What executives are

reading in 2019
Time to restock your shelves? We asked leaders of some of the
world’s biggest organizations to share the books they look forward
to reading or revisiting.

© Image Source/Getty Images

August 2019
 We have books on the brain, with the recent release
of the Financial Times–McKinsey Business Book
of the Year long list. (See coverage of last year’s
winner, Bad Blood, on our blog, and check back
December 3, when the 2019 award is given.) There’s
inspiration aplenty in the selections, which offer
compelling insights on topics crucial to business
today. But we also wanted to see what CEOs
and other business leaders are keeping on their
shelves or tucking into their suitcases—consider
it food for thought in picking your next read. Read
on for selections from leaders at Novartis, PayPal,
Walmart, and more.
Doug McMillon, CEO, Walmart
—— The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the
Age of Colorblindness—Michelle Alexander
(New Press, 2010, nonfiction)
—— Them: Why We Hate Each Other—and How
to Heal—Ben Sasse (St. Martin’s Press, 2018,
nonfiction)
—— The Sixth Man: A Memoir—Andre Iguodala (Blue
Rider Press, June 2019, nonfiction)
—— Become an Accelerator Leader: Accelerate
Yourself, Others, and Your Organization to
Maximize Impact—Alvin Rohrs (Gatekeeper
Press, May 2019, nonfiction)
Meg Whitman, CEO, Quibi
—— Red Notice: A True Story of High Finance, Murder, —— Becoming—Michelle Obama (Crown, 2018,
and One Man’s Fight for Justice—Bill Browder
(Simon & Schuster, 2015, nonfiction)
—— The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers
Who Brought the American Ideal West—David
McCullough (Simon & Schuster, May 2019,
nonfiction)
—— The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women
Changes the World—Melinda Gates (Flatiron
Books, April 2019, nonfiction)
2 What executives are reading in 2019
Jørgen Vig Knudstorp, executive chairman, LEGO
Brand Group
—— The End of the End of the Earth—Jonathan
Franzen (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2018,
nonfiction)
—— Let Love Have the Last Word: A Memoir—
Common (Atria Books, May 2019, nonfiction)
—— Men in My Situation—Per Petterson (Forlaget
Oktober, 2018, fiction)
—— Wholehearted Leadership—Morten Mortensen
(MM Holding, April 2019, nonfiction)
—— A Little Book about Love—Frederik Dessau
(Gyldendal Forlag, 1996, nonfiction)
Salman Khan, founder and CEO, Khan Academy
—— Breakfast of Champions—Kurt Vonnegut
(Delacorte Press/Seymour Lawrence, 1973,
fiction)
—— The Upanishads—translated by Eknath
Easwaran (Nilgiri Press, second edition, 2007,
nonfiction)
—— A Short History of Byzantium—John Julius
Norwich (Vintage, 1998, nonfiction)
Jacqui Canney, chief people officer, WPP
nonfiction)
—— Imagine It Forward: Courage, Creativity, and the
Power of Change—Beth Comstock, with Tahl
Raz (Currency, 2018, nonfiction)
—— Leaders: Myth and Reality—Stanley McChrystal,
Jeff Eggers, and Jason Mangone (Portfolio
Penguin, 2018, nonfiction)
Andrew Penn, CEO and managing director,
Telstra Corporation
—— Architects of Intelligence: The Truth about AI
from the People Building It—Martin Ford (Packt
Publishing, 2018, nonfiction)
—— Death of a River Guide—Richard Flanagan
(Grove Press, reprint edition, 2002, fiction)
—— The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet—David
Mitchell (Random House, 2010, fiction)
Dan Schulman, president and CEO, PayPal
—— People, Power, and Profits: Progressive
Capitalism for an Age of Discontent—Joseph E.
Stiglitz (W. W. Norton, April 2019, nonfiction)
—— The Accidental Admiral: A Sailor Takes
Command at NATO—James Stavridis (Naval
Institute Press, 2014, nonfiction)
—— Lexicon—Max Barry (Penguin Books, 2013, fiction)
—— The New Rules of War: Victory in the Age of
Durable Disorder—Sean McFate (William
Morrow, January 2019, nonfiction)
Strive Masiyiwa, founder, executive chairman,
Econet
—— The Resilience Dividend: Being Strong in a
World Where Things Go Wrong—Judith Rodin
(PublicAffairs, 2014, nonfiction)
—— The Other Story: A Fireside Chat with African
Achievers—Judy Dlamini (February 2019,
nonfiction)
—— Africa at Work—Acha Leke et al. (2012,
nonfiction)
Joerg Reinhardt, PhD, chairman, Novartis
—— Has the West Lost It? A Provocation—Kishore
Mahbubani (Penguin, April 2019, nonfiction)
What executives are reading in 2019
—— The Icarus Deception: How High Will You Fly?—
Seth Godin (Portfolio Penguin, 2012, nonfiction)
—— The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine—
Michael Lewis (W. W. Norton, 2010, nonfiction)
Beth Comstock, former vice chair, General
Electric; author, Imagine It Forward: Courage,
Creativity, and the Power of Change
—— The Overstory—Richard Powers (W. W. Norton,
2018, fiction)
—— The Hidden Life of Trees: What They Feel, How
They Communicate—Discoveries from a Secret
World—Peter Wohlleben (Greystone Books,
2016, nonfiction)
—— Leaves of Grass: The First (1855) Edition—Walt
Whitman (Penguin Classics, 1961, nonfiction)
Jesper Jos Olsson, group CEO and founding
partner, White Peak Real Estate
—— Serotonin—Michel Houellebecq (Farrar, Straus
and Giroux, November 2019, fiction)
—— The Uninhabitable Earth: Life after Warming—
David Wallace-Wells (Tim Duggan Books,
February 2019, nonfiction)
—— Aniara: An Epic Science Fiction Poem—Harry
Martinson (1956, fiction)
Richard Plepler, founder, RLP & Company; former
chairman and CEO, HBO
—— Our Man: Richard Holbrooke and the End of the
American Century—George Packer (Alfred A.
Knopf, May 2019, nonfiction)
—— The Back Channel: A Memoir of American
Diplomacy and the Case for Its Renewal—William
J. Burns (Random House, March 2019, nonfiction)
—— Fleishman is in Trouble—Taffy Brodesser-Akner
(Random House, June 2019, fiction)
3
 Sarah Friar, CEO, Nextdoor
—— Upheaval: Turning Points for Nations in Crisis—
Jared Diamond (Little, Brown and Company, May
2019, nonfiction)
—— Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That
Shapes What We See, Think, and Do—Jennifer L.
Eberhardt (Viking, March 2019, nonfiction)
—— Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of
the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster—Adam
Higginbotham (Simon & Schuster, February
2019, nonfiction)
—— Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory
in Northern Ireland—Patrick Radden Keefe
(Doubleday, February 2019, nonfiction)
Designed by Global Editorial Services.
Copyright © 2019 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved.
4 What executives are reading in 2019
Kevin Sneader, global managing partner,
McKinsey & Company
—— The New Silk Roads: The Present and Future
of the World—Peter Frankopan (Bloomsbury
Publishing, 2018, nonfiction)
—— Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of
the World’s Greatest Nuclear Disaster—Adam
Higginbotham (Simon & Schuster, February
2019, nonfiction)
—— Lords of the Desert: Britain’s Struggle with
America to Dominate the Middle East—James
Barr (Simon & Schuster UK, 2018, nonfiction)
—— A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy
and the Crisis of the Old Order—Richard Haass
(Penguin Press, 2017, nonfiction)
 We know what you’re
reading this summer
McKinsey’s annual reading list is back—reimagined for
this pandemic year.

