The Best Business Books Ever: The 100 Most Influential Management Books You'll Never Have Time to Read

by Perseus Publishing

Given the urgency and immediacy of so many business problems and challenges, a solid grounding in the history and evolution of business thinking will help managers separate fad from fact and apply the cumulative wisdom of the writers whose ideas have demonstrated profound and lasting impact. From Sun Tzu's timeless Art of War to the inventors of modern management in the 1920s-'40s to the books that have the captured the New Economy Zeitgeist, The Best Business Books Ever illuminates the key ideas and contributions of the 100 books that should form the basis of any manager's, business student's, or entrepreneur's library. The Best Business Books Ever places both historical and contemporary works in context and draws fascinating parallels and points of connection between books from different places and times, all of which have contributed to our collective understanding and practice of the art of management.

Genres: Business, Reference

240 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 2003

Reviews

[Ashraf Haggag · Rating 4 out of 5]

It is a wonderful reference to look at when reading business and management book , Strongly recommending it

[Andrew Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book has become less relevant as it's aged, but I still found dozens of entries useful, mostly from the perspective of understanding how management thinking developed. My major complaint is organizational: it's alphabetical by book title, despite the authors generally being more memorable than their titles, and it makes almost no mention of when the works were published. It should have been chronological, preferably by business discipline. I ended up using the index to read in alphabetical order by author. The entry quality also varies somewhat, with a few that are wordy and unclear. On the plus side, all the entries are bite-sized, so a single work break is good for about 2 of them.

Edit: I added a star after returning to business school classes and experiencing the value of catching multiple new references to foundational works of business literature per day - simple familiarity with the authors and titles is a confidence boost.