“Not all readers are leaders, but all leaders must be readers.” –President Harry S. Truman
As some of you are aware, the first half of 2026 has been incredibly busy for me. I love the freedom of being on my own, but the downside is that you have no one to delegate things to…and I decided to take on too many projects simultaneously. Thankfully almost all of them have worked out very well, but my writing had to take a backseat. I’m turning the corner on that now…
So, let’s reintegrate on something we all share in common – a love for reading. I’m not going to say that mine has waned even a bit, but – oddly enough – I’ve been on what the country music artist, Clint Black, would call “a good run of bad luck” this year. I love to share with you the books that make an impact on me and that I believe would do the same for you. Unfortunately not all of them do.
As I’ve gotten older, I’ve been better about putting down books that don’t make an impact on me – even if I’m only a quarter of the way into them. I no longer feel the need to finish a book simply because I started it. Maybe this is some sort of “sunk cost fallacy of reading” or something, but there comes a time to cut your losses and preserve the value of your future time and attention. This perspective served me well in the last six months because I put down a lot of books…
Here are some that I didn’t. These are the best books I read in the last 180 days(ish) and would recommend them as part of your professional development and worthy of your personal evolution. If you’ve got some faves from your stack, please share them with me as I’m always compiling a growing list of books to read.
“The Almanack of Naval Ravikant” by Eric Jorgenson
I had read snippets in blogs and heard sound bites from podcasts of “Naval” at various times over the last handful of years, but it was always from a “one-and-done” standpoint. I like a good quote as much as the next guy, but a quote is only a coherent thought (hopefully) and not a persuasive argument. Context matters, and if you want to get into “the why” behind something – be it an exploratory thought of your own or someone else’s – a quote just isn’t going to do it.
I ended up listening to Naval’s conversation with Chris Williamson on his podcast, called Modern Wisdom, and found it to be incredibly thought-provoking – so much so that I searched for and found this compilation of his thoughts from Eric Jorgenson. Yes, it is a series of quotes, but it is nicely stitched together to give better background and context behind almost all of it. I don’t agree with everything in there (“Happiness is more about peace than it is about joy”…Naval and I probably go to different churches…), but there is quite a bit that makes you stop and ponder (“Compound interest also happens in your reputation”…brilliantly stated).
I’ve got to give Jorgenson credit here because he compiled a LOT of excerpts of Naval-isms and put them into categories and logical sequences that make all of it digestible – and applicable. Sometimes listening to a podcast is like watching a tennis match – you feel like your head is on swivel trying to follow the ball flying back and forth. For me, a podcast is the equivalent of “ear candy.” If I’m going to apply something, I need to read it. I’m glad Eric Jorgenson took the time to write it. You will be, too.
“Shadow Divers” by Robert Kurson
I like being around the water – especially the beach. It has a soothing rhythm to me. It’s cathartic and relaxing. I like swimming in the ocean, but only up to a point of the waterline being around my chest. And I don’t really like thinking about what’s swimming around in the water that I can’t see.
Lucy and I went to Bora Bora for our honeymoon and did a “swim with the sharks” in about 20 feet of water. We used snorkels and both decided to stay on the surface while the guides and few of the other vacationers dove deeper grab the dorsal fins of some lemon sharks. These things weren’t “man eaters,” but they were over eight feet long – which is considerably longer than the people holding onto their fins. I don’t have many true fears in life, but being eaten alive and drowning are in my Top 5 for sure.
After reading “Shadow Divers,” I can safely say that scuba diving isn’t in my future for about 100 reasons – 99 of them are in this damn book. Have you ever read a book that was so intense that you literally could not put it down – and when you finally did, you were soaked in sweat? I compared this book (for a friend) to watching the Alex Honnold documentary, “Free Solo.” If you’ve seen that, you’ll know what I mean.
Shadow Divers is about a handful of scuba divers who are willing to go to maximum depths to explore the wreckage of sunken ships. Some of them do it bring back treasured artifacts that are considered un-recoverable; others do it for the fame and bravado of “being the first” to do something considered too dangerous; and others do it simply for the love and the spirit of the sport. Quite a few die in the process. And several do so in this book.