August 2020
 See the full list of responses below. Glenn Kelman, CEO, Redfin

— Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, Cho Nam-Joo

Business leaders
John Visentin, CEO, Xerox
Bob Iger, Executive chairman,
The Walt Disney Company
— Scotty, Ken Dryden
— Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents,
— Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned From 15
Isabel Wilkerson
Years as CEO of The Walt Disney Company,
Bob Iger
— The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson

David Gibbs, CEO, Yum! Brands

Oscar Munoz, Executive chairman,
United Airlines Holdings, Inc.
— David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the
Art of Battling Giants, Malcolm Gladwell
— Separated: Inside an American Tragedy,
Jacob Soboroff
Nandan Nilekani, Chairman and cofounder, Infosys
Kenneth M. Jacobs, Chairman and CEO, Lazard
— What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of
Excellence, Steve Schwarzman
— The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson

— Capitalism in America: An Economic History

— Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement
of the United States, Alan Greenspan and
of Black Americans from the Civil War to World
Adrian Woolridge
War II, Douglas A. Blackmon

— Naoroji: Pioneer of Indian Nationalism,

— Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure of
Dinyar Patel
Authoritarianism, Anne Applebaum

Peter Chapman, President and CEO, IonQ

Laxman Narasimhan, CEO, Reckitt Benckiser

— The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons Learned from

— The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest
15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company,
Pandemic in History, John M. Barry
Bob Iger
— Wherever You Go, There You Are: Mindfulness
— That Will Never Work: The Birth of Netflix and
Meditation in Everyday Life, Jon Kabat-Zinn
the Amazing Life of an Idea, Marc Randolph
— Leadership: In Turbulent Times,
Serge Saxonov, Cofounder and CEO, 10x Genomics
Doris Kearns Goodwin

— The Billion Dollar Molecule: The Quest for

Katherine Garrett-Cox, CEO,
the Perfect Drug, Barry Werth
Gulf International Bank (UK)

— Reamde: A Novel, Neal Stephenson

— The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate
Crisis, Christiana Figueres and
— The Fabric of Reality: The Sciences of Parallel
Tom Rivett-Carnac
Universes—and Its Implications, David Deutsch

2 We know what you’re reading this summer

Thomas S. Gayner, Co-CEO, Markel
— The Power of Bad: How the Negativity Effect
Rules Us and How We Can Rule It, John Tierney
and Roy Baumeister
— Love Your Enemies: How Decent People Can
Save America from the Culture of Contempt,
Arthur C. Brooks
— Days of Grace: A Memoir, Arthur Ashe and
Arnold Rampersad
Global leaders
François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of
Foreign Affairs, Government of Canada
— Hell and Other Destinations: A 21st-Century
Memoir, Madeleine Albright
— Seven Lessons for Leading in Crisis, Bill George
Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus,
Director-General, World Health Organization
— Inside Change: Transforming Your Organization
with Emotional Intelligence, Joshua Freedman
and Massimiliano Ghini MBA
— A World of Three Zeros: The New Economics of
Zero Poverty, Zero Unemployment, and Zero Net
Carbon Emissions, Muhammad Yunus
Joseph E. Stiglitz, Professor, Columbia Business
School; 2001 recipient, Nobel Memorial Prize in
Economic Sciences
— Mapmaker’s Wife, Robert Whittaker
— The Great Influenza, John M. Barry
— Heavy, Kiese Laymon
— Too Much and Never Enough: How my Family
Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man,
Mary L. Trump
We know what you’re reading this summer
Technologists/entrepreneurs/
philanthropists
Craig Newmark, Founder, Craigslist and Craig
Newmark Philanthropies
Ghosting the News: Local Journalism and the Crisis
of American Democracy, Margaret Sullivan
The Mirror & the Light, Hilary Mantel
The City We Became: A Novel, N. K. Jemisin
Yoky Matsuoka, CEO of the Lifestyle Business
Strategy Division, Panasonic; former CTO of Google
Nest and a cofounder of Google X
A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose,
Eckhart Tolle
Sebastian Thrun, CEO, Kitty Hawk, and chairman,
Udacity
— Einstein: His Life and Universe, Walter Isaacson
— Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your
Life Depended on It, Chris Voss with Tahl Raz
— Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling
Disruptive Products to Mainstream Customers,
Geoffrey A. Moore
Debbie Sterling, Founder and CEO, GoldieBlox
— American Pastoral, Philip Roth
— American Dirt, Jeanine Cummins
— Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption,
Bryan Stevenson
— This Could Be Our Future: A Manifesto for a More
Generous World, Yancey Strickler
3
 Alberto Ibargüen, President and CEO, John S. and Angela Duckworth, Founder and CEO, Character
James L. Knight Foundation Lab at University of Pennsylvania

— The Twilight of Democracy: The Seductive Lure — Peak: Secrets from the New Science of
of Authoritarianism, Anne Applebaum Expertise, Anders Ericsson

— The Coddling of the American Mind, Greg

Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt Business media
Matt Murray, Editor in Chief, Wall Street Journal
— Self-Portrait in Black and White, Thomas
Chatterton Williams
— The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of
Democracy, Christopher Lasch
— White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White
People to Talk About Racism, Robin DiAngelo
— The Restless Kings: Henry II, His Sons and the
Wars for the Plantagenet Crown, Nick Barratt
Mack Gill, COO and board member,
Torstone Technology
— The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich: A History of
Nazi Germany, William L. Shirer
— The Gene: An Intimate History,
Siddhartha Mukerjee
— Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Life, Alison Weir

— Good Economics for Hard Times,

Gillian Tett, Chair, editorial board, and Editor at
Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo
Large, US, Financial Times

— The Mirror & the Light, Hilary Mantel

— Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents,
Isabel Wilkerson
Gary Liu, CEO, South China Morning Post
Publishers Ltd
Alan Murray, CEO, FORTUNE Media

