Three Change Books To Read And Transform In Summer 2024
Summer is a good time not only to relax and take a break from our work. It’s also a great time to explore new ideas, new directions. And get a fresh perspective on our business or life. Once we are away from the daily routines — ideally comfortably seated in a chaise-longue on a sunny beach with chilled mochitto at arms reach — we may start to see thing differently. New dreams emerge. And we are suddenly plotting new plans and reshuffling our priorities.
Summer is really the perfect time to reflect, recharge, and renew our perspectives. It's a season of transformation in nature, and it can be a season of transformation for you, too. With a good book in hand, you can start a journey of personal and professional growth.
Imagine soaking up the sun while learning how to make lasting transformations and reaching your goals. Because the right book can be a catalyst for change, offering you fresh perspectives and practical advice.
So here are my three recommended summer change essential books…
1. “The One Thing” by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan
When you want to change anything, you better make sure that you have a razor sharp focus on what you want to achieve. The distraction is your enemy.
If you think you’re good at multitasking, prepare to be hilariously humbled. This book is brutally honest because it tells you that, no, you can't juggle fifteen tasks at once and expect to be awesome at all of them.
Keller and Papasan make a compelling case for the power of focus by asking one simple yet profound question: what's the ONE thing you should do to achieve your objective, so everything else will be easier or unnecessary?
This idea resonates so much with me — because understanding your change leaver is one of the four fundamental pillars in my ChangeBootcamp training.
Today, the world is obsessed with productivity hacks. And tips how to organize and re-organize to-do lists that are longer than a grocery store receipt. And how to squeeze twelve tasks into one hour.
But 'The One Thing' is different — a gust of fresh, sarcastically realistic air. Keller and Papasan argue that success is sequential, not simultaneous. Now — what does that mean? Just stop trying to be a superhero — and instead focus on doing one thing exceptionally well at a time.
This book is not just smart stuff. It’s also fun to read — because while it offers those “aha” insights on how to declutter your work and personal life, it makes you chuckle at how foolish we've been to believe that busyness equals productivity. Spoiler alert: no, it doesn't. On the contrary: by narrowing your focus to the most important task, you'll achieve extraordinary results — without feeling like a hamster on a wheel.
Unlike some other books, I like that 'The One Thing' doesn't just slap you with this revelation and leave you hanging. It actually walks you through practical steps too. Especially, about how to identify your 'one thing' and how to protect it from the relentless assaults of distraction.
But the book also doesn't sugarcoat the truth: because being focused is a hard work in our distraction-filled world. Anyway the good news is that the learnings are applicable to both business and personal life. Just be ready to swim against the current.
When reading this book, I cannot really tell you how many times I had recalled moments experienced along my career — situations when managers praised and promoted multitasking as something to loath for. And how the “multi-tasking skillset” is embedded in almost any job description template. This book will open your eyes. So you will realize that instead of putting multi-tasking on the pedestal, those managers should actually make up their minds what the hell they want to get done…
Perhaps you may put this book discreetly on your boss’ desk, once you are done with the reading…? :)
2. “Atomic Habits” by James Clear
This is quite a popular book and you may have heard of it already. But I strongly recommend you to actually read it too… Because if you think you can’t change your habits, since you’ve tried and failed a million times, this book is here with a fresh take. Atomic Habits promote simple yet powerful philosophy: it's the tiny changes that make the biggest difference.
So — instead of trying to reengineer your entire life overnight, Atomic Habits suggest that you start with changes so small they’re almost laughable. You know, something like doing one push-up a day or reading a single page in a book. It sounds ridiculous, but it works.
James Clear in his book debunks the popular myth that massive success requires massive action. He argues that real, lasting change comes from the compound effect of hundreds of small decisions – what he calls 'atomic habits.' And when these tiny adjustments accumulate, they transform your life or business. Kind of like how a tiny snowflake becomes an avalanche.