The book is about a group that stumbles onto the wreckage of a World War II German U Boat (submarine) that sunk off of the coast of New Jersey. No one knew about it because it wasn’t supposed to be there. No one knew about it because it sunk under mysterious circumstances and not as a result of a military confrontation. And no one knew about it because it was resting on the verge of depths considered to be too deep to explore by humans – around 200 feet of water.
The true story that unfolds is harrowing – and heartbreaking. It’s harrowing because of what deep water diving is and how things can quickly go wrong. It’s heartbreaking after two of the divers make it their life’s mission to piece together the puzzle that actually identifies the U Boat accurately, then traces back a surviving member of the actual crew (who wasn’t on board due to illness).
In the late stages of World War II, the Allies had cracked the Enigma Code for all German electronic communication, so they knew where every U Boat was and where they were going. To be on a U Boat crew in 1944 was a death sentence. And the crews all knew it. This one was commissioned in January of 1944. The 26 year-old Commander, Helmuth Neuerburg, told his younger brother: “I’m not coming back.” None of them did. It took a handful of American deep water divers over 60 years to tell the story.
Simply one of the best non-fiction books I’ve ever read.
“First Principles” by Thomas Ricks
We all grew up studying history, but if I’m being honest, it was more from a perspective of “what happened” versus “why it happened.” As I’ve gotten older, I’ve grown to love our country more every year. I think that’s a natural evolution for many of us as we become older and wiser.
One aspect of my love for the country extends back to the Founders themselves. I know all of you who read my writing and listen to my podcast are business leaders and business owners. Think about how hard it is for you to build and lead a business of a (few) dozen employees. Some days it feels like nobody’s on the same page – and you know what your business specifically is. Now imagine trying to do that and create a new country with a new type of self-government. I cannot begin to fathom the challenge.
The fact that they made it so far to even consider the proposition was, in itself, quite incredible. The colonists basically lost what became known as The Revolutionary War except for a massive stroke of luck and the late participations from the French navy. Things could’ve been dramatically different. And all other revolutions had ended in tyranny or anarchy (see 1789 in France for reference…).
What caused George Washington to become, well, “President George Washington” and not the Dictator, Napoleon Bonaparte? And what about the peaceful transition of power every 4 or 8 years between other leaders so different in Adams, Jefferson and Madison? Why did none of them try to become the American Caesar?
We’re a very unique country with an incredibly unique founding at a point in history that drew from Greek and Roman philosophies up to more modern (at the time) trends of the Scottish Enlightenment and the Protestant Reformation. All of that contributed to everything from Washington’s military strategy to the intellectual arguments against the British monarchy to the writing of our founding documents to physical construction of our nation’s capital.
Ricks’s discovery process of all of it is incredibly compelling. It makes me want to dive deeper into just how fortunate we are to have been founded at a point in history where all of that was both possible and prevalent as well as by a handful of men who had the courage to do so and the intelligence to make it work.
“The Declaration of Independence” and “The Constitution of the United States”
I’m willing to take some 5th grade ribbing and being called a “nerd” by a few of you when I tell you that almost every year, on or around the 4th of July, I pull out a small copy of those 2 founding documents and read them over. And, NO, I can’t recite them by heart. That’s not what I’m talking about here…
Each and every one of us loves to talk about the “mission, vision and values” of our business. We love a good 10-year “BHAG.” I’m unique and you’re unique. But nothing either of us is doing or will be doing is at all revolutionary – in business or in life. I believe in what I do, but I don’t think I’m willing to die for it. There are things I’d be willing to risk my life for – namely Lucy and Elizabeth. But those are two people. Is there an idea that so compels my action?
If I were a successful landowner or business owner 250 years ago, would I have been willing to “pledge my life, my fortune and my scared honor” for the principle of freedom? For the authors of that Declaration, they were signing their own death warrant. That surely meant something then, but I fear we’ve lost sight of what it really meant 250 years later. I hope I’m wrong on that, and that today’s angst is a passing phase in time.
I read the Declaration of Independence every year because the words mean something to me. I readily acknowledge that I was blessed with all of my physical and mental abilities and born to two parents who created a stable household and invested in our education. Add all of that together with being born in today’s United States of America and it makes me one of the luckiest people on the face of the planet. I’m beyond grateful for all of it. Every day.
