out. Not just in business. Also as a lover—specifically a man. He helps women in a different way. There’s a lot of clarity in The Art of Manliness. He explains what’s wrong with guys. And how we can grow up. Because men don’t grow up so seamlessly. Women are better at growing up. He tells me the difference between ancient Roman and 21st century manliness. “Manliness meant being a person or a man of virtue,” he says, “It meant developing temperance. It meant developing courage—not just physical and martial courage, but also moral and intellectual courage and being able to stand up for your beliefs or a cause. And a man who developed these virtues was given the title of ‘man.’ You’re not just born a man in ancient Rome or ancient Greece; you had to become one, and that was through virtuous living.” When I took tango lessons, the key thing I learned is that a woman could become a successful dancer if her partner is just really good at leading. In this episode, you’ll learn tricks to lead. And you’ll be the type of leader that helps others. You’ll be a strong leader. A good leader. And, if you listen to Brett, you’ll achieve something great. KINGSMITH.

2015 Was A Tipping Point For Six Technologies That Will Change The World By Vivek Wadhwa

To the average person, it may seem that the biggest technology advances of 2015 were the larger smartphone screens and small app updates. But a lot more happened than that. A broad range of technologies reached a tipping point, from cool science projects or objects of convenience for the rich, to inventions that will transform humanity. We haven’t seen anything of this magnitude since the invention of the printing press in the 1400s. Here are the six:
1. The Internet and knowledge
In the developed world, we have become used to having devices that connect and inform us and provide services on demand, and the developing world has largely been in the dark. As of 2015, however, nearly half of China’s population and a fifth of India’s population have gained Internet connectivity. India now has more Internet users than does the U.S., and China has twice as many.
Smartphones with the capabilities of today’s iPhone will cost less than $50 by 2020. By then, the efforts of Facebook, Google, OneWeb, and SpaceX to blanket the Earth with inexpensive Internet access through drones, balloons, and microsatellites will surely bear fruit. This means that we will see another three billion people come on line. Never before has all of humanity been connected in this way.
This will be particularly transformative for the developing world. Knowledge has always been a privilege of the rich; tyrants rule by keeping their populations ignorant. Soon, everyone, everywhere, will have access to the ocean of knowledge on the Internet. They will be able to learn about scientific advances as they happen. Social media will enable billions of people to share their experiences and help one another. Workers in the remotest villages of Africa will be able to offer digital services to the elite in Silicon Valley. Farmers will be able learn how to improve crop yields; artisans will gain access to global markets; and economies based on smartphone apps will flourish everywhere.
2. Doctors in our pockets
All of this has been made possible by advances in computing and networks. In a progression called Moore’s Law, computers continually get faster, cheaper, and smaller, doubling in speed every 18 months. Our $100 smartphones are more powerful than the supercomputers of the 1970s—which cost millions of dollars. With faster computers, it becomes possible to design more powerful sensors and artificial-intelligence (A.I.) systems. With better sensors, we can develop sophisticated medical devices, drone-based delivery systems, and smart cities; and, with A.I., we can develop self-driving cars, voice-recognition systems, and digital doctors. Yes, I am talking about applications that can diagnose our medical condition and prescribe remedies.
In 2015, smartphone-connected medical devices came into the mainstream. Most notably, Apple released a watch that, using a heart-rate sensor and accelerometer, can keep track of vital signs, activity, and lifestyles. Through its free Research Kit app, Apple provided the ability to monitor, on a global scale, the use of medicines and their efficacy. Microsoft, IBM, Samsung, and Google too, as well as a host of startups, are developing sensors and A.I.-based tools to do the work of doctors. These technologies are expensive and geared for the developed world; but companies in China, India, and Africa are working on inexpensive versions. The sensors that these devices use, and the computing and storage that A.I. systems need cost very little. Previous generations of medical advances were for the rich; now all can benefit.
