Reading List

What to Read Next

• The Smartest Guys in the Room (McLean & Elkind)
• Unequaled (James Runde) - Schlottman recommended this book in a Wall Street Journal article
• Peopleware

Business Insider's 15 Best Business Books of All Time

Books from this list I've read (every one of these has been amazing):

• Liar's Poker (Michael Lewis)
• The Intelligent Investor (Benjamin Graham)
• The Black Swan (Nassim Nicholas Taleb)
• Good to Great (Jim Collins)
• When Genius Failed (Roger Lowenstein) - case study used in options trading class at U.C.
• The Lean Startup (Eric Ries)
• The Innovator's Dilemma (Clayton M. Christensen) - Jeff Bezos listed this as an influential book

Books from this list I haven't read (but probably should):

• Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco - this was used as a case study in college
• Den of Thieves (James Stewart)
• Too Big to Fail (Andrew Ross Sorkin)
• The Essays of Warren Buffet (Warren Buffet)
• The Smartest Guys in the Room (McLean & Elkind)
• Lords of Finance (Liaquat Ahamed)
• Thinking, Fast and Slow (Daniel Kahneman)
• Reminiscences of a Stock Operator (Edwin Lefevre)

Recommendations from Heinrich:

• The Next Level – What Insiders Know About Executive Success (Scott Eblin)
• The 360 Degree Leader – Developing Your Influence (John Maxwell)
• Switch – How to Change Things When Things are Hard (Chip & Dan Heath)
• The Charisma Myth – How Anyone can Master the Art and Science of Personal Magnetism (Olivia Fox Cabane)
• Leading Change (John Cauter)

Past Reads

Loonshots

• Author: Safi Bahcall
• Theme: Business Strategy
• Date: May 2020
• Rating Great

Loonshots (How to Nurture the Crazy Ideas That Win Wars, Cure Diseases, and Transform Industries) demonstrates the author's belief that "loonshots" are both necessary to a company's survival and nearly impossible to develop in a large organization that focuses on low-risk "franchise" projects. The author shows how incentives drive people in large companies to focus on these low-risk projects rather than the high-risk/longshot/high-reward projects that are more likely to grow in small, startup companies. Safi uses multiple examples from history (including radar in WW2, biotech and disease research, movies at Pixar, airline companies, the Polaroid camera, Steve Jobs, Isaac Newton, and others) to demonstrate his point. The stories make this book a fun and fast read. Even though the thesis is almost self-evident and doesn't need this much supporting evidence, it is still a great read with a lot of history and lessons learned from history. The conclusions and suggestions are also VERY applicable to Kroger.

Link to My Notes

Creativity, Inc.

• Author: Ed Catmull
• Theme: Business Strategy
• Rating: Great
• Date: December 2018

Ed Catmull is the founder and CEO of Pixar. This book explains how his early fascination with computer-generated graphics in college and his desire to create the first computer-generated animated movie turned into Pixar and Toy Story. He also dives deep into the culture at Pixar, showing how they create a culture of creativity where artists can develop their stories (a process that often takes years) with feedback from others in a non-threatening environment that encourages everyone to grow. Along the way, the company is bought by Steve Jobs, and even Steve learns to be a better manager from the lessons taught at Pixar. Great book if you consider yourself an artist or creator and want to know how to inspire creativity and growth in others.

Recommended by: Heather Ackles

Measure What Matters

• Author: John Doerr
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Good
• Date: September 2018

This book explains the practice of setting OKRs (Objectives and Key Results). The author is a private equity investor whose company has worked with several west coast startups. He was also involved with Google and taught them how to use OKRs. The basic idea is to set goals at the corporate level, publish them, track progress, and encourage others to set goals that align with these high-value ones. Google does this very publicly with every employee posting goals on their corporate intranet page or even outside their office. Everyone knows what everyone else is working on and can help support these efforts.

Recommended by: Ryan Kean (He made all of his managers in EIM read this book.)

Data Science on the Google Cloud Platform

• Author: Valliappa Lakshmanan
• Theme: Data Science, I/T
• Rating: Excellent
• Date: July 2018

Great book. The author was a data scientist at a weather research company that began using Google cloud to speed up their data science work by orders of magnitude. He then joined Google and became an evangelist for the cloud. He walks you through a sample data science project (predicting whether a plan will be late) and shows how to use various components of GCP (GCE, CloudSQL, GCS, BigQuery, Data Studio, Data Lab, Spark, PubSub, CloudML, and others). This is by far the best introduction to Google Cloud (especially with a focus on data science) that I have seen. The author also teaches classes on Coursera that are very good.

