Saporta

Insightfulness: 4/5 stars.
Poor research and full-on-inaccuracies: -2/5 stars.


Reading this book is like listening to your mechanic say:
"People don't like horse manure, that's why the automobile succeeded in replacing the horse-drawn carriage." and: "Having a car allows you to get places faster. So without a car, you can’t get anywhere on time.”
And then, the mechanic follows that up with very useful advice on how to maintain your car. You appreciate the useful advice, but you are blown away by some of the other comments. Oh, and the mechanic happens to be the friendliest person you know!

The author comes across as an extremely kindhearted person, and so it pains me to write anything but the loveliest review. However, it also pains me to hear the author say:

"A company is a culture. A group of people brought together around a common set of values and beliefs." Certainly, each person in the group has a reason (a “Why” as the author calls it) for being a part of the group, but those reasons are not necessarily *shared* amongst the group.

The author makes a multitude of social, anthropological, technological and historical claims many of which are, to varying degrees, inaccurate and poorly researched. Other claims simply seem naïve of the author to make (eg. what were the Wright Brothers’ and Steve Jobs’ *true,* *deep-down internal* thought processes and motivations driving their achievements). And often times, the author exemplifies a misunderstanding of causality (akin to the horse manure/automobile logic above).

Ironically, the skewed-logic and faulty claims are invoked to support what are otherwise insightful conclusions. (eg, it is beneficial to employees/ers to choose their respective association with each other based on a common set of values and beliefs).

If you can make it through the frustrating distractions of repetitiveness and inaccuracies, this book does have useful tidbits.


(he does do a good job with narration)

Great book, well worth the read.
A nice mix of economics, history and basic probability. Great for non-mathematicians and bad gamblers.