3. Bitcoin and disintermediation
One of the most controversial technology advances of late is Bitcoin, an unregulated and uncontrolled digital currency. It gained notoriety for its use by criminals and hackers and the fall of its price from a peak of about $1100 to $250. Yet, in 2015, it gained acceptance by retailers such as Overstock.com. And the technology that underlies it, blockchain, became the basis of hundreds of technology-development efforts.
The blockchain is not useful just for finance. It is an almost incorruptible digital ledger that can be used to record practically anything that can be digitized: birth and death certificates, marriage licenses, deeds and titles of ownership, educational degrees, medical records, contracts, and votes. It has the potential to transform the lives of billions of people who lack bank accounts and access to the legal and administrative infrastructure that we take for granted.
4. Engineering of life
Another technology that came into the mainstream was CRISPR gene modification. Discovered by scientists only a few years ago, CRISPRs are elements of an ancient system that protects bacteria and other single-celled organisms from viruses, acquiring immunity to them by incorporating genetic elements from the virus invaders. Via CRISPRs, DNA can be edited, either removing unwanted sequences or inserting payload sequences, the genetic and chemical components necessary costing as little as $100.
CRISPR modification introduces many new risks if used wrongly—to edit human embryos, for example. But it could also be used to correct faulty DNA that’s responsible for genetic diseases such as cystic fibrosis, sickle-cell anemia, and Alzheimer’s, and to edit the genes of plants to produce more-nutritious food and require less water. Labs all over the world are working with this technology to solve a wide range of problems, and we will see breakthroughs.
5. The drone age
It is estimated that Americans will have purchased nearly half a million drones during this holiday season. With the cost of these flying machines falling to less than $100, the drone age has officially begun. We will see them everywhere. As the technologies advance, these will carry increasing amounts of weight and travel over longer distances. You can expect Amazon and Walmart to deliver your groceries and Starbucks to bring you your morning latte via drone. And they will monitor traffic and crime, perform building inspections, and provide emergency assistance in disasters.
These are an even bigger deal for the developing world. Large sections of Africa don’t have roads; remote towns and villages can’t get medical supplies; and large cities are clogged with traffic—much of it for delivery of small goods. Drones will solve many of these infrastructure problems and reduce pollution and traffic. They will also allow the constant monitoring of the Earth’s changing climate and wildlife ecology.
6. Saving the planet with unlimited clean energy
The biggest geopolitical breakthrough in clean energy in 2015 wasn’t the climate agreement in Paris, between 196 countries, to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide. It was the deal that U.S. lawmakers struck to extend tax credits for solar and wind capture for another five years. The good intentions of nations will only take us so far; the U.S. deal will accelerate the progress of clean energy world wide.
Solar and wind capture are already advancing on exponential curves, installation rates regularly doubling and costs falling. Even without the subsidies, the costs of U.S. solar installations could be halved by 2022, reducing the returns on investments in homes to less than four years. By, 2030, solar capture could provide 100 percent of today’s energy; by 2035, it could be free—just as cell-phone calls are today.
The tax credits for renewable energy generation will accelerate and ensure progress. Bloomberg New Energy Finance estimates that the extension will add an extra 20 gigawatts of solar power—more than every panel ever installed in the U.S. prior to 2015. “The US was already one of the world’s biggest clean-energy investors. This deal is like adding another America of solar power into the mix,” Bloomberg said.
We are also seeing similar advances in battery storage. Combined with the advances in energy, large swaths of the planet that don’t presently have electricity have the potential to light up in the early 2020s. Having unlimited, clean energy will be transformative for the developing world—and the planet.
So we have a lot to be cheerful about and a lot to look forward to during the years ahead, as technology makes its major leaps forward. We just have to be careful to use it for bettering mankind rather than for holding it back—because there are as many risks as opportunities.
KINGSMITH.

