LIBRARY

"Show me your books and I will tell you who you are."

Our curated library of unconventional insights worth sharing.

01

Book

Browse our selection of must-read books in strategy, organization, and AI.

03

Quotes

Find quotes of thought leaders to spark meaningful discussions within your team.

02

Articles

Find a curated list of essential readings published in leading magazines and those created by our team.

04

Videos

Explore a curated selection of videos offering valuable lessons in strategy, innovation, and AI.

Essential books

We often get the question which books are truly great. This is our selection of must-read books, organized by 3 areas: strategy, organization and AI. For each book we provide short commentary why these are essential.

Strategy

Must read to actually understand disruption. This is where it all started for me

Classic, as Mr. Drucker already clearly laid out different ways to think and act entrepreneurial and innovative, long before the buzz words

A very interesting read, albeit a bit theoretic, where the lens of disruption was applied to project the future.

Great guide for any company that needs to execute new growth

A clear perspective how to overcome the dilemma, how to drive innovation

Great explanation why some nations really took off, and others did not

The father of design thinking cannot be missed when learning strategy and innovation.

A clear guide on what it really means and takes to be customer centric

Comprehensive and easy to read overview of all key matters growth

Great guide if you want or need to enter a new growth area

A great read how to think about customers, and not about competition. Simon explains, in different terms, why thinking jobs to be done vs. data is critical.

A book about purpose which clearly explains why it’s so freakin’ important to have one defined.

Well structured and researched piece, providing a clear framework to define your growth strategy

A guide how to overcome the biggest flaw in strategy processes, being pushing today’s business forward, rather than pulling in future’s business.

Answer for corporates that might be disrupted

Organization

True eye opener as it upends everything you thought you knew about what makes people tick. For me it solved a big question why, even with the best innovation methods, we did not get teams to move at one of the world's leading consumer goods companies

Another classic, advocated by Daniel Grieder, Hugo Boss’s incredibly successful CEO

But can people be trusted or do they need to be controlled? Are they good or bad? Rutger explains why it’s the former, luckily. So there, we can safely work with a new critical assumption, which opens the door to

In this book he organizes and shares even more practices

Great read on how self-organizing really works in nature. Ants, a great example for human beings!

Well and if you wonder where the success of Nike came from, read this. It’s a great and very entertaining story

Great story of how Netflix became successful with practical example of driving a sense of autonomy

Diving into how humans operate, Kahneman cannot be missed

This book provides a strong view on how to make sure the right leaders pop up, avoiding all the changes the other above talk about

Welcome 21st century management. The guide that translates all of the above into implications for key management processes to stop, and those to start

Daniel double-clicks on many of the practices you can start to apply changing your organization

Essential to understanding culture and finding good metaphors (Beach and lilypond) to describe culture and change

Essential deep-dive into a key concept applied by Satya Nadella. What mindset is prevalent in your organization?

There is a gap between what science knows and what business does. This books aims to close that by some true myth busting and truth building.

Another critical element for real innovation is to get rid of anxiety to speak up, a critical factor for innovation. Amy’s seminal work defines why and how

Great insight with sports, corporate and cultural examples of building a high performance, truly safe and motivated group of people.

Very solid double click on the most cumbersome century-old process: budgeting. Bjarte shows the alternative and many follow

Fellow dutchmen Joost and Pim were done with corporate live and dedicated their work to finding great examples

The guide to understanding culture and choosing and adapting appropriate management practices vs blind copying USA-born methods

If you still wonder why Microsoft is so successful, read what Satya did in practice. He paid attention and applies it well

Brene Brown double clicks on removing anxiety, showing how to overcome the painful hurdles to be vulnerable

Another way of removing anxiety, enter humor! A proven catalyst for innovation

Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini provide all the evidence you need to start fighting bureaucracy in your organization. It costs so much money and it can be fixed, but not the way you think it does

The way to fix it is not a program but bottom-up revolution. Aaron explains how you do that

Guidebook any CHRO should read. A clear and fun description of combining people science and data to boost your company

Another classic. You want to know how you create a better team, here’s the 5 step approach

AI

In this book he organizes and shares even more practices

Deep exploration of the impact of AI on different professions. Essential to understanding the future of work

Very good background for anyone who wants to understand AI

The founder of deepminds lays out the risks of accelerating technologies incl. synthetic biology and robotics and how to contain

Deep exploration of the impact of AI on different professions. Essential to understanding the future of work

Articles for that aha moment

A short curated list of essential readings that offer diverse perspectives on strategy, innovation, and organizational leadership.

