The
best business reads list is always hard to frame. At the top PGDM College in
Delhi, Ishan
Institute of Management & Technology, the
faculty team has prepared a list of business reads ahead of the competitive
admission season to crack group discussion and personal interviews. While
preparing this list we have also given due weights to the utility of these
books for enhancing business acumen in addition to serving up as good pieces of
literature on business and management. Here is the list of the top business
reads and the key takeaways from these books.
My Years with General Motors
My
years with General Motors, is written by the former CEO of General Motors,
Alfred.P.Sloan. Sloan in his active years at the company was responsible for
its tremendous growth and transformation from being a U.S. based automobile
manufacturer to being a global company with footprints in the markets of
Western Europe and Asia later on. His take on the big picture of the company as
a whole, the working of the different departments of a company like parts of a
well oiled machine and finally the vision of being a customer centric company
rather than being a technology based one are the key takeaways. We refer to
this book in the first semester during our lectures and believe it is one of
the best references on papers like organizational behaviour or advance
management concepts.
Better India Better World
Better
India Better World, is a compilation of lectures delivered by the former CEO of
Infosys, N.R.Narayana Murthy. Regarded as one of the doyens of corporate
governance and business ethics, this book bases itself on the growth of the
company during the early days. The business model is well explained. The famous
Global Delivery Model conceptualized and implemented by Murthy and fellow
founders like Nilekani, Shibulal, Gopalakirshnan and Pai is an eye opener for
aspiring business leaders and managers even today. The PSPD model for risk
mitigation and the virtues of business forecasting for sustainability are also
key takeaways. At Ishan we recommend this book for papers like business
environment, corporate strategy and corporate governance. Murthy’s intellectual
class stands out like nobody else.
Thinking Strategically
Written
by Indian American economist Avinash Dixit and Barry Nalebuff from Princeton
and Yale universities, this is a book that combines game theory with strategic
management. We strongly recommend this book to STEM (science, technology,
engineering& mathematics) students for the papers of strategic management
and operations research. More than mere academics it shows how choice theory
can be affected by the availability and absence of reaction function based
outcomes in competitive situations. In our business lives we very often come
across situations where we have to compete against a rival with two specific
options such as attack/defend, lead/follow, innovate/imitate, etc. This is a
great read for dealing with situations.
How Stella Saved the Farm?
How
Stella Saved the Farm is an adaptation of the classic Animal Farm written by
George Orwell. Penned by Chris Trimble and C.Vijaygovindrajan of Tuck School of
Business, we recommend this book to students of humanities background. It is
perhaps the ultimate fun way to learn people management, leadership,
motivation, innovation and core competence from comic characters like Stella.
Written in lucid language and simplified for young minds this is a book that
shows that intellectual greatness in business management is about simplicity.
The book is great for doing role plays and the best part is that each chapter
ends with some questions for self study that can be of great help for
interviews.
The Country of First Boys
The
Country of First Boys written by India’s only Nobel winning economist Amartya
Sen may not be deemed as a business book at all. It may also not be deemed to
be a book on economics. The mistake is not in the definition of the book but in
the notions that business school graduates and managers develop about economic
development. Most business leaders in Europe and U.S believe that economic
development is about liberalizing the economic system of trade and non trade
barriers, financial and banking sector reforms and industrialization. The Asian
model of economic development as applied in countries like Singapore, Malaysia,
Thailand or even Hong Kong has the quality improvement of people at its centre.
As the name of the book suggests economic growth in India does not reflect in
gender diversity and thus conspicuously overlook women in economic development.
It is a must read for group discussions on issues of growth, gender diversity,
poverty, regional imbalances and welfare state.
Some of the best MBA colleges in Delhi NCR do well in academics and placement because of the education software that goes into administering marketable skill formation in students. Ishan is a top PGDM college in Delhi and the first graduate business school in Greater Noida.