5 Big Money Stories of 2015 By Jill Schlesinger.

It’s that time of year…when we reflect on the year that was and look back at the big stories that shaped the financial world. Of course this is much easier than the futile attempt to predict the future at the beginning of the year, but in the spirit of full disclosure, I am going to note when I made the right call and when I missed the boat.
1. Federal Reserve Rate Hike: In 2015, the U.S. central bank did something that it had not done in over nine years: it raised short-term interest rates. With the economy growing at a decent, though not great 2.25 percent annualized pace, monthly job creation averaging 210,000 and unemployment sitting at a seven-year low of 5 percent, Fed Chair Janet Yellen and her cohorts decided to hike rates at their last policy meeting of the year. Future Fed actions should eventually return rates to the vicinity of 3.5 percent over the course of the next three years, but how markets will react to the normalization of policy is unknown. After all, this was the first increase in over nine years, competing the longest stretch without a fed hike in 25 years. To say that the economy is in uncharted and choppy waters may be the understatement of the decade.
JS CALL: I predicted that the first hike would occur in September, not in December, so not too far off!
2. China: 2015 began as China was in the midst of a stock market boom. The steep ascent started in mid-2014, after the Chinese government urged small investors to enter the market. “Policy makers and state media continued to trumpet the rally even as prices rose well beyond most reasonable estimates of fair valuation,” according to Capital Economics, as a full-blown bubble formed.
By the June 12th peak, the Shanghai Composite was up over 160 percent from the 2014 lows. Chinese officials stepped in to try to prick the bubble that it had fostered. Unfortunately, as is the case with most bubbles, pricks often lead to pops and the market tumbled by over 40 percent, before recovering some of the losses.
Economists were less concerned with the stock market and more worried about the waning pace of growth in China. The world’s second largest economy had seen 10+ percent growth for the past three decades, but in 2015, downshifted to a 5-6 percent pace. While China slowed down in 2015 and the stock market tanked, there was no catastrophic “hard landing” as many had predicted. However, the Chinese slowdown, combined with a strong U.S. dollar, made 2015 tough for U.S. manufacturers, who experienced their worst year since 2009.
JS CALL: While I thought that the Chinese economy would slow, I did not predict that the government would intervene in both the stock and currency markets.
3. Oil Plunge: After a 46 percent drubbing, which pushed crude futures down to $53.27 per barrel at the end of 2014, oil managed to trade above $60 early in 2015. But as news emerged that China was slowing down, the bears took hold. In addition to softening demand, global production remained high. Whether it was the U.S.-based frackers, OPEC nations, Russia or Brazil, the oil spigots remained wide open. As a reminder of Econ 101: weak demand + strong supply = lower prices. The savings at the gas pumps was supposed to propel retail sales in the US, but most Americans chose to save those extra pennies, rather than spend them in other parts of the economy.
JS CALL: This is one call that I completely blew…I had counted on OPEC nations curtailing output to push up the price of oil and to keep it in a range of $50-$70.
4. Greece: Another year, another flirtation with disaster for Greece and the euro zone. After an election, a snap referendum and lots of political gamesmanship, Greece accepted the harsh terms of yet another European bailout. The Greek Tragedy might be mistaken for comedy, if the human stakes were not so high.
JS CALL: The game of chicken between Greece and the euro zone went on far longer than I thought. I did not think the euro zone (led by Germany) would be as harsh as it was.
5. U.S. stock market correction It took four years, but U.S. stocks finally dropped by more than 10 percent in August. The main driver was the aforementioned Chinese economy. Investors feared that the slowdown in the world’s second largest economy, in addition to the cooling of once-hot emerging economies like Brazil and Russia, would negatively impact the rest of the world.
The swoon was notable for its brevity - depending on the index; it lasted for a few days to a couple of weeks. Investors were long overdue for the sell-off: according to Capital Research and Management, through 2014, 10 percent corrections occur about every year and 20 percent bear markets occur about every 3 ½ years, so we are also due for one of those—the last one ended in March 2009.
JS CALL: I thought that the correction would occur, but I had no idea that China would be the driving force. Instead, I thought it would occur as a result of the Greek debt stand off.
KINGSMITH.