Recommended by: Andy Muse (He was reading this book to learn more about Google Cloud)

Work Rules! Insights from Inside Google that will Transform How you Live and Lead

• Author: Laszlo Bock
• Theme: People Operations
• Rating: Great
• Date: June 2018

The VP of People Operations at Google describes the culture and practices at that make them one of the most admired and best companies to work for. Doug Meiser mandated that all of his managers read this and to take insight from it for how we should think about running the Operations Research and Data Science team at Kroger. Great read for anyone looking for ways to transform the workplace, encourage greatness and openness, and re-think corporate culture.

Recommended by: Doug Meiser

Link to My Notes

The Innovator's Solution

• Author: Clayton M. Christensen
• Theme: Business Strategy
• Rating: (not finished)
• Date: May 2018

A deeper look into how to succeed with disruptive innovations. This examines the type of company or business unit you want to create as well as things like what products should you build and what markets should you sell to. A great follow-up to The Innovator's Dilemma to help you think through disruptive change and how to position your company to profit from it.

The Innovator's Dilemma

• Author: Clayton M. Christensen
• Theme: Business Strategy
• Rating: Great
• Date: May 2018

A classic in disruptive innovation, this book examines the reasons why big companies miss the biggest innovations in their fields and often perish as a result. Christensen divides innovations into two types: sustaining and disruptive. Sustaining innovations, those that add features that current customers value, are almost always achieved first by big companies. Disruptive innovations, those that build products for new markets and new value chains, are almost always mastered by emerging companies first. These are the industry-changers that could upend the established companies' entire business models. In order to survive, big companies must allocate resources to small, start-up like units to pursue these ill-defined products in new markets with new customers if they don't want to be the victims of disruption.

Jeff Bezos listed this as an influential book.

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't

• Author: Jim Collins
• Theme: Business Strategy
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2017

An amazing book summarizing years of research into what makes a good company become great. The study identified 11 companies with average performance that suddenly turned a corner and produced stellar results over a period of at least 10 years. They compare them to baseline companies that started similarly but never improved to see what was different. Great book with great insights. I'm struggling with how to put some of the insights into action - especially when the first one is to carefully select the people you work with (which isn't always an option at a large company.) Oh, and Kroger was one of the companies features in this book!

The Lean Startup

• Author: Eric Reis
• Theme: I/T Strategy
• Rating: (not finished)
• Date: 2017

Popular book that describes a way of doing business that is intended for start-ups working in highly uncertain environments. The central piece of advice is to understand your customer by delivering software as quickly as possible (MVP) and then getting real-world feedback on it. This allows you to double-down on winning strategies and pivot away from unsuccessful ones.

Recommended by: Heinrich Stander

Scrum: The Art of Doing Twice the Work in Half the Time

• Author: Jeff Sutherland
• Theme: Management (Scrum)
• Rating: Life Changing!
• Date: 2017

One of the best books I've ever read! Great intro to scrum at a high-level, conceptual level. Jeff explains what motivated him to create scrum and provides background on some of the foundational principles. Some criticize the book for not being detailed enough to actually implement scrum, but I'm the type who finds the concepts and principles more important than the details. Many recommend this as an intro book to get excited about scrum before diving into the practical details.

Business Adventures

• Author: John Brooks
• Theme: Business
• Rating: (not finished)
• Date: 2017

Interesting content, but WAY too wordy... The stories just go on and on when the content could have been communicated so much more succinctly. Good content. Pretty dull read though.

Recommended by: Bill Gates (For some reason he said this was the best business book he ever read)

High Output Management

• Author: Andrew Grove (CEO, Intel)
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Excellent
• Date: 2016

Great book! Reading this book is like being mentored directly by the CEO. Grove is able to simplify management concepts to just a few basic ideas and provide practical advice about how to manage both your team and a whole company. His advice is based on lots of past experience - which he freely shares. Very good and approachable book!

Great review of this book here.

SQL Antipatterns

• Author: Bill Karwin
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2016

Great book about common mistakes made when building a relational database. You learn what to do by learning what not to do. (Sadly, I've seen every one of these mistakes made in production systems at Kroger, and I might have even done a few myself... but at least now I know they're mistakes!)

Recommended by: Don Humberson

The Data Warehouse Lifecycle Toolkit

• Author: Ralph Kimball
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: (not finished)
• Date: 2017

Building the Data Warehouse

• Author: Bill Inmon
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: Good
• Date: 2017

Very good book on the original theory of the data warehouse. A lot of the material is very dated, but even the older material is good for people like me who weren't around when these developments took place. Big idea: data warehouse should have normalized tables and no one should actually use it. Instead, it is a central place to store data and a source for departmental data marts (using star-schemas) that are actually built for end-users and analytics.

Recommended by: Tony Mazza

Data Governance

• Author: John Ladley
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2016

A little boring, but good intro to the topic.