And again — there’s lot of resemblance with the 4-step change model I teach in the ChangeBootcamp or ChangeDay. Because the application of Atomic Habits is like transforming the ChangeLeavers into an actionable plan. Basically, it’s moving step by step — pushing an pulling on those those ChangeLeavers bit by bit. Instead of facing an overwhelming goal, you have suddenly set of little, understandable and actionable tasks to perform.
In this book, James Clear makes you realize that you don’t need superhuman willpower to change your habits. Instead, you need a system that makes good habits inevitable and bad habits impossible.
For example — have you ever heard of the 2-Minute Rule? It’s about starting a new habit by doing something that takes two minutes or less. The idea is to make your new habit so easy that you can’t say no. Want to start reading more? Just read a page a day. Want to get fit? Put on your workout clothes every morning. It’s about showing up and starting, no matter how small the effort. And once you’ve mastered the art of showing up, you can gradually increase the effort. Before you know it, those tiny habits snowball into significant, lasting changes.
So, if you’re tired of setting bold resolutions only to abandon them next week, 'Atomic Habits' is a book worth reading. Stop beating yourself up for failing big and start celebrating your small wins. Opening this book can be actually your first tiny, atomic habit — don’t you think?
3. “How To Start A Change: : A Guide To First Transformation Steps In Business And Life” by Viktor Houška
Well — speaking of how to start working on your change goals, here comes the third reading tip. And yes, you may guessed right — it’s me who humbly wrote it. Because during more than two decaders in change management, I realized that it’s the initial phases, the very first moments of our journey, that have critical influence on the future success or failure.
If you've ever found yourself stuck at the starting line of making a big change, you know what I mean. So this book is about to make you ready and well prepared. The premise is straightforward: making the first step towards change doesn't have to feel like climbing Everest. It's all about just six simple questions you should ask yourself. My inspiration were the checklists pilots use before every flight — to make sure no important element is overlooked and that the flight will be smooth.
In a world where everyone's obsessed with the endgame – hitting goals, smashing milestones, becoming a 'new you' overnight – 'How To Start A Change' ebook rather suggests to take a breath first and assess your odds. Because if you don’t, the common change problems will catch up with you later. They always do. And they can make achieving your goals more expensive, more frustrating, more time consuming.
And because I understand that your ambitions may vary, I wrote this ebook with four use-cases in mind. So it provides practical guidelines for application in your personal life, for entrepreneurs and business owners, as well as for corporate managers or project managers.
Unlike many fancy how-to books, everything inside this ebook is based on real-life experience. Sometimes — the painfully gained experience. Because I wanted to give you a practical guide and no-nonsense tips that actually work.
Have you ever wondered why your previous attempts at change fizzled out? It's because you were aiming for the finish line — without nailing down the start first.
This frequent misconception always reminds me of this story. I was attending a company conference in Cannes, France, some years ago. As not to spend all the time in a conference room, the organizers prepared for us a team game for one afternoon. The idea was to explore the town in breakup groups in a sort of a treasure hunt game. And funny thing happened when the organizers handed over to our team the sealed envelope with instructions and map of the checkpoints. My teammates grabbed the envelope and started running away, shouting “quickly — let’s go!” — urging everybody to run and rush along. But where to? The envelope was still sealed! Why to run in a certain direction — if you have no idea where is the first checkpoint, where is the first clue hidden or what you are actually supposed to achieve, once there?
However anecdotal, I guess that you may recall similar situations you may have experienced at your work — projects launched without a second thought, or ambitious business plans announced without any idea how to make them.
This guide provides a clear, actionable roadmap to help you make those critical first moves with confidence. Whether it’s setting up a new business project or kick-starting personal growth, you'll learn how to navigate the often tricky, but totally doable, first steps.
So, if you're ready to finally break through and start making real changes, 'How To Start A Change' is your essential guide. And as I said, it’s refreshingly practical, sometimes sarcastic — as you may expect from me — but above all, really really useful.
Hence, I suggest you finis off that mojito you are holding right now — and get your copy at Amazon.com. It’s ridiculously affordabe — actually it’s likely equal to your mojito drink — so stop dreaming about change and start doing it.