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In depth review of different ways to formulate strategy under high uncertainty. Beyond classic scenario modelling.

Describing jobs to be done and how to apply in a 5 min read.

Proving a cookbook for how to drive a creative yet structured ideation process. I worked with Joe, he is very good at this.

A classic on how to manage risks in any start-ups. A must-read for anyone venturing into something new.

Quotes for triggering a much needed discussion in your Team.

Strategy & innovation

That business purpose and business mission are so rarely given adequate thought is perhaps the most important cause of business frustration and failure.

Peter Drucker

Entrepreneurship is 'risky' mainly because so few of the so-called entrepreneurs know what they are doing.

Peter Drucker

For [target customers]. Who are dissatisfied with [the current offerings in the , market]. My idea/product is a [new idea or product category]. That provides [key problem/solution features]. Unlike [the competing product]. My idea/product is.

Venture Capitalist Geoff Moore

The purpose of business is to create and keep a customer.

Peter Drucker

Innovation is risky. Not innovating is risk.

Scott Anthony

Smart entrepreneurs aren’t cowboys – they are methodical managers of risk.

Eyring Gilberts

If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you shipped too late.

Reid Hoffman

A startup is an organization formed to search for a repeatable and scalable business model.

Steve Blank

Only 11 percent of executives feel strategic planning truly adds value.

Harvard Business Review

Investors and entrepreneurs should learn to be patient for growth, but impatient for profits.

Clayton Christensen

Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.

Mike Tyson

Organization & leadership

Most of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get their work done.

Peter Drucker

We do not want rules. We want values to aspire to that define what it means to be part of our tribe.

Owen Eastwood

Belonging is a wildly undervalued condition required for human performance.

Owen Eastwood

Control leads to compliance; autonomy leads to engagement.

Daniel Pink

Emotions if not checked, or neglected, they serve goal

#1: safety,instead of

#2:development.

Monique Schuurmans

Management is the most noble of professions if it’s practiced well. No other occupation offers as many ways to help others learn and grow, take responsibility and be recognized for achievement, and contribute to the success of a team.

Clay Christensen

A whopping 42% time spent on internal issues resolving disputes, wrangling resources, negotiating targets.

Bjarte Bogsnes

In an ordinary organisation, most people are doing a second job no one is paying them for, covering up their weaknesses, managing other people’s impressions on them and hiding their limitations.

Robert Kegan and Lisan Lahey

Only 3 per cent of leaders’ time today is spent on visioning, but three in four workers expect their leaders to paint pictures of the future.

Owen Eastwood

Hierarchies amplify or suppress information. Flat networks distribute it.

Tamsim Woolley-Barker

Culture is the way in which people solve problems.

Fons Trompenaars

Culture is a way of working together toward common goals that have been followed so frequently and so successfully that people don’t even think about trying to do things another way. If a culture has formed, people will autonomously do what they need to do to be successful.

Edgar Schein

Hierarchical organizations used to provide certainty. They try and still tell us where to go and when , what to do and how, which provide some illusion of stability.

Tamsim Woolley-Barker

Executives and managers may have the big picture but they lack vital local detail.

Tamsim Woolley-Barker

If leaders expect real learning, critical thinking, and change, then discomfort should be normalized.

Brene Brown

Feelings of insecurity over belonging trigger our fight, flight or freeze response.”

Owen Eastwood

Videos

A selection of videos we often use in our work to bring different insights across. Each video offering valuable lessons for strategy, innovation, or AI.

The classic milkshake story by Clayton Christensen. Explaining as no one else can, why and how to start with the customer.

Showcasing how a strong purpose triggers powerful new concepts and brand growth around the world.

Pitch early and clearly. Jack Ma shows how.

Steve Jobs masterpiece why one should always start with the customer.

Sir Jonathan Ives explains what attracted and kept him at Apple. This is what purposes does.

Curious about how LLMs actually work? Watch this insightful video.