The 3 Books to Read in October

The “3 to Read” series took a little bit of a break the last two months, but we are back in business with 3 new books to enjoy this October. The last couple of months have been a pretty hectic time in our life. Who knew planning a transatlantic move, with pets, in the middle of a global pandemic would be such a logistical nightmare? Luckily, at the time of writing this post, most fires have been put out, and our move is looking like it will happen as smoothly as you could expect in today’s current environment. Beyond planning for this crazy move, we have managed to take two much needed getaways to Portugal (post coming soon!) and Paris. Laying on a beach in the Algarve and sipping wine and eating a baguette in the park in front of the Eiffel Tower can have a therapeutic effect on a person. Unfortunately, due to the circumstances that accompany this pandemic, it looks like our European adventures have come to a close. Thankfully, it will take years for me to run out of places, countries, and trips that we have taken before I run out of things to write about. So, fear not, you can continue to live vicariously through my travels on this website for years to come.

Say what you want about Amazon and Jeff Bezos, but what they have been able to accomplish in the e-commerce arena since their inception in 1994 is nothing short of amazing. In The Everything Store, the Brad Stone takes you on a journey through the entire history of Amazon (formerly known as Cadabra), and some rare insight into Bezos’ personal life. One of the more interesting things that I took out of reading this book was Bezos’ leadership style. I didn’t really peg Bezos as a Steve Jobs type of leader, where work is your life, and you are an idiot if you have a life outside of your job. I believe that working your tail off to get ahead is very important, but I also believe that if you don’t allow your subordinates to have any semblance of a personal life, then you are a terrible boss. As opposed to a lot of books that address how the 2008 financial crisis affected them, this book talks a bit about how the dot-com bubble bursting almost erased Amazon forever. Some very questionable acquisitions and management issues really brought Amazon to the brink of insolvency. I had no idea that the Amazon we know today almost ceased to exist. It is pretty crazy to think that twenty years ago Amazon got all the way down to about $6/share. As of today, Amazon is trading at almost $3,200/share. That is a cool 53,233% gain in just twenty years. Like I said at the beginning of this blurb, say what you want about Amazon and Jeff Bezos, but that is just an absurd statistic. Amazon is the future of e-commerce whether we like it or not, and that is exactly what Jeff Bezos set out to do. Jeff Bezos is the human embodiment of “the customer is always right.” He said he wanted to create an “everything store” for the consumer when he came up with the idea for Amazon, and twenty years later we have a place to go where we can find any weird thing that we never knew we needed. Guess what? Two days later, it’s on your front porch. The everything store is a machine that will only continue to pump faster and better for the consumer as long as Jeff Bezos has anything to say about it.

Disney is a company that is seemingly involved in nearly every facet of entertainment that a company could be involved in. The acquisitions and decisions they have made in the last twenty or so years has put the company at heights that even Walt Disney could have never imagined they would reach. I had heard a lot of good things about this book, so I was excited to finally be able to read it. The book takes you through Iger’s entire career path from lowly errand boy on ABC sets, all the way up to being President/COO of Disney. It truly is a work hard and hustle to get where you want to be type of story. There is a section of the book that really stands out to me where Iger talks about how he turned Disney’s soured relationship with Pixar in the early 2000’s, into a great friendship with Steve Jobs and an immensely successful partnership between the two companies. That section was really captivating and moving to read because it showed a human side to Jobs that was not often broadcasted for the world to see. It was a nice illustration of how two incredible businessmen did business together, the right way, and respect each other as innovators. It is an especially moving part of the book because Iger recalls when Jobs tells him that his cancer is progressing, and he is not likely to live too much longer. Jobs tells him this mere minutes before they are about to announce Disney and Pixar’s new relationship. Iger was the first person to know about the new spread of his cancer outside of Jobs, his wife, and his doctor, and you can really feel the weight of the moment in reading the book.

Something interesting that I took from the book is how Iger’s leadership style is remarkably similar to Jim Mattis’ leadership style. I read their books back to back, so the similarities were much more glaring. Iger is all about letting the leaders that he has chosen to lead, lead. One of his first decisions as COO was to decentralize Disney’s decision-making processes. I think as an organizational leader, it is important to entrust the people that you hired to do their job correctly without them having to run their decision by you. You hired them for a reason, let them be great at what they do. This was one of the better books I have read recently, and I highly recommend it to leaders and to people in positions of power. Iger is one of the best leaders in business, and this book is a great dive into his thoughts on leadership and innovation.

When I think of military leaders, my mind usually goes to one of two people: Gen. Patton or Gen. Jim Mattis. It makes a lot of sense that Mattis would write a book on leadership and how his leadership style led to such great success on the battlefield. While this book is full of military buzzwords, and a little eye-roll inducing at times, it is still a good read on how decentralizing decision making and making sure the people you placed in positions of leadership are explicitly clear on what the organization's overall goals are. Mattis repeats multiple times that if everyone is on the same page, you can worry about your own tasks as CEO, and not worry what your account manager is doing. That really is the prevailing theme of this book. By making sure what you want as the leader of the organization is known, it allows everyone else to act accordingly with that in mind and do so at their best abilities. Beyond the leadership advice, it is an interesting read on the path of Mattis’ career all the way up to general, and the stories he shares from his time serving in the Middle East are pretty awesome to read about. Just like The Ride of a Lifetime, I definitely recommend giving this a read if you are in a position of leadership or power. There are some great tips on leading a massive unit of people and achieving great success.