— Factfulness, Hans Rosling

— George Marshall: Defender of the Republic,
David Roll
— The Beautiful Country and the Middle Kingdom,
John Pomfret
Jessica Lessin, Founder and Editor in Chief,
The Information
— A History of Scotland, Neil Oliver
— Girl, Woman, Other, Bernardine Evaristo
Richard Buery, President, Achievement First,
a charter-school network with 37 schools in
— Golden Gates: Fighting for Housing in America,
Connecticut, New York, and Rhode Island
Conor Dougherty

— The Fire Next Time, James Baldwin

Adi Ignatius, Editor in Chief, Harvard Business
Review
— Deacon King Kong, James McBride
— Eat the Buddha: Life and Death in a Tibetan
— Black Software: The Internet and Racial Justice,
Town, Barbara Demick
from the AfroNet to Black Lives Matter,
Charlton D. McIlwain

4 We know what you’re reading this summer

Stephanie Mehta, Editor in Chief, Fast Company
— Antisocial, Andrew Marantz
— Rodham, Curtis Sittenfeld
— The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,
Robert Louis Stevenson
Platforms
Dan Roth, Editor in Chief, LinkedIn
— The Vanishing Half: A Novel, Brit Bennett
— Citizen Reporters: S.S. McClure, Ida Tarbell,
and the Magazine That Rewrote America,
Stephanie Gorton
— The Deficit Myth: Modern Monetary Theory
and the Birth of the People’s Economy,
Stephanie Kelton
Katherine Maher, CEO and executive director,
Wikimedia Foundation
— All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions
for the Climate Crisis, edited by Ayana Elizabeth
Johnson and Katharine Keeble Wilkinson
— Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, Isabel
Wilkerson
— The History of White People, Nell Irvin Painter
Richard Gingras, Vice president, News, Google
— Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman,
Robert K. Massie
— The Overstory: A Novel, Richard Powers
— The Big Goodnight: Chinatown and the Last
Years of Hollywood, Sam Wassan
— Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its
Disappearing Water, Marc Reisner
— Wolf Hall Trilogy, Hilary Mantel
We know what you’re reading this summer
TV/entertainment
Jorge Ramos, Coanchor, “Noticiero Univision,” host,
“Al Punto,” and anchor, “Real America”
— Intimations, Zadie Smith
— My Time To Speak: Reclaiming Ancestry and
Confronting Race, Ilia Calderón
— La Corresponsal, Cristina De Stefano
Dan Lemon, Anchor, “CNN Tonight”
Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, Isabel
Wilkerson
Intimations, Zadie Smith
The Beauty in Breaking: A Memoir, Michele Harper
The Vanishing Half: A Novel, Brit Bennett
Utopia Avenue: A Novel, David Mitchell
Finding Freedom: Harry and Meghan and the
Making of a Modern Royal Family, Omid Scobie and
Carolyn Durand
Ali Velshi, Host, “Velshi,” on MSNBC
— The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of
America’s Great Migration, Isabel Wilkerson
— For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful
Masculinity, Liz Plank
— Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its
Urgent Lessons for Our Own, Eddie S. Glaude Jr.
Poorna Jagannathan, Actor; producer, Nirbhaya
(winner of the 2013 Amnesty International Award)
— See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of
Revolutionary Love, Valerie Kaur
5
 Adam Sharp, President and CEO, National
Academy of Television Arts & Sciences, which
oversees the Emmys
— The Hardest Job in the World: The American
Presidency, John Dickerson
— Action Park: Fast Times, Wild Rides,
and the Untold Story of America’s Most
Dangerous Amusement Park, Andy Mulvihill
and Jake Rossen
— Forever: A Novel, Pete Hamill
Ilia Calderón, News anchor and cohost,
“Noticiero Univision” and “Aquí y Ahora”
— Say It Louder, Tiffany D. Cross
— Little Leaders, Vashti Harrison
— Three Women, Lisa Taddeo
Civil rights/freedom of expression
Anthony D. Romero, Executive director, ACLU
— Manifesto for a Moral Revolution,
Jacqueline Novogratz
— American Sonnets for My Past and Future
Assassin, Terrance Hayes
— The End of Policing, Alex S. Vitale
— The Human Stain, Philip Roth
— Five Days: The Fiery Reckoning of an
American City, Wes Moore
— Democracy If We Can Keep It, Ellis Cose
— Men in the Off Hours, Anne Carson
— Caravaggio, Howard Hibbard
6 We know what you’re reading this summer
Jameel Jaffer, Executive director, Knight First
Amendment Institute at Columbia University
— In Hoffa’s Shadow: A Stepfather, a
Disappearance in Detroit, and My Search
for the Truth, Jack Goldsmith
— The Lehman Trilogy: A Novel, Stefano Massini
— Feel Free: Essays, Zadie Smith
Suzanne Nossel, CEO, PEN America, and author,
Dare to Speak: Defending Free Speech for All
— She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment
Story that Helped Ignite a Movement,
Jodi Kantor and Meghan Twohey
— Intimations, Zadie Smith
— The Room Where It Happened, John Bolton
Diversity/inclusion activists
Ellen Pao, Cofounder and CEO, Project Include,
and author, Reset: My Fight for Inclusion and
Lasting Change
— So You Want To Talk About Race, Ijeoma Oluo
— Big Friendship: How We Keep Each Other Close,
Aminatou Sow and Ann Friedman
— Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the
New Jim Code, Ruha Benjamin
Marley Dias, Founder, #1000BlackGirlBooks,
activist, and author, Marley Dias Gets It Done
And So Can You!
— Harbor Me, Jacqueline Woodson
— Modern HERstory, Blair Imani
— Living Lively, Haile Thomas
Reshma Saujani, Founder and CEO, Girls Who
Code, and author, Brave Not Perfect: How
Celebrating Imperfection Helps You Live Your Best,
Most Joyful Life
— The Vanishing Half: A Novel, Brit Bennett
Other media
Radhika Jones, Editor in Chief, Vanity Fair
— A Burning, Megha Majumdar
— The Last Samurai, Helen DeWitt
— Transcendent Kingdom, Yaa Gyasi
Edward Felsenthal, Editor in Chief and CEO of Time
— Indian Summer: The Secret History of the End of
An Empire, Alex von Tunzelmann
— The Last Trial, Scott Turow
Mina Al-Oraibi, Editor in Chief, The National, and
World Economic Forum Young Global Leader
— The Nature of Nature, Enric Sala
— Divided: Why We Are Living in an Age of Walls,
Tim Marshall
Danielle Belton, Editor in Chief, The Root
— Too Much and Never Enough: How my Family
Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man,
Mary L. Trump
— Drink: The Intimate Relationship Between
Women and Alcohol, Ann Dowsett Johnson
— The Hero With A Thousand Faces,
Joseph Campbell
— The Writer’s Journey: Mythic Structure
for Writers, Christopher Vogler
We know what you’re reading this summer
Emily Ramshaw, Cofounder and CEO, The 19th
— The Women’s Hour: The Great Fight to Win
the Vote, Elaine Weiss
Nabiha Syed, President, The Markup
— A Burning: A Novel, Megha Majumdar
— Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes
to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed,
James C. Scott
— Overcomplicated: Technology at the Limits of
Comprehension, Samuel Arbesman
Teachers/experts
Dan Ariely, James B. Duke Professor of psychology
and behavioral economics, Duke University
— How to Change Your Mind, Michael Pollan
— Oryx and Crake, Margaret Atwood
Ram Charan, Business adviser, author, speaker
— The Third Pillar: How Markets and the State
Leave the Community Behind, Raghuram Rajan
Arturo Condo, President, EARTH University
— Manifesto for a Moral Revolution,
Jacqueline Novogratz
— The Future We Choose: Surviving the
Climate Crisis, Christiana Figueres and
Tom Rivett-Carnac
— La Peste, Albert Camus
— Cien años de soledad, Gabriel García Márquez
7
 McKinsey leaders Pierre Gentin, partner and general counsel,
New York
Liz Hilton Segel, senior partner, New York, and
managing partner for McKinsey in North America
— Zelda Fitzgerald: Her Voice in Paradise,
Sally Cline
— The World: A Brief Introduction, Richard Haass

— Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald

Kevin Sneader, global managing partner,
Hong Kong
— Black Box, Amos Oz

— The Lehman Trilogy: A Novel, Stefano Massini

— Lives Like Loaded Guns: Emily Dickinson
and Her Family’s Feuds, Lyndall Gordon
— 1968: The Year That Rocked the World,
Mark Kurlansky
Lareina Yee, senior partner, San Francisco

— Ordinary Grace, William Kent Krueger

— Evicted: Poverty and Profit in the American City,
Matthew Desmond
Pal Erik Sjatil, senior partner, Paris, and managing
partner for McKinsey in Europe
— Exhalation: Stories, Ted Chiang

— The Second World War, Antony Beevor

— All the Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr

Acha Leke, senior partner, Johannesburg

— Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind,

Yuval Noah Harari

Designed by Global Editorial Services

Copyright © 2020 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved.

8 We know what you’re reading this summer

 We still know what you’re
reading this summer
McKinsey’s annual reading list is back for 2021.

© Melanie Tönnies / EyeEm/Getty Images

August 2021
 Corporate leaders
James Gorman, Chair and CEO, Morgan Stanley
— Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri
Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad
by M. T. Anderson
John W. Rogers Jr., Chair, Co-CEO, and Chief
Investment Officer, Ariel Investments
— Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You
Don’t Know by Adam Grant
Rob Fauber, President and CEO,
Moody’s Corporation
— The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a
Business When There Are No Easy Answers
by Ben Horowitz
— Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement
of Black Americans from the Civil War to World
War II by Douglas A. Blackmon
Scott Kirby, CEO, United Airlines
— How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions
We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need
by Bill Gates
— The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill,
Family, and Defiance During the Blitz
by Erik Larson
— Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health,
Wealth, and Happiness by Cass R. Sunstein and
Richard H. Thaler
— The Code Breaker: Jennifer Doudna, Gene
Editing, and the Future of the Human Race
by Walter Isaacson
Shobhana Bhartia, Chair and Editorial Director,
HT Media
— Lifespan: Why We Age—and Why We Don’t
Have To by David A. Sinclair
2 We still know what you’re reading this summer
— A Promised Land by Barack Obama
— Ghost Wars: The Secret History of the CIA,
Afghanistan, and Bin Laden, from the Soviet
Invasion to September 10, 2001 by Steve Coll
— The Great Decoupling: China, America and the
Struggle for Technological Supremacy
by Nigel Inkster
Christian Klein, CEO, SAP
— Good Economics for Hard Times: Better
Answers to Our Biggest Problems
by Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo
Ann Fudge, Chair, WGBH Radio
— Humankind: A Hopeful History
by Rutger Bregman
— The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our
Brains by Nicholas Carr
— Haiku: The Last Poems of an American Icon
by Richard Wright
— The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone
and How We Can Prosper Together
by Heather McGhee
— Eating the Sun: Small Musings on a Vast
Universe by Ella Frances Sanders
Gretchen Howard, COO, Robinhood Markets
— Two Sides of Glory: The 1986 Boston Red Sox in
Their Own Words by Erik Sherman
— The Museum of Rain by Dave Eggers
Other leaders
Jacqueline Novogratz, CEO, Acumen Fund
— High Conflict: Why We Get Trapped and How We
Get Out by Amanda Ripley
— Lab Girl by Hope Jahrel
— 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World
by Elif Shafak
— Freedom by Sebastian Junger
— 100 Poems to Break Your Heart
by Edward Hirsch
— How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the
History of Slavery Across America by Clint Smith
Richard Buery, CEO, Achievement First; CEO,
Robin Hood Foundation (effective September 2021)
— How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the
History of Slavery Across America by Clint Smith
— On Juneteenth by Annette Gordon-Reed
— Policing the Black Man: Arrest, Prosecution,
and Imprisonment by Angela J. Davis, Bryan
Stevenson, Marc Mauer, Bruce Western, and
Jeremy Travis
— Tangled Up in Blue: Policing the American City
by Rosa Brooks
— God in the Ghetto: A Prophetic Word Revisited
by William Augustus Jones Jr. (edited by his
daughter Jennifer Jones Austin)
— King of Scars by Leigh Bardugo
We still know what you’re reading this summer
Alexis McGill Johnson, President and CEO,
Planned Parenthood
— How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the
History of Slavery Across America by Clint Smith
— The Engagement: America’s Quarter-Century
Struggle Over Same-Sex Marriage
by Sasha Issenberg
— Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler
Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe
— The Premonition: A Pandemic Story
by Michael Lewis
Ailish Campbell, Canada’s Ambassador to the EU
— How to Stay Sane in an Age of Division
by Elif Shafak
— Putin’s People: How the KGB Took Back Russia
and Then Took On the West by Catherine Belton
— The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante
(translated by Ann Goldstein)
Rebecca Lowell Edwards, Chief Communications
Officer, ACLU
— The Color of Money: Black Banks and the Racial
Wealth Gap by Mehrsa Baradaran
— Parent Like It Matters: How to Raise Joyful,
Change-Making Girls by Janice Johnson Dias, PhD
— You Are Enough! Reclaiming Your Career
and Your Life with Purpose, Passion,
and Unapologetic Authenticity
by Charlene Wheeless
— How Beautiful We Were: A Novel by Imbolo Mbue
3
 Shamina Singh, Executive Vice President,
Sustainability, and President, Center for Inclusive
Growth, Mastercard
— Travels with Charley: In Search of America
by John Steinbeck
— Between Two Kingdoms: A Memoir of a Life
Interrupted by Suleika Jaouad
Frank McCourt, Chair and CEO, Unfinished Labs;
Owner, Olympique de Marseille
— These Truths: A History of the United States
by Jill Lepore
— Evil Geniuses: The Unmaking of America: A
Recent History by Kurt Andersen
— Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters: 10 Secrets
Every Father Should Know by Meg Meeker, MD
Jessica Herrera-Flanigan, Vice President,
Public Policy & Philanthropy, Americas, Twitter
— Trejo: My Life of Crime, Redemption, and
Hollywood by Danny Trejo with Donal Logue
— The Ethical Algorithm: The Science of Socially
Aware Algorithm Design by Michael Kearns and
Aaron Roth
— A Civic Technologist’s Practice Guide
by Cyd Harrell
