Top 10 Bestselling Management Books You Should Read

Top 10 Bestselling Management Books You Should Read

October 27, 2020

Management is a vast field that requires constant study. You need to be focused right from the beginning. Students choosing business management as a field start right after school and do a BBA degree, often followed by an MBA. They then get placed in various positions in corporate entities through India and the globe. Even when they're working, managers need to keep expanding their knowledge, and staying abreast with the latest trends, while having a solid background in management practices and strategy that can help them overcome any obstacles in the organisation.

Naturally, the key to expanding knowledge is by reading. While presentations, podcasts, videos and other forms of learning are cool and interesting, good old books deliver the real deal. You get a strong foundation and the latest information as you thumb through a book's pages. Reading can open up your mind, giving rise to new perspectives. Naturally, some of the best management books find themselves in the bookshelves of most budding managers. There are books for new managers and books for seasoned veterans. There are books on orthodox practices, and there are books on radical methods. However, all the best management books of all time have one thing in common. They contain invaluable information that can help you if you're planning to successfully scale the corporate ladder.

Here are some of the must-read management books of all time.

1. How to win friends and influence people - Dale Carnegie

This book is great for both managers and employees alike. Released in 1936, it has sold around 15 million copies. Expect rock-solid advice and enduring principles that can help you achieve your maximum potential in this complex and competitive corporate world. Valuable takeaways from this book include six ways to make people like you, twelve ways to win them over with your thinking, and nine ways to change the way people think, without arousing resentment.

2. The one thing you need to know - Marcus Buckingham

This absorbing book will take you on a journey, learning what makes great managers and leaders successful at what they do, which is guiding and motivating people. This book stresses that good managers need to look for strengths in an individual and focus on capitalising on them. This book is a complete guide to managing people by identifying their strengths and using them to help the organisation at large.

3. Financial Intelligence - Karen Berman and Joe Knight

This book focuses on the significance of financial awareness for a manager, so informed decisions may be taken. Acquaintance with basic financial concepts is required at every managerial level, and this book can do just that. Learn how financial decisions have an impact on the company and a manager's role to play.

4. In Search Of Excellence - Lessons From America's Best-Run Companies

A New York Times Bestseller for the better part of three years, this book contains the study of around 43 successful American firms, specialising in consumer goods, high technology and services. Each company is different, yet there are 8 basic management principles that they all use, for success.

5. Leadership is an Art - Max De Pree

One of the best books on leadership and management, this volume explores leadership as an art that needs to be felt, experienced and created. It shows how to apply leadership abilities as well as a sense of integrity to business management situations. While many argue that leadership cannot be learned, core leadership skills can indeed be picked up by reading the right books.

6. HBR's 10 Must Reads on Managing Yourself - The Harvard Business Review

This book is a compilation of 10 articles that have been selected from hundreds of Harvard Business Review Articles. These 10 articles focus on helping you maximise yourself. This book will inspire you to be engaged and energetic through your work life. Find out your deepest values. Get candid feedback. Refresh, mentally and physically. Balance work, life, and play. Moreover, learn to deal with distractions.

7. The Advantage - Patrick Lencioni

In this book, the author argues that the main difference between successful companies and others is good organisational health. If a company is whole, consistent and complete, it means its management, operations, and culture are unified. Healthy organisations far outperform their counterparts, are devoid of politics and confusion and provide an encouraging environment such that star performers never want to leave. This book is great for managers looking to bring a sea change of attitude into their workforce.

8. Playing To Win - How Strategy Really Works - AG Lafley and Roger L Martin

Strategy isn't easy. It requires people and companies to make specific choices about the future. Learn about strategy from two of the best-known business thinkers. Learn from the most successful corporate turnarounds of the past century. Learn how leaders in all organisations of all varieties can achieve strategic goals if they follow certain principles.

9. The Essential Drucker

This is perhaps one of the most famous must read management books of all time. A compilation of 26 selections from the works of the legendary figure also known as the Father of Modern Management. Learn valuable insight on management, learn how to overcome challenges and turn them into opportunities for growth. Find answers to commonly asked questions and challenges faced in management.

10. The First-Time Manager - Loren B Belker, Jim McCormick and Gary S Topchik

This book is great and is considered one of the best books for new female managers and male managers because it helps in imparting confidence. This book covers all the essentials for anyone who has never been supervised before. Learn about hiring and firing, managing time and managing people. This might not be a very fun read, but it is a classic for a very good reason. Whether you are starting on a new job, or you've just received a promotion, pick up this book to learn how to take things to the next level.

Contemporary best-selling management books often argue that customers are the most important element in the external environment. Do you agree? In what company situations might this statement be untru

Yes, customers are indeed the most important element in the external environment because, in the absence of customers, no company can imagine revenue generation. Customers buy the products and avail the services; they also promote the goods and services directly and also indirectly. Therefore, to earn income, customers are a must for all business entities.

When it comes to growth measurement and business expansion, the place of the most important element is taken over by the company's stakeholders....

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