What We’re Reading

By Glen Gonzalez January 9, 2020 Trends

The beginning of a new year is usually a good time for me to catch up on my reading list. I’ve jotted down the titles I’m currently focusing on and I’ve asked my colleagues here at Smith to share what they’re reading right now, too. If you’re looking for a recommendation or a conversation, check out the titles below. If you have a great read you’d recommend, please let us know!

Staff picks from the Smith team

Glen Gonzalez

The Social Organization by Anthony J. Bradley and Mark P. McDonald

Drive by Daniel Pink

A beat up copy of the March 2008 edition of Fantasy & Science Fiction magazine.  which I found for $0.99 at my local record store.

Jennifer Needham

The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier

Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World by Laura Spinney

American Heiress: The Wild Saga of the Kidnapping, Crimes and Trial of Patty Hearst by Jeffrey Toobin

Sara Levinson

The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results by Gary Keller

Checking In: Hospitality-Driven Thinking, Business, and You by Stephen Cloobeck

Allison Artnak

Don’t Make Me Think, Revisited: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug

Why Simple Wins: Escape the Complexity Trap and Get to Work That Matters by Lisa Bodell

The Employee Experience Advantage: How to Win the War for Talent by Giving Employees the Workspaces They Want, the Tools They Need, and a Culture They Can Celebrate by Jacob Morgan

Julia Wolf

Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande

Homebody: A Guide to Creating Spaces You Never Want to Leave by Joanna Gaines

Gretchen Vaught

The Dream King: How the Dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. Is Being Fulfilled to Heal Racism in America by Will Ford and Matt Lockett

The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin

Bourgeois Equality: How Ideas, not Capital or Institutions, Enriched the World by Deirdre McCloskey

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover

Rick Cole

The Content Trap: A Strategist’s Guide to Digital Change by Bharat Narendra Anand

Baracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo” by Zora Neale Hurston

The Misinformation Age: How False Beliefs Spread by Cailin O’Connor and James Owen Weatherall

Will Spiers

How to Be an Artist: 33 Rules to Take You from Clueless Amateur to Generational Talent (or at Least Help You Live Life a Little More Creatively) by Jerry Saltz

Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat by Samin Nosrat

Michael Garcia

Bunker Hill: A City, A Siege, A Revolution by Nathaniel Philbrick

Lord of Misrule by Jaimy Gordon

Don Sanford

A Column of Fire by Ken Follett

Catherine Sturges

Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc. by Jeff Tweedy

Pat Dodd

The Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon

Amy Crowell

Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover

Lindsey Comas

21 Lessons for the 21st Century by Yuval Noah Harari