— When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our
Songs Came Through: A Norton Anthology of
Native Nations Poetry edited by Joy Harjo
Business media
Matt Murray, Editor in Chief, Wall Street Journal
— American Pastoral by Philip Roth
— Alaric the Goth: An Outsider’s History of the Fall
of Rome by Douglas Boin
— The Cult of We: WeWork, Adam Neumann, and
the Great Startup Delusion by Eliot Brown and
Maureen Farrell
4 We still know what you’re reading this summer
— Frankly, We Did Win This Election: The Inside
Story of How Trump Lost by Michael C. Bender
Roula Khalaf, Editor in Chief, Financial Times
— Le pays des autres (In the Country of Others)
by Leïla Slimani
Alan Murray, CEO, Fortune Media
— How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions
We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need
by Bill Gates
— The Road Less Traveled: The Secret Battle to
End the Great War, 1916–1917 by Philip Zelikow
Stephanie Mehta, Editor in Chief, Fast Company
— The Contrarian: Peter Thiel and Silicon Valley’s
Pursuit of Power by Max Chafkin
— A Burning: A Novel by Megha Majumdar
Becky Quick, Squawk Box anchor, CNBC
— Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As if Your
Life Depended On It by Chris Voss with Tahl Raz
— When: The Scientific Secrets of Perfect Timing
by Daniel H. Pink
Julia Beizer, Global Head of Digital,
Bloomberg Media
— New York, New York, New York: Four Decades of
Success, Excess, and Transformation
by Thomas Dyja
— Klara and the Sun: A Novel by Kazuo Ishiguro
Rafat Ali, CEO and Founder, Skift
— The Caesars Palace Coup: How a Billionaire
Brawl Over the Famous Casino Exposed the
Power and Greed of Wall Street by Max Frumes
and Sujeet Indap
Other media
Kevin Merida, Executive Editor, Los Angeles Times
— The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X
by Les Payne and Tamara Payne
— Postcolonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz
— Dissent: The Radicalization of the Republican
Party and Its Capture of the Court
by Jackie Calmes
Sally Buzbee, Executive Editor, Washington Post
— The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
— Gaudy Night: A Lord Peter Wimsey Mystery with
Harriet Vane by Dorothy L. Sayers
Gwendolyn Bounds, Chief Content Officer,
Consumer Reports
— Range: Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized
World by David Epstein
— Freedom by Sebastian Junger
— Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents
by Octavia E. Butler
Adrienne LaFrance, Executive Editor, Atlantic
— Demagogue: The Life and Long Shadow of
Senator Joe McCarthy by Larry Tye
— The Great Fear of 1789: Rural Panic in
Revolutionary France by Georges Lefebvre
— The Sacraments of Desire by Linda Gregg
— Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
Anup Kaphle, Executive Editor, Rest of World
— An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for
Domination by Sheera Frenkel and Cecilia Kang
— The Cruelty Is the Point: The Past, Present, and
Future of Trump’s America by Adam Serwer
We still know what you’re reading this summer
— Mango and Peppercorns: A Memoir of Food, an
Unlikely Family, and the American Dream by
Katherine Manning, Lyn Nguyen, and
Tung Nguyen
Danielle Belton, Editor in Chief, HuffPost
— African Europeans: An Untold History
by Olivette Otele
— These Ghosts Are Family: A Novel by Maisy Card
— Yellow Wife: A Novel by Sadeqa Johnson
S. Mitra Kalita, CEO and Cofounder, URL Media
— The Vanishing Half: A Novel by Brit Bennett
— The Dead Are Arising: The Life of Malcolm X
by Les Payne and Tamara Payne
— Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee
McKinsey leaders
Bob Sternfels, Global Managing Partner, McKinsey
— Operation Tidal Wave: The Bloodiest Air Battle in
the History of War by Vincent dePaul Lupiano
— A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles
— A Pirate of Exquisite Mind: Explorer, Naturalist,
and Buccaneer: The Life of William Dampier
by Diana Preston and Michael Preston
Tracy Francis, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— The Mirror & the Light: A Novel by Hilary Mantel
— The Premonition: A Pandemic Story
by Michael Lewis
Pierre Gentin, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of
Sylvia Plath by Heather Clark
— Both Are True by Reyna Marder Gentin
5
 Homayoun Hatami, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— This Is How They Tell Me the World Ends: The
Cyberweapons Arms Race by Nicole Perlroth
Eric Kutcher, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— First Principles: What America’s Founders
Learned from the Greeks and Romans and How
That Shaped Our Country by Thomas E. Ricks
— Stars in Their Courses: The Gettysburg
Campaign, June–July 1863 by Shelby Foote
James Manyika, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— Mirrors: Stories of Almost Everyone
by Eduardo Galeano
— Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White
Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Crow
by Henry Louis Gates Jr.
— Circe: A Novel by Madeline Miller
— The Old Drift: A Novel by Namwali Serpell
— Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called
Quest by Hanif Abdurraqib
Gary Pinkus, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— The Empire of the Senses by Alexis Landau
— Disunited Nations: The Scramble for Power in an
Ungoverned World by Peter Zeihan
Designed by McKinsey Global Publishing
Copyright © 2021 McKinsey & Company. All rights reserved.
6 We still know what you’re reading this summer
Liz Hilton Segel, Global Leader,
Industry Practices, McKinsey
— The How of Happiness: A New Approach to
Getting the Life You Want by Sonja Lyubomirsky
— Learned Optimism: How to Change Your Mind
and Your Life by Martin E. P. Seligman
Sven Smit, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— The Power of Creative Destruction: Economic
Upheaval and the Wealth of Nations by Philippe
Aghion, Céline Antonin, and Simon Bunel
— Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion
by Robert B. Cialdini
— Pre-Suasion: A Revolutionary Way to Influence
and Persuade by Robert B. Cialdini
Magnus Tyreman, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— The Morning Star: A Novel
by Karl Ove Knausgaard
Rodney Zemmel, Senior Partner, McKinsey
— Shape: The Hidden Geometry of Information,
Biology, Strategy, Democracy, and Everything
Else by Jordan Ellenberg
— Blockchain Chicken Farm: And Other Stories of
Tech in China’s Countryside by Xiaowei Wang
— Call It Sleep: A Novel by Henry Roth
 2022 summer reading
guide from leaders,
authors, and editors
McKinsey’s annual books list is back—with something for everyone.