Making EIM Work for Business

• Author: John Ladley
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2016

A little boring (and WAY TOO LONG), but still a good intro to some topics.

The New Science of Retailing

• Author: Marshall Fisher and Ananth Raman
• Theme: Retailing
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2015

Amazing book describing different problems in retailing and how analytics can be applied to them. The case studies and proposals are highly relevant to what we do at Kroger and someone could make a whole career out of simply implementing some of these ideas.

Recommended by: Jonathan Olsen

The Machine That Changed the World

• Author: James Womack
• Theme: Management
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2015

Jeff Abate told a room full of Retail Ops associates "If you want to know what Kroger will look like in 10 years, read this book." I think he might have meant "The Toyota Way", because that one was much better and much more applicable to work at Kroger. Good book, but I'd definitely recomment "The Toyota Way" over this one.

Recommended by: Jeff Abate

The Toyota Way

• Author: Jeffrey Liker
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2015

I remember finishing this book and thinking, "wow, I should read that book again every couple of years." This book encouraged me to think about work differently. It inspired so many different thoughts and new ideas for how to change the way we work in our company, that I'd like to read it again some time and see if it's still as good as I remember.

Billion Dollar Lessons: What you can learn from the most inexcusable business failures of the last 25 years

• Author: Paul Carroll & Chunka Mui
• Theme: Business
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2015

Great book describing epic failures in business. Big idea: don't stray too far from your core business, and if your business relies more on "financial engineering" than it does on delivering value to customers... you're in trouble!

Recommended by: NPR

Managing to Learn - Using the A3 Management Process

• Author: John Shook
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Life Changing
• Date: 2014

Great book providing an introduction to A3's and walking through how to use them both for problem solving and management. This book was required reading for the Order Evolution team leads. The story might be a bit dull, but it provides examples of how this actually is supposed to work. The ideas in this book are ones I still think about all the time!

Recommended by: Jeff Abate

• [My Notes - Detailed](assets/Managing to Learn - Using the A3 managment process.docx)
• [My Notes - Reference Sheet](assets/Managing to Learn - Using the A3 managment process - Reference Sheet.docx)

The Drucker Lectures: Essential Lessons on Management, Society, and Economy

• Author: Peter Drucker
• Theme: Management
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2014

Information Dashboard Design

• Author: Stephen Few
• Theme: Analytics
• Rating: Excellent
• Date: 2015

Excellent book on how to design effective visualizations and dashboards. I found this book after reading through material on a Data Visualization course and noticed that all of the content came from one author: Stephen Few. He is the man! And this book will take your reporting and analytics presentations - and of course your dashboards - to the next level.

Show Me the Numbers

• Author: Stephen Few
• Theme: Analytics
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2015

Great book on data visualization. This one goes a bit deeper than "Information Dashboard Design." If you've read the dashboard book this one is a lot of review, but it still adds new content. On it's own it would be "Excellent", but since the Dashboard book was so much better, I dropped the rating to "Great."

Applied Predictive Modeling

• Author: Max Kuhn
• Theme: Analytics
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2014

Very detailed book about analytical and data mining methods with examples of how to apply them in R. Max Kuhn wrote the "caret" package in R which the Ops Research team highly recommended. This book is my go-to reference for advanced data mining techniques. I can't say I've used a lot of the material in this book, but knowing it sure gives you a good breadth of knowledge when choosing an analytical approach to a problem.

The Power of Presence - Unlock your potential

• Author: Christie Hedges
• Theme: Personal Development
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2014

Recommended by: Heinrich Stander

The Hidden Factor - Executive Presence

• Author: Sally Williamson
• Theme: Personal Development
• Rating: OK

Recommended by: Heinrich Stander

Gung Ho! Turn on the People in Any Organization

• Author: Ken Blanchard & Sheldon Bowles
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2013

Great story about one manager who turned around a production facility and boils all of management down to 3 allegories:

• The Spirit of the Squirrel (meaningful work)
• The Way of the Beaver (empowerment and trust)
• The Gift of the Goose (cheering and affirmation)

For some reason the "gift of the goose" is the one that stuck with me the most and the one I still think about when I'm walking outside.

Recommended by: Nick Kaufman

[My Notes](assets/Gung Ho.docx)

Death by Meeting

• Author: Patrick Lencioni
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2013

Good book - and very practical. Everyone hates bad meetings. This book provides advice for how to run effective meetings, combining that with a story that shows the principles of good (and bad) meetings played out in an interesting way. Many managers at Kroger structure team meetings based on this book. It's an excellent way to think about meetings and a consistent reminder that meetings should be setup with a specific purpose in mind. They should also have drama, context, and importance to those attending the meeting.