How to Make Much Better Decisions in 2016 By Deepak Chopra.

A constant theme in my posts has been that awareness is the key to success. This applies most strongly when it comes to making decisions. With the aim of improving the decisions you make in 2016, let’s take a close look at how decision-making actually works, because most people base their decisions almost solely on how they acted in the past. Their minds are habituated to a certain style of thinking, which means that they are ill-equipped for new, unexpected challenges.
Decisions lead to actions, which is why they are important to begin with. But just as important is the sequence of steps that leads up it. A series of steps must be fully mastered; otherwise, action becomes erratic and unreliable. All-important action plans follow the same template.
The Anatomy of Action

1. A challenge presents itself.
2. The situation is assessed.
3. Consultation is called in.
4. A decision is made.
5. Action is taken - there is something to do.
6. A result is achieved.
7. Responsibility for the result is accepted.

What makes action far more difficult in the real world than any model can indicate is that all seven steps are generally present at the same time, -- challenges don't arrive in a neat linear sequence like boxcars on a railroad track. Every day is filled with things to assess, advice from others, and so on. This constant overlapping and merging means that you can't rely on a simple formula for action. Anyone who reads the biographies of great generals or captains of industry quickly realizes that the "fog of war" could be called "the fog of leadership" just as well. It takes consciousness to negotiate your way through murky situations. In most situations of great importance, this comes down to group consciousness - a decision-maker with a good team behind him has a better chance of arriving at the right action in time to make a difference.
The main lessons drawn from the past tend to lead to the following tactics:

1. Assess the ratio of risk to reward.
2. Know the situation. Gather as much external evidence as possible.
3. Judge your rival's tactics as best you can.
4. Gather a team which shares the same values and goals.
5. Think outside the box to avoid conventional wisdom and the rigidity it brings.
6. Learn to trust your instincts.
7. Generate enthusiasm, loyalty, and esprit de corps among your followers.

This is good advice, much of it appealing to common sense. But it skews decision-making toward the cool-headed and rational. That's fine in the classroom; it bears little resemblance to decision-making in real life, which is fraught with stress, time pressure, deadlines, internal squabbles, conflicting aims, anxiety, and the pervasive confusion that afflicts "the fog of war" but hardly stops there.
Psychological studies have shown that emotions cannot be separated from reason, and experiments that attempt to isolate rational thinking have almost entirely failed. For example, buyers will pay too much for retail goods if they are in either a bad mood (which makes them impatient to get the whole thing over with) or a good mood (which makes them feel over-confident and generous). Bidders will go over their limit in the heat of auctions, and they will even pay more than an item is worth if there's a rival they want to beat.

ONE WORLD: LUCY LIU & DEEPAK CHOPRA

Courtesy of Youtube/The ChopraWell

The focus necessarily turns to an arena that is hard to document and analyze in leadership courses. In this arena are intangibles of mood, temperament, personal chemistry, group behavior, social dynamics, and so on. Skill in these areas is real and invaluable, and the lessons to be learned need to begin early on. They look different from the rational angle taken so often in case studies.

1. Know yourself. Tune in to how you feel. Don't try to be a rational robot, but don't make decisions overshadowed by anger, jealousy, and fear.
2. See the mood of the team as a reflection of your own as their leader.
3. Earn your group's loyalty by emphasizing hope, trust, stability and compassion, the four things that followers most want from a leader.
4. Learn the pitfalls of ego - self-importance, bravado, winning at all costs.
5. Never do what you know to be wrong - moral decisions aren't guaranteed to work, but the opposite is guaranteed to have high personal costs.
6. Fully recognize and reward the achievements of others. Honest praise and encouragement from the leader is a valued good, just like a salary bonus.
7. Promote diverse opinions, but make sure that they are positive contributions. Naysayers, messengers of gloom and doom, and worst-case scenario experts should be avoided. Realism isn't the same as bad news.
8. As leader, remember that you are the messenger of vision, and there's only one of you to do that job.
9. Don’t promote an atmosphere for gambling and gun-slinging. It will lead to dishonest representation of a situation's risks.
10. Catch yourself if you see that your followers fear you. Fear can create discipline, but the drawback is that others will be reluctant to tell you hard truths when you need to hear them.

