What Are SA’s Business Folk Reading Right Now? – Ronald Bach Tells Us What He’s Been Reading Lately
by Yolandi on 19/11/09 at 6:30 am
2 comments
South Africa’s business folk are reading and I’m interested in knowing what books they are busy reading right now. Product manager and mobilista at 20fourlabs Ronald Bach told me of two very interesting books he’s been reading lately.
The first book Ron recommends is Outliers (non-fiction) by Malcolm Gladwell. For Ron, it’s a book that has sparked many discussions around the dinner table or braai.
In this book, Malcolm Gladwell asks the question – what makes high achievers different? His answer is that we pay too much attention to what successful people are like, and too little attention to where they are from – that is, their culture, their family, their generation, and the idiosyncratic experiences of their upbringing.
“It argues that sociological factors such as “the Matthew effect” and “the 10,000-Hour Rule” and how being in the right place at the right time are some of the reasons certain people (Bill Gates, The Beatles, Canadian ice-hockey players etc) have been so successful.”
The second book Ron mentions is Makers by Cory Doctorow. Ron has recently been exploring different mobile e-readers and has started reading the book by Boing Boing editor, Sci-Fi author and digital rights activist Cory Doctorow on his iPhone.
Makers tells the story of a group of hardware hackers who fall in with microfinancing venture capitalists and reinvent the American economy after a total economic collapse, and who find themselves swimming with sharks, fighting with gangsters, and leading a band of global techno-revolutionaries.
Ron’s only a third through it but already highly recommends it (even if you’re not a Sci-Fi fan). “It’s all about innovation, creativity and new business models in the near future.” Thanks Ron for sharing your thoughts on these interesting books with us.
Yolandi Janse van Rensburg writes about social media, marketing, life and, of course, cars. We say “of course” because Yolandi is nuts about anything on 4 wheels. Besides moonlighting as the Heavy Chef girl at World Wide Creative, Yolandi runs Autofemme, a blog about cars, as a business on the side. View more articles by Yolandi.
Tags: Business books
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Ron Bach
Nov 19th, 2009
My pleasure Yolandi. I look forward to hearing what other folk are reading.
Shane
Nov 19th, 2009
Nice one Ron, just about to finish Outliers – brilliant book!