© Edward Greenberg

August 2022
 Biography & memoir
Azeem Azhar, creator, Exponential View
— Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History
by Lea Ypi
Abhijit Banerjee, Nobel Prize laureate; economist;
author, Cooking to Save Your Life
— Toast: The Story of a Boy’s Hunger by
Nigel Slater
Sinéad Burke, CEO, Tilting the Lens
— Haben: The Deafblind Woman Who Conquered
Harvard Law by Haben Girma
Óscar García Maceiras, CEO, Inditex
— Personal History by Katharine Graham
Radhika Jones, editor in chief, Vanity Fair
— Terms & Conditions: Life in Girls’
Boarding Schools, 1939–1979 by Ysenda
Maxtone Graham
Leslie Maasdorp, vice president and CFO, New
Development Bank
— Xi: A Study in Power by Kerry Brown
Kevin Merida, executive editor, Los Angeles Times
— His Name Is George Floyd: One Man’s Life
and the Struggle for Racial Justice by Toluse
Olorunnipa and Robert Samuels
— It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World That
Made Him by Justin Tinsley
— Shine Bright: A Very Personal History of Black
Women in Pop by Danyel Smith
2 Summer reading 2022
Lloyd B. Minor, dean, Stanford University School
of Medicine
— In the Shadow of the Mountain: A Memoir of
Courage by Silvia Vasquez-Lavado
Indra Nooyi, former CEO, PepsiCo
— The Chancellor: The Remarkable Odyssey of
Angela Merkel by Kati Marton
Reshma Saujani, founder, Girls Who Code; CEO,
Marshall Plan for Moms
— Burn Rate: Launching a Startup and Losing My
Mind by Andy Dunn
Christi Shaw, CEO, Kite Pharma
— Healing: When a Nurse Becomes a Patient by
Theresa Brown
— This Will All Be Over Soon: A Memoir by
Cecily Strong
Sylvana Quader Sinha, founder and CEO,
Praava Health
— My Life in Full: Work, Family, and Our Future by
Indra Nooyi
Albert Wenger, managing partner, Union
Square Ventures
— The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson
Bob Sternfels, global managing partner, McKinsey
— Out of Thin Air: Running Wisdom and
Magic from above the Clouds in Ethiopia by
Michael Crawley
Tracy Francis, senior partner, McKinsey
— Ten Steps to Nanette: A Memoir Situation by
Hannah Gadsby
Eric Kutcher, senior partner, McKinsey
— Never Enough: A Navy SEAL Commander on
Living a Life of Excellence, Agility, and Meaning
by Mike Hayes
— Phil: The Rip-Roaring (and Unauthorized!)
Biography of Golf’s Most Colorful Superstar by
Alan Shipnuck
Pierre M. Gentin, senior partner, McKinsey
— The Hare with Amber Eyes: A Hidden Inheritance
by Edmund de Waal
Chris Bradley, senior partner, McKinsey
— Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture
in Crisis by J. D. Vance
Business & economics
François-Philippe Champagne, minister of
innovation, science, and industry, Government
of Canada
— The Next Age of Uncertainty: How the World Can
Adapt to a Riskier Future by Stephen Poloz
Katherine Garrett-Cox, CEO, Gulf International
Bank (UK)
— The Key Man: The True Story of How the Global
Elite Was Duped by a Capitalist Fairy Tale by
Simon Clark and Will Louch
Neil Hoyne, chief measurement strategist, Google
— Build for Tomorrow: An Action Plan for
Embracing Change, Adapting Fast, and Future-
Proofing Your Career by Jason Feifer
— The Voltage Effect: How to Make Good Ideas
Great and Great Ideas Scale by John A. List
Summer reading 2022
Leslie Maasdorp, vice president and CFO, New
Development Bank
— The World for Sale: Money, Power, and the
Traders Who Barter the Earth’s Resources by
Javier Blas and Jack Farchy
Matt Murray, editor in chief, the Wall Street Journal
— 21st Century Monetary Policy: The Federal
Reserve from the Great Inflation to COVID-19 by
Ben S. Bernanke
Sylvana Quader Sinha, founder and CEO,
Praava Health
— Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion,
and Purpose by Tony Hsieh
Noel Quinn, CEO, HSBC
— Maverick: The Success Story behind the World’s
Most Unusual Workplace by Ricardo Semler
Kiersten Saunders, cocreator, rich & REGULAR
— Build the Damn Thing: How to Start a Successful
Business If You’re Not a Rich White Guy by
Kathryn Finney
Shankar Vedantam, creator and host, Hidden Brain
— Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the
Way to Fight Global Poverty by Abhijit Banerjee
and Esther Duflo
Daisy Veerasingham, president and CEO, the
Associated Press
— No Rules Rules: Netflix and the Culture of
Reinvention by Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer
David Vélez, cofounder and CEO, Nubank
— The Bitcoin Standard: The Decentralized
Alternative to Central Banking by
Saifedean Ammous
3
 Amy Webb, founder and CEO, Future Today Institute
— Capital in the Twenty-First Century by Thomas
Piketty (translated by Arthur Goldhammer)
Lisa Witter, CEO, Apolitical Foundation;
cofounder, Apolitical
— The XX Edge: Unlocking Higher Returns
and Lower Risk by Patience Marime-Ball and
Ruth Shaber
Jen L. Wong, COO, Reddit
— Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things
Done by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan
Fiction, poetry & essays
Mina Al-Oraibi, editor in chief, the National
— The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles
Abhijit Banerjee, Nobel Prize laureate; economist;
author, Cooking to Save Your Life
— Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke
— On Photography by Susan Sontag
Sinéad Burke, CEO, Tilting the Lens
— Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the
Twenty-First Century edited by Alice Wong
— Just by Looking at Him by Ryan O’Connell
Esther Duflo, professor, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology; Nobel Prize laureate
— Summer by Ali Smith
Óscar García Maceiras, CEO, Inditex
— Dogs of Summer by Andrea Abreu
4 Summer reading 2022
Neil Hoyne, chief measurement strategist, Google
— The Wonderful Things You Will Be by Emily
Winfield Martin
Paul Hudson, CEO, Sanofi
— The Paris Bookseller by Kerri Maher
Radhika Jones, editor in chief, Vanity Fair
— The Magician by Colm Tóibín
S. Mitra Kalita, CEO, URL Media; publisher,
Epicenter NYC
— Brown Girls by Daphne Palasi Andreades
— Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by
Rebecca Wells
Laxman Narasimhan, CEO, Reckitt Benckiser
— Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro
Manuel Rabaté, director, Louvre Abu Dhabi
— The Nabatī Poetry of the United Arab Emirates:
Selected Poems, Annotated and Translated into
English edited by Said Salman Abu Athera and