In the end, nothing replaces individual awareness, so you will benefit yourself if you look closely at the anatomy of action, with an eye to maximizing each step. Learning how to make your decisions more conscious should take priority in the coming year. It’s the one decision that makes all the others easier.
KINGSMITH.

5 Ways to Let Go and Enjoy Life By Brett Berhoff.

Today is December 18, 2015 and most of us are carrying a computer in our pocket (Some on our watch or integrated into our glasses). Mobile phones are a thing of the past, and pocket supercomputers are all the rage. What are you doing with your mobile device? Is it allowing you to let go and enjoy your life more, or do you find it is eating up precious time you'll never get back.

The paragraph above represents one of many things in modern life that can actually hinder letting go. It is often in life, we are presented illusions of enjoyment. However, when you take a step back from them, you realize, they are empty time wasters. Sometimes it isn't the device or thing you are doing, but it is how you are using it that can affect the outcome. Positioning is key for all success. It is important to pay attention to the position you are putting yourself in, and it's relation to the world.

Let's take a look at 5 Ways to Let Go and Enjoy Life

Experiment

Pick One thing on your "I've always wanted to try that" list, and DO IT! If you like it, find a way to integrate it into your life. This doesn't have to be bucket list type of stuff. Get creative with this list. It can be as simple as turning off your mobile phone, computer, and TV after 5pm for one evening. Unplug. See how it feels. Don't let the grid own you, own the grid. Experiment with Letting GO.

Stop Hanging out with Norm

We all know Norm(al). What is normal anyways? Is it normal to work 9-5, come home do the same thing every day, and complain about it? Maybe you see someone else doing something interesting to try, but in your mind's eye, that isn't "normal". Your friends and co-workers might not consider anything out of the "Norm" ok for you. Is that holding you back? Who is the referee of normal? Honestly, who really gives a shit! If you are not happy with Norm(al), then step out and have some fun!

Vacation Every Day

When are you "going" on your next vacation? Who invented the "staycation"? I'm not sure, but they were pretty smart. Of course if you're located in a freezing cold place in the winter, but would rather be in Hawaii, then location comes into play. However, we do have the option to focus on mindset. Many people who are going on vacation get into the "vacation mindset". They are able to shift from one gear to the next. If you have noticed, this can even happen days or weeks prior to physically leaving for vacation. Get in touch with your vacation mindset, and start using it today.

Unlock Your Mind

Get in the mood. It is important to provide yourself tools in which to unlock your mind to let go and enjoy your life to it's fullest. Tapping into our senses is an excellent start. Explore smells that brought you back to a great childhood memory. Find music that unlocks the mind to the place you want to be. Grab your air guitar and have a good time. (Personally, I do really well on the air guitar)

Laugh at it

Laughing is one of the greatest tools to unlock the mind but it deserves it's own section. Are you finding yourself not laughing enough? If there aren't any funny people in your life, and you're really not that funny, not to worry. Every type of comedy is covered by so many different really talented entertainers. See them live, watch their shows, read their books. Take it a step deeper, and find humor in the parts of life that provided previous frustration. Let laughing be one of your greatest tools, and best medicine.

Today is the day.
Now is the time.
Let Go and Enjoy your Life!

What are some ways you have found helpful in upgrading your lifestyle? What are your favorite life hacks? What's your favorite Joke? Let's laugh a little! Please comment below.
KINGSMITH.

