Ashok's Blog

Following is the list of my favorite books that can help improve your Leadership skills. The list is in not in any order. 1. How We Decide   2. Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action 3. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right 4. Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard 5. Six Thinking Hats 6. Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us 7. Confessions of a Public Speaker 8. Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive 9. A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future 10. Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success at Work and in Life One Conversation at a Time 11. Emotional Intelligence: 10th Anniversary Edition; Why It Can Matter More Than IQ 12. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die 13. Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In 14. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity 15. How to Castrate a Bull: Unexpected Lessons on Risk, Growth, and Succe

This book is  about how human mind make decisions and how we can make better decisions. Sometimes we need to think through the options we have and sometimes we need to listen to our emotions. The secret is to know when to use these different styles of thought. Reason and feelings have important strengths and weakness. Different situations require different strategies. How we decide should depend on what we are deciding.   Our reasoning is like the charioteer and our emotions are the horses. People have disparaged the emotional brain, blaming our feelings for our  mistakes. Emotions are crucial part of decision making. A brain that can't feel can't make up its mind. Since Plato we have been assured that a perfectly rational world would be perfect world. This is not true. The reality of the brain is that, sometimes, rationality can lead us astray. Choking is one of the example of the havoc that can be caused by too much thought. It's an illustration of rationality gon