Clives Holes
Marc Rosen, CEO, JCPenney
— The Maid by Nita Prose
Amy Webb, founder and CEO, Future Today Institute
— Upgrade by Blake Crouch
Albert Wenger, managing partner, Union
Square Ventures
— Perhaps the Stars by Ada Palmer
Tracy Francis, senior partner, McKinsey
— Middlemarch by George Eliot
Magnus Tyreman, senior partner, McKinsey
— Ulvene fra evighetens skog (The wolves from the
forest of eternity) by Karl Ove Knausgård
Ozgur Tanrikulu, senior partner, McKinsey
— Complete Tales & Poems of Edgar Allan Poe by
Edgar Allan Poe
— Rumi: Whispers of the Beloved by Rumi
(translated by Maryam Mafi and Azima
Melita Kolin)
History
Mimi Alemayehou, senior vice president, Mastercard
— Born in Blackness: Africa, Africans, and the
Making of the Modern World, 1471 to the Second
World War by Howard W. French
— HBR at 100: The Most Influential and Innovative
Articles from Harvard Business Review’s First
Century by Harvard Business Review et al.
Mina Al-Oraibi, editor in chief, the National
— The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine: A History
of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–
2017 by Rashid Khalidi
Esther Duflo, professor, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology; Nobel Prize laureate
— A Brief History of Equality by Thomas Piketty
(translated by Steven Rendall)
Benedict Evans, independent analyst
— Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great
West by William Cronon
— Recollections of a Picture Dealer by
Ambroise Vollard
Summer reading 2022
Radhika Jones, editor in chief, Vanity Fair
— Portrait of a Novel: Henry James and the Making
of an American Masterpiece by Michael Gorra
Alan Murray, CEO, Fortune Media
— Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler
Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe
— The Man Who Broke Capitalism: How Jack
Welch Gutted the Heartland and Crushed the
Soul of Corporate America—and How to Undo
His Legacy by David Gelles
Matt Murray, editor in chief, the Wall Street Journal
— The Civil War: A Narrative (Volume 1, Fort Sumter
to Perryville) by Shelby Foote
Laxman Narasimhan, CEO, Reckitt Benckiser
— How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the
History of Slavery across America by Clint Smith
Manuel Rabaté, director, Louvre Abu Dhabi
— Art contemporain africain: Histoire(s) d’une
notion par celles et ceux qui l’ont faite by
Cédric Vincent
Marc Rosen, CEO, JCPenney
— How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them by
Barbara F. Walter
Enric Sala, explorer in residence, National
Geographic Society
— The Greeks: A Global History by Roderick Beaton
Anjhula Mya Singh Bais, chair, international board,
Amnesty International
— Amnesty International and Human Rights
Activism in Postwar Britain, 1945–1977 by
Tom Buchanan
5
 Daisy Veerasingham, president and CEO, the
Associated Press
— You Don’t Belong Here: How Three Women
Rewrote the Story of War by Elizabeth Becker
Albert Wenger, managing partner, Union
Square Ventures
— The Collapse of Complex Societies by
Joseph A. Tainter
Jen L. Wong, COO, Reddit
— The Lessons of History by Ariel Durant and
Will Durant
Tessa West, associate professor, NYU
— The Monster’s Bones: The Discovery of T. rex and
How It Shook Our World by David K. Randall
Bob Sternfels, global managing partner, McKinsey
— The Barbary Coast: An Informal History of the
San Francisco Underworld by Herbert Asbury
Sven Smit, senior partner, McKinsey
— Oil Shock: The 1973 Crisis and Its Economic
Legacy edited by Elisabetta Bini, Giuliano
Garavini, and Federico Romero
Magnus Tyreman, senior partner, McKinsey
— Bloodlands: Europe between Hitler and Stalin by
Timothy Snyder
Pierre M. Gentin, senior partner, McKinsey
— Legal Sabotage: Ernst Fraenkel in Hitler’s
Germany by Douglas G. Morris
6 Summer reading 2022
Personal development
Paul Hudson, CEO, Sanofi
— How to Get Your Act Together: A Judgement-
Free Guide to Diversity and Inclusion for Straight
White Men by Felicity Hassan and Suki Sandhu
Alan Murray, CEO, Fortune Media
— Don’t Trust Your Gut: Using Data to Get
What You Really Want in Life by Seth
Stephens-Davidowitz
Tsedal Neeley, senior associate dean, Harvard
Business School
— Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art
of Receiving Feedback Well by Sheila Heen and
Douglas Stone
Manuel Rabaté, director, Louvre Abu Dhabi
— The Art of Procrastination: A Guide to Effective
Dawdling, Lollygagging and Postponing by
John Perry
Reshma Saujani, founder, Girls Who Code; CEO,
Marshall Plan for Moms
— Grief Is Love: Living with Loss by Marisa
Renee Lee
Christi Shaw, CEO, Kite Pharma
— Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations.
Whole Hearts. by Brené Brown
Janeen Uzzell, CEO, the National Society of
Black Engineers
— Black Faces in High Places: 10 Strategic
Actions for Black Professionals to Reach the
Top and Stay There by Randal D. Pinkett and
Jeffrey A. Robinson
Lisa Witter, CEO, Apolitical Foundation;
cofounder, Apolitical
— The Lost Art of Connecting: The Gather, Ask,
Do Method for Building Meaningful Business
Relationships by Susan McPherson
Sven Smit, senior partner, McKinsey
— The Longevity Solution: Rediscovering
Centuries-Old Secrets to a Healthy, Long Life by
Dr. James DiNicolantonio and Dr. Jason Fung
Gautam Kumra, senior partner, McKinsey
— From Strength to Strength: Finding Success,
Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second
Half of Life by Arthur C. Brooks
— The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral
Life by David Brooks
Politics & government
Mina Al-Oraibi, editor in chief, the National
— Liberalism and Its Discontents by
Francis Fukuyama
Azeem Azhar, creator, Exponential View
— Liberalism and Its Discontents by
Francis Fukuyama
— Plunder of the Commons: A Manifesto for
Sharing Public Wealth by Guy Standing
Børge Brende, president, World Economic Forum
— The Age of Unpeace: How Connectivity Causes
Conflict by Mark Leonard
François-Philippe Champagne, minister of
innovation, science, and industry, Government
of Canada
— China Unbound: A New World Disorder by
Joanna Chiu
Summer reading 2022
Esther Duflo, professor, Massachusetts Institute of
Technology; Nobel Prize laureate
— Streets of Gold: America’s Untold Story of
Immigrant Success by Ran Abramitzky and