While everyone loves to argue political points and talk about how “our current XYZ crisis is the worst it has ever been for our country,” I tend to think otherwise. America endures because we were born in battle and built to overcome – overcome our aggressors and overcome our own faults. Freedom yields a messy process at times, but from that process emerges further greatness. For reference, see the time periods around 1776, 1860 and 1939 just to name several.
I’m grateful that those 56 men pledged “their lives, their fortune and their sacred honor” so that I wouldn’t have to. To a degree, I’m the steward of their legacy. To each one of them, I’d tell them that the best days of the country are still to come.
The Book I RE-Read Last Quarter: “You’re in Charge – Now What?” by Thomas Neff & James Citrin
Rolling into 2026, I’ve decided that every quarter I’m going to re-read one of the books from my personal library that I consider to be “timeless” in its impact. I want to do that for me every bit as much as I do to share it with you, but I hope you’ll find some value in this approach as well. There comes a point where the practice of reading must become the commitment of study, and where study becomes the impact of application.
I have a ton of great books in my office – many of them from decades ago when I was climbing the ladder in the Corporate America world. Most of these are books on “management” or “leadership” written in the zeitgeist of top-down corporate structures and less about the entrepreneurial or tech-based literature of today. Almost all of you who read my writing or listen to my podcast are healthcare group or practice owners, and I can make a compelling case that the business literature of two decades ago has more meaning and application to your current role than any of the stuff you typically like to read.
Why is that? Well, because your business is tech-enabled, not tech-based. You deliver healthcare services through your people to a typically anxious, relatively un-educated consumer. I’m not saying your patients are dumb; I’m saying they don’t know how you do what you do. Your people make the impact as to whether or not your patients view you as a commodity. You make an impact as to whether or not your people can deliver on that promise. If you follow my logic and if you think my assessment of your business is accurate, then you need to read more books about leadership, creating greater results through people, and well…execution.
“You’re in Charge – Now What?” was a book I referred back to numerous times in my early leadership career. It fit well with what I was doing because I was in a corporate setting and because I have taken over new branches and had a series of “fresh starts” with those new teams. That being said, I think it has tremendous relevance to many in this audience. You can discard the points on working in a corporation, but here’s my key point for each of you: if you’re going to own your business for another 20 to 30 years, then you’re going to have to “reinvent yourself” in front of your existing team numerous times – or, at least, you should.
The authors stage the book as “your first 100 days” in the new role, but the salient points are all timeless and definitely not time-bound. Aligning expectations; building a leadership team; crafting a strategic agenda; and the importance of communication never go out of style. And the final chapter of “Avoiding the Top 10 Traps for New Leaders” is a must-read for everyone in a leadership role.
Re-reading “Now What?” was a bit of a walk down memory lane for me, but it also served as a report card of sorts. While I never thought of it as such at the time, the book gave me an objective way of thinking back about what I got right and what I got wrong in some of those branches I ran at Patterson. I was a pretty good, young executive back in those days. Maybe I should’ve read the book more thoroughly. You should, too.
Public Service Announcement
I’m an entrepreneur like many of you. I run a small business like many of you. I marvel at corporations that change the economic landscape at scale…like many of you. Amazon is one of those businesses, but I don’t buy books there unless I have no other means of finding them.
I buy physical books because I love the practice of reading with a book in my hand and a highlighter and a pencil on my desk. I highlight passages. I make notes. I underline things. I come back and re-read passages repeatedly. I realize you can do all of the above on a Kindle, but I spend far too much of my life in front of a computer, so reading for me is a release from that obligation.
I also enjoy going into a bookstore and browsing the shelves. I enjoy the inefficient task of buying a book for myself, not simply opening a cardboard box that appears “24 hours later.” It makes me feel good to support local entrepreneurs who are trying to earn a living by sharing their love of books and taking a risk to create something that a corporation can’t. Park Road Books in Charlotte is one of those stores.
So, here’s my challenge to you. Instead of downloading your next book off of Amazon, buy a physical book from your local bookshop. Just try it once.
Keep going. Keep growing. And keep grinding beans.