Things you must know about your retirement By Manish Shah.

You’re truly on your own

This is true. As you approach your desired retirement age, you will find that your children start living by themselves. They will move out to study or start working in another city, or get married and settled abroad. With little choice left, you will have to look after yourself. Besides, retirement planning doesn’t provide the luxury of assisted aid.
There’s always help available to cover you while making important life decisions. Home loans to help you buy your first (or second) house, education loans and scholarships for your children’s education, loans to buy your car, etc. But when was the last time you heard of a loan to retire well? Sure, there are reverse home loan mortgages but the amount you get every month is a pittance. So, be sure to take this goal seriously as no one else will.

People are living a lot longer – so might you

It’s fairly common for people to live well into their eighties. For many, that’s at least 20 to 25 years of retired life. Put differently, you could have almost as long retired life as your working life. While it’s great to live longer, you also have to think about providing for yourself for that much longer.
Below is a calculation depicting how much a couple, aged 35 and 33, would require to save for retirement.

The factors taken into account while making the calculation include the couple’s monthly expenses and the age when they both intend to retire.

Understand how much you will need

This is the crux. And it’s not as simple as just inflating your current expenses at a certain inflation rate to arrive at a scary number that you will need to save in order to retire well. We created a BigDecisions retirement index based on 20 years of household data to help you more accurately estimate which expenses will go up only marginally because of lifestyle and family size changes as you age (like leisure and food) and those that will gallop ahead (like healthcare). This information can help you plan better for a comfortable retired life. The answers from our tools are likely to positively surprise you.
KINGSMITH.

