100 books like Advice for Working Dads

Many of us tend to focus on the child— the child has tantrums, therefore the child has the problem. It‘s important for me to include this book on the list because adults play an unparalleled role in modeling emotional regulation for kids. We need to remind ourselves that how we respond can make the difference between resolving the situation OR making it worse. This book is an eye-opener and can help grown-ups relate to kids in better ways. It’s about connection before correction, because a dysregulated child (or adult, for that matter), cannot think straight and will not be able to act rationally. The teaching moments can come after we have calmed the storm, always coming from a place of love and understanding.

This is more than a book—it’s an incredible call to change, and in many ways the other side of the coin for the advice for working dads. 

Mary Portas has a strong insight here—that the patriarchy has driven much of what we see, hear, and feel as ‘the world’ today, and that to start to change that, we all need to lean much more into traditionally ‘feminine’ qualities such as cooperation, collaboration, and more to start to live humanities fuller potential. 

I saw Mary speak after getting this book, and it was a double whammy of incredible change. It’s one of the most inspiring books I’ve read in an awfully long time.

I call this book ‘the big so what of modern day fatherhood’ as it’s the ultimate destination for where modern day dads can go and what we can achieve. 

James and David have crafted a compelling argument not just about how the world sees dads and the language used, but also sets a pathway toward true gender equality by challenging us about how dads can unlock so much more change across pretty much every facet of society, economics, and more.

Ok so after all the seriousness of pregnancy, dads at work, and gender equality you might be surprised that a children’s story makes my list about modern day fatherhood. This book is a gem, and does something really rare. It represents dad as the primary carer, and it also describes, through much adventure, cheekiness, and love, the type of dad bond and every night realisms that we feel and experience—even through the eyes of a child. I loved reading this book to my son as he was growing up in his toddler years, and even now if gets a little run out every now and then.

I know (and research backs it up) that when women earn more money (and have more money) the world will be a better place for it. We all win. But in today’s society being the breadwinner also comes with a higher risk of burnout, infidelity, depression, and divorce. In When She Makes More, Farnoosh shares the ten rules for a fulfilling and wealthy life at home and work.   

While the origins of northern police in this country were rooted in the development of a new set of class relations among white people, discussions of policing today cannot be untangled from the history of African Americans.

Trotter shows that Black people have always been a crucial part of this country’s workforce. Racism itself is rooted in the ways that Black workers’ position has been shaped by capitalists, non-black workers, and Black workers themselves, and this has been true since the dawn of slavery.

In his last chapters, Trotter brilliantly illustrates how the problems created for the entire working class by the end of the post-World War II economic boom were inflicted out of all proportion on the Black population. In other words, the relatively well-paying jobs were destroyed, and it was Black workers in particular who lost them.

The rise of mass incarceration since the 1970s and the violent… show more.

The domestic slave trade business was operated predominantly by white men, but the labor of Black women was critical to making it profitable. Here, Alexandra Finley recovers the stories of Black women who fed and clothed the enslaved in pens and jail, who kept the houses of slave traders, who were commodified for purposes of sexual slavery in the so-called fancy trade, and who sometimes even lived as the concubines and “wives” of traders. Putting enslaved women and their work at the center of the story yields an entirely new angle of vision on the trade.

In her career, Indra broke numerous barriers (being an immigrant and a woman of color, to name just two) to become a Fortune 50 CEO.

She was a trailblazer and refused to compromise on her values, even when faced with near-constant resistance and challenges. Indra’s memoir is a powerful look at how one woman chose to do things differently, as well as being a call to action for the business world to shift the current paradigm.

I found this book fascinating. The guilds of early modern London were a male-only ‘closed shop’. But Laura Gowing’s pioneering study shows how resourceful women found ways to exploit loopholes and carve out a role in the world of skilled trades and crafts.

A guild member’s widow was permitted to continue her husband’s trade (provided she didn’t remarry), and she might take on a female apprentice and use the signing-on ‘premium’ to grow her business. Once the apprenticeship was completed, the young woman would now have the skills to set up on her own in the suburbs or provinces where guilds had no control.

I liked the case-studies where Gowing has been able to reconstruct individual lives to bring this new world vividly to life.   

Business psychology is a growing and important field in which Binna Kandola (and his firm Pearn Kandola) plays a leading part. If you are white and living in the UK, you may simply not be aware how racism can affect and damage your colleagues and fellow citizens. But this book is not some aggressive “woke” polemic. Kandola is measured, tactful and serious. He tries to show all of us can do better when it comes to recognizing and halting racism at work. Even if you reject the notion of “unconscious bias” – and that might be understandable given some of the failed interventions and flimsy training courses that have been offered by some – Kandola explains that racism is not imagined or exaggerated. It is real and has to be dealt with.