Recommended by: Nick Kaufman

[My Notes](assets/Death by Meeting.docx)

Strengths Finder 2.0

• Author: Tom Rath
• Theme: Personal Development
• Rating: Excellent
• Date: 2013

The core of this book is online self-assessment that identifies your 5 strengths. The books thesis is an interesting one: focus on exploiting these strengths rather than trying to improve weak areas. It's better to be exceptional at some things rather than mediocre at everything. I've recommended this book to many people - especially those who seem to be struggling to find out who they are and what their passion really is. My strengths report is attached. My 5 strengths were:

1. Intellection
2. Analytical
3. Deliberate
4. Futuristic
5. Strategic

Recommended by: Nick Kaufman

The Effective Executive

• Author: Peter Drucker
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Excellent
• Date: 2013

Great book. Drucker is the thought leader in business management, and if you read no other book by him: read this one! Drucker defines an executive as anyone who comes to work each week and has to decide what to work on. If your job involves determining what things to work on (and really, all of our jobs fit that description) this is a good book to read. Drucker's famous advice includes:

• Management is doing things right. Leadership is doing the right things.
• Doing the right thing is more important than doing things right.
• There is nothing quite so useless as doing with great efficiency something that should not be done at all.

This is another book that I remember wanting to re-read every few years because it spawned so many great ideas and thoughts.

Code Red

• Author: John Mauldin
• Theme: Finance
• Date: 2013

The Two-Second Advantage: How we Succeed by Anticipating the Future - Just Enough

• Author: Vivek Ranadive & Kevin Maney
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2013

(from Hjelm's bookshelf)

It's Your Ship: Management Techniques from the Best Damn Ship in the Navy

• Author: Michael Abrashoff (Captain, USN)
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Great
• Date: 2013

Good book on management written by a Captain of a naval ship. The stories he tells were entertaining. The advice was practical and applicable. There are several pieces of advice that I still think about often - especially his belief that your people know how to run things better than you (it's their job, not yours). Solicit feedback from them and make immediate change based upon their needs and suggestions. Be an advocate for them, and make sure they have what they want: good food, unity, accountability, pride in their work, and a beer or two on New Year's Eve (even if you have to bend a few rules to make some of that happen.)

(from Hjelm's bookshelf)

[My Notes](assets/It's Your Ship.docx)

I/T Architecture in Action

• Author: Richard Reese
• Theme: I/T
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2013

When I had a chance to ask Chris Hjelm what books he'd recommend, this was his very first recommendation. It includes a good overview of how an I/T company looks from the highest level. It discusses the components of I/T Architecture and how that architecture should match the business in terms of strategy and execution. Very good read to get a high-level view of architecture and how to think about an I/T company.

Recommended By: Chris Hjelm

[My Notes](assets/IT Architecture in Action.docx)

The Oz Principle

• Author: Roger Connors, Tom Smith, and Craig Hickman
• Rating: OK
• Date: 2012

[My Notes](assets/The Oz Principle.docx)

Recommended by: Kroger (required reading for an "Above the Line" program they ran at the same time).

Managing Humans

• Author: Michael Lopp
• Theme: Management
• Rating: Good

When I first joined the company and became a Team Lead, this is the book I turned to figure out what exactly does that mean? I had taken management classes in college, but this put all those ideas into a practical framework with good advice about 1-on-1's, meetings, goals, and the basic blocking and tackling of management. It's also great that it was presented from an I/T perspective.

The Non-Designers Design Book

• Author: Robin Williams (no, not that one)
• Theme: Design
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2009?

This book presents the same design principles we covered in college: CRAP (Contrast, Repetition, Alignment, and Proximity), but it does it in a much better way. It is packed full of examples of both good designs and bad designs and has exercises where you take bad designs and make them better. This book will make even the most style-handicapped person (like myself) better at putting together dashboards, documents, presentations, and much more. I think about it every time I work on something visual.

Information Theory, Inference, and Learning Algorithms

• Author: David J.C. MacKay
• Theme: Math
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2008?

This is a dense and difficult book on Information Theory. When I first tried to read it, many of the chapters were beyond my ability to comprehend or took multiple readings to determine what exactly was going on. However, the lessons I learned from this book were absolute gems. This includes: how to apply Bayesian statistics in simulations and understanding a single neural node as a simple classifier.

This book is available online for free (from the author) here.

Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach

• Author: Stuart Russell and Peter Norvig
• Theme: Artificial Intelligence
• Rating: Very Good
• Date: 2008?

This popular textbook on AI begins with search and optimization algorithms as simple forms of AI. They emphasize the idea of "agent" programs: programs that have a goal and a set of actions they can take to get nearer to that goal. These conceptualizations are helpful for creating many types of programs. I've used them in my Tic-Tac-Toe, Checkers, and Chess playing programs. I've also experimented with multi-agent programs, but those are usually more complicated than they need to be.