The Best Business Books of 2015 By Matthew Bishop

Looking for a last minute holiday gift for the business person in your life, or something profitable to read when you get bored of talking to the family and nobody wants to play Monopoly? Here, in no particular order, are my top choices of books on business, finance and economics published in 2015:
The Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future The fashionable idea that smart machines are going to destroy gazillions of jobs fast and leave many of us with nothing better to do than write poetry has not totally convinced the economist in me. But Martin Ford, a Silicon Valley entrepreneur, makes a powerful, must read case, persuasive enough to win the FT & McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award.
From the Other Side of the World: Extraordinary Entrepreneurs, Unlikely Places No longer can it be taken for granted that the best entrepreneurs live in Silicon Valley. Elmira Bayrasli (an old friend) has scoured the world to find inspiring examples of business people overcoming significant obstacles to build thriving companies in countries ranging from Pakistan to Mexico. My review of the book is here. Want to find out where the next Steve Jobs may come from? This book is for you.
Leadership BS: Fixing Workplaces and Careers One Truth At a Time It is always a treat to interview Jeffrey Pfeffer, a Stanford professor who seems to get off on sticking the boot into the work of other business academics, especially if that work should lean in the direction of political correctness. In his latest book, he attacks what he sees as a huge steaming pot of BS that has been written on the topic of "leadership". Hugely entertaining, and full of insights.
Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioural Economics Like many disruptive ideas, behavioural economics met fierce resistance as it tried to humanise the dismal science. Richard Thaler, one of the pioneers of this new approach, has written a gripping personal account of the lengths and pettiness to which the economics establishment resorted in its efforts to resist it, and of the growing use of it to explain and "nudge" how humans behave.
Phishing For Phools: The Economics of Manipulation and Deception Two Nobel prize-winning economists, George Akerlof and Robert Shiller, have written a marvellous book on an important aspect of behavioural economics. They argue persuasively that markets often settle at an equilibrium in which some people make a handsome and sustainable profit by exploiting the ignorance or idiocy of others. A powerful counterblast against simplistic arguments asserting that "the market always knows best".
Work Rules! Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead Google is widely regarded as one of the world's best places to work. As the company's Head of People Operations, Laszlo Bock has played a key role in designing this extraordinary workplace. In this fascinating book, he sets out several important rules for creating a great work environment, as well as offering tips on how to get hired by the internet search giant (be a generalist; make your resume about your achievements not your job titles; in every job you do, always over deliver). You can read my take on the book here and watch an interview I did with Bock here.
The Summit. Bretton Woods 1944: J.M. Keynes and the Reshaping of the Global Economy As World War 2 drew to an end, a hotel in Bretton Woods played host to a conference to set the rules that would govern the global economy as peace returned. At the heart of this conference was a titanic struggle between Harry Dexter White, an American official later accused of being a spy for the Soviet Union, and the ailing great British economist, John Maynard Keynes. Ed Conway has written an extremely entertaining account of the goings-on in the New Hampshire woods, and of the significance for today's economy of what was agreed, and not agreed, there. You can read my review of the book in the New York Times here.
Other People’s Money: The Real Business of Finance The crash of 2008 revealed our financial system to be horribly flawed. But how did it get that way? And what should be done to fix it? John Kay (with whom I coauthored a few books a couple of decades ago) has written a highly readable and thought-provoking account, highlighting the agency problems that have arisen as a result of the industry managing so much of other people's money in ways that are often opaque and insufficiently accountable. Whilst I don't agree with all his proposed solutions, many of them deserve serious debate.
Smart Money: How High-Stakes Financial Innovation is Reshaping Our World - For the Better Since the crash of 2008, financial innovation has been widely damned (see previous book). Yet Andrew Palmer, a colleague at The Economist, has written a compelling contrarian account of why more, not less, financial innovation is needed if we are to create a financial system that truly benefits even the poorest and sickest people on the planet.
The Age of Cryptocurrency: How Bitcoin and Digital Money Are Challenging the Global Economic Order This has been the year in which fading hype about Bitcoin as a currency gave way to growing enthusiasm for the block chain technology that powers it. The Economist even ran a cover story about it. Michael Casey and Paul Vigna have written by far the best account to date of the history of Bitcoin and other attempts at cyber money making, and spell out block chain's revolutionary potential to transform the efficiency of finance throughout the digital world.
The Public Wealth of Nations: How Management of Public Assets Can
Boost or Bust Economic Growth The privatisation of government-owned assets has been a "thing" for so long now that it is easy to forget that states around the world still own trillions of dollars worth of land, buildings and businesses. In fact, according to this persuasive analysis by Dag Detter and Stefan Fölster, state-owned assets remain the largest pool of wealth in the world, worth twice the world's total pension savings and ten times the total of all the sovereign wealth funds on the planet. Many of these assets are terribly managed. Yet if they were properly run, they would generate an annual yield of $2.7 trillion dollars for governments to spend, more than current global expenditure on transport, power, water and communications. Whilst I can quibble with some of the detail, but this book deserves serious attention from policymakers.
The Silo Effect: The Peril of Expertise and the Promise of Breaking Down Barriers Why do intelligent people so often make bad choices, especially in business? According to Gillian Tett, the root of this problem all too often is that we work in silos, restrained by rules or behavioural norms that push us to behave in ways that we privately know to be dysfunctional. It is hard to quibble with her analysis, which is supported by some fascinating and alarming case studies. Breaking down barriers must be the answer, though even when confronted with the evidence about the problems of silos, getting rid of them remains awfully hard to do.
The Planet Remade: How Geoengineering Could Change the World What if the agreement just struck in Paris on measures to fight climate change does not deliver the goods - which, let's face it, would not come as a huge surprise? As some important innovators have started to realise, we might need to resort to a form of large scale human intervention known as "geoengineering". Oliver Morton, a colleague at The Economist, has written a fascinating book on what could be done if something drastic and fast working is needed to stop the planet getting more than 2 degrees warmer, whether by sucking carbon from the atmosphere or reducing the amount of sunlight getting through the clouds to cook us all.
Happy reading - and let me know of any books you feel I should have included!
KINGSMITH.