Leah Boustan
Katherine Garrett-Cox, CEO, Gulf International
Bank (UK)
— Very Bad People: The Inside Story of the Fight
against the World’s Network of Corruption by
Patrick Alley
Reid Hoffman, cofounder, LinkedIn; partner,
Greylock Partners
— The Constitution of Knowledge: A Defense of
Truth by Jonathan Rauch
S. Mitra Kalita, CEO, URL Media; publisher,
Epicenter NYC
— Visions for a Better Indian Country: One
Potawatomi Editor’s Opinions by Levi Rickert
Leslie Maasdorp, vice president and CFO, New
Development Bank
— Chums: How a Tiny Caste of Oxford Tories Took
Over the UK by Simon Kuper
Kiersten Saunders, cocreator, rich & REGULAR
— How We Show Up: Reclaiming Family, Friendship,
and Community by Mia Birdsong
Janeen Uzzell, CEO, the National Society of
Black Engineers
— Hood Feminism: Notes from the Women That a
Movement Forgot by Mikki Kendall
Shankar Vedantam, creator and host, Hidden Brain
— Civil Resistance: What Everyone Needs to Know
by Erica Chenoweth
7
 Daisy Veerasingham, president and CEO, the
Associated Press
— Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and
American Politics by Andrew E. Busch and John
J. Pitney Jr.
David Vélez, cofounder and CEO, Nubank
— Principles for Dealing with the Changing
World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail
by Ray Dalio
— Liberalism and Its Discontents by
Francis Fukuyama
Tracy Francis, senior partner, McKinsey
— The Power of Crisis: How Three Threats—
and Our Response—Will Change the World by
Ian Bremmer
Sven Smit, senior partner, McKinsey
— Republic by Plato
Psychology
Mimi Alemayehou, senior vice president, Mastercard
— How Minds Change: The Surprising
Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion
by David McRaney
Børge Brende, president, World Economic Forum
— Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You
Don’t Know by Adam Grant
Tsedal Neeley, senior associate dean, Harvard
Business School
— Why We’re Polarized by Ezra Klein
8 Summer reading 2022
Tessa West, associate professor, NYU
— How Minds Change: The Surprising
Science of Belief, Opinion, and Persuasion
by David McRaney
— You Have More Influence than You Think: How
We Underestimate Our Power of Persuasion,
and Why It Matters by Vanessa Bohns
Gautam Kumra, senior partner, McKinsey
— Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You
Don’t Know by Adam Grant
Chris Bradley, senior partner, McKinsey
— The Courage to Be Disliked: The Japanese
Phenomenon That Shows You How to Change
Your Life and Achieve Real Happiness by Ichiro
Kishimi and Fumitake Koga
Public health
Katherine Garrett-Cox, CEO, Gulf International
Bank (UK)
— Citizens: Why the Key to Fixing Everything Is All
of Us by Jon Alexander
Lloyd B. Minor, dean, Stanford University School
of Medicine
— Under the Skin: The Hidden Toll of Racism on
American Lives and on the Health of Our Nation
by Linda Villarosa
— Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future by
Elizabeth Kolbert
Indra Nooyi, former CEO, PepsiCo
— Moonshot: Inside Pfizer’s Nine-Month
Race to Make the Impossible Possible by
Dr. Albert Bourla
Noel Quinn, CEO, HSBC
— How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions
We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need by
Bill Gates
Kiersten Saunders, cocreator, rich & REGULAR
— Essential Labor: Mothering as Social Change by
Angela Garbes
Lisa Witter, CEO, Apolitical Foundation;
cofounder, Apolitical
— Citizens: Why the Key to Fixing Everything Is All
of Us by Jon Alexander
Magnus Tyreman, senior partner, McKinsey
— How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions
We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need by
Bill Gates
Science & technology
François-Philippe Champagne, minister of
innovation, science, and industry, Government
of Canada
— How the World Really Works: A Scientist’s Guide
to Our Past, Present and Future by Vaclav Smil
Óscar García Maceiras, CEO, Inditex
— The Future of the Professions: How Technology
Will Transform the Work of Human Experts,
updated edition, by Daniel Susskind and
Richard Susskind
Reid Hoffman, cofounder, LinkedIn; partner,
Greylock Partners
— Dædalus: AI & Society edited by
James M. Manyika
Summer reading 2022
Paul Hudson, CEO, Sanofi
— The Age of AI: And Our Human Future by
Daniel Huttenlocher, Henry A. Kissinger, and
Eric Schmidt
Tsedal Neeley, senior associate dean, Harvard
Business School
— The Exponential Age: How Accelerating
Technology Is Transforming Business, Politics
and Society by Azeem Azhar
Indra Nooyi, former CEO, PepsiCo
— Dignity in a Digital Age: Making Tech Work for All
of Us by Ro Khanna
Enric Sala, explorer in residence, National
Geographic Society
— The Invention of Nature: Alexander von
Humboldt’s New World by Andrea Wulf
— Finding the Mother Tree: Discovering the
Wisdom of the Forest by Suzanne Simard
Amy Webb, founder and CEO, Future Today Institute
— Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of
Philosophy by David J. Chalmers
Jen L. Wong, COO, Reddit
— Scale: The Universal Laws of Life, Growth, and
Death in Organisms, Cities, and Companies by
Geoffrey West
Ozgur Tanrikulu, senior partner, McKinsey
— You Look Like a Thing and I Love You: How
Artificial Intelligence Works and Why It’s Making
the World a Weirder Place by Janelle Shane
9
 Workplace culture
Reid Hoffman, cofounder, LinkedIn; partner,
Greylock Partners
— Talent: How to Identify Energizers, Creatives, and
Winners around the World by Tyler Cowen and
Daniel Gross
Laxman Narasimhan, CEO, Reckitt Benckiser
Anjhula Mya Singh Bais, chair, international board,
Amnesty International
— Leadership: Six Studies in World Strategy by
Henry Kissinger
Shankar Vedantam, creator and host, Hidden Brain
— Mastering Civility: A Manifesto for the Workplace
by Christine Porath

— Leadership: Six Studies in World Strategy by Eric Kutcher, senior partner, McKinsey
Henry Kissinger
— CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That
Marc Rosen, CEO, JCPenney Distinguish the Best Leaders from the
Rest by Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, and
— Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up Vikram Malhotra
by Jerry Colonna

Reshma Saujani, founder, Girls Who Code; CEO,

Marshall Plan for Moms
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10 Summer reading 2022