Last time I wrote about books, I claimed I don’t read enough. Barely 7 books per year as of 2019. This year, that has changed.
I more than doubled the amount of books I read this year, with 17 total books.
In fact, 2020 has actually been pretty good for me, I’ll admit. At the beginning of October I joined Pleo, a business expense solution company, here in Denmark. As part of my onboarding, I was given a handful of books to read which was also great.
Here are my top six picks for product managers in 2021:
1. Inspired by Matty Cagan
Yes, I should’ve read this one a long time ago.
This book is made up of over 60 short, easy-to-consume chapters. It almost feels more like a collection of blog posts than a book, but it’s really easy to read!
Matty Cagan is super insightful, and while some of it may seem obvious, his takes on learnings, focusing on problems, and seeing customer’s processes for yourself are refreshing and great even for experienced product managers.
This is a book I’d recommend to non-PMs too, as it also shows how innovation often comes from the bottom, not the top.
Amazon: INSPIRED: How to Create Tech Products Customers Love (Silicon Valley Product Group)
2. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries
The Lean Startup is a set of methodologies that helps you understand how to run lean initiatives. It’s not just for startups, but also for initiatives inside bigger companies.
Eric Ries teaches you how to pivot, how to grow, and how to get maximum learning through experimentation.
I loved reading about determining product market fit and the build-measure-learn feedback loop. Even though most of this seems trivial, it’s once again great to see it spelled out.
3. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
This is the easiest book I read this year. It’s such a wonderful page-turner, and not a classic “business” book.
Patrck Lencioni tells a super compelling story of a management team at a fake Silicon Valley company.
Even though it’s fiction, it hits a little too close to home. I’ve been more than one of those team members at some time in the last 3 years. It’s interesting also because I felt like I would fire myself after reading this book, because I behaved “suboptimally” if I may say so myself.
One of my key takeaways is that even if someone “delivers”, they can still drag a team down.
Amazon: The Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Leadership Fable
4. The Sprint Book by Jake Knapp
I wrote about this book last year. Jake Knapp and co walk you through running a 5-day sprint – from brainstorming to almost delivering a feature. I found it extremely useful in organizing my product team around user goals rather than technology.
It’s really insightful and serves as my go-to guide for running sprints and solving difficult problems with the rest of my team.
Amazon: Sprint (How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days)
5. I’m Afraid Debbie From Marketing Has Left for the Day by Morten Münster
This book is mostly a collection of references to other works, including many by leading psychologists and researchers like Daniel Kahneman.
This book is interesting because it makes you think about how people actually behave – regardless of how we design things for them.
Humans are fickle, and we must take that into account.
6. No Rules Rules by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer
Probably one of the most interesting books I read this year, as I was joining Pleo, a company that is based on trusting employees.
This book is written with alternating sections based on interviews with hundreds of Netflix employees.
Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer go over how to hire the best talent, increase candor and transparency, and build trust, including when scaling.
Many parts of the book felt counter-intuitive at first, but creates a very compelling framework for building teams with a new approach.
Amazon: No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of Reinvention
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