Here are 100 books that Peak fans have personally recommended if you like
Peak.
Shepherd is a community of 10,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
Shepherd is reader supported. When you buy books, we may earn an affiliate commission.
I am a New York Times #1 bestselling author of more than 10 customer experience and leadership books. When I am not reading and writing, I help leaders and entrepreneurs drive employee engagement, customer loyalty, and referrals.
Economists Gilmore and Pine, trace economic value through the agrarian, industrial and service age and pioneer thinking on the importance of “staging” experiences. This book created a tectonic shift from transactional “customer service” to emotionally engaging “customer experiences.” In a world where customer satisfaction is table stakes, The Experience Economy shows readers how to drive emotional engagement and repeat business.
Time is limited. Attention is scarce. Are you engaging your customers?
Apple Stores, Disney, LEGO, Starbucks. Do these names conjure up images of mere goods and services, or do they evoke something more--something visceral?
Welcome to the Experience Economy, where businesses must form unique connections in order to secure their customers' affections--and ensure their own economic vitality.
This seminal book on experience innovation by Joe Pine and Jim Gilmore explores how savvy companies excel by offering compelling experiences for their customers, resulting not only in increased customer allegiance but also in a more profitable bottom line. Translated into thirteen languages,…
I am a New York Times #1 bestselling author of more than 10 customer experience and leadership books. When I am not reading and writing, I help leaders and entrepreneurs drive employee engagement, customer loyalty, and referrals.
If only my mail carrier were like Fred… but that’s the point. All of us can “up our game” when it comes to caring for and about others. Mark Sanborn crafted a highly accessible and engaging book that shows how everyone can “be a Fred.” The line between ordinary and extraordinary is less about resources and more about focus and effort.
Mark Sanborn met his postman, Fred, just after he moved to Denver. Fred knocked on his door, introduced himself, and welcomed him to the neighborhood. He also asked Sanborn about himself and how he wanted his mail handled while he was away. Needless to say, Sanborn was shocked. He asked Fred more about his job and how he approached it. Fred's answers inspired him to develop motivational seminars promoting Fred's attitude and approach to life.
To embody the Fred philosophy is to realise and practise that:--Everyone can make a difference--Success is built on good relationships--You must continually create value for…
I'm Professor Emeritus at UCLA and have also been on the faculty of Columbia University and The University of Michigan, where I received my PhD degree. I founded Management Systems Consulting, which works with entrepreneurial firms in the US and globally to scale up, in 1978. I've served on the board of a firm (99 Cents Only Stores) that scaled up and was a NYSE listed firm. I've advised CEOs who have created global champion firms and been recognized as leaders in their space. I've authored or co-authored several books including Creating Family Business Champions; Corporate Culture: The Ultimate Strategic Advantage; Changing the Game; and Leading Strategic Change.
This book is by the founder of a company that has successfully navigated the stages of growth from a start-up to a sustainably successful organization and become a global champion or recognized leader in its space. Accordingly, the book is from the “horse’s mouth.” Schultz and his coauthor take the reader on the journey of the development of one of the classic entrepreneurial successes of our time. He details the challenges, his thinking, and the responses that were made to create the Starbucks of today. The book provided s the reader with a rare opportunity to participate in the Starbucks journey from a vision to the reality of building a great company.
In Pour Your Heart Into It, former CEO and now chairman emeritus Howard Schultz illustrates the principles that have shaped the Starbucks phenomenon, sharing the wisdom he has gained from his quest to make great coffee part of the American experience.
The success of Starbucks Coffee Company is one of the most amazing business stories in decades. What started as a single store on Seattle's waterfront has grown into the largest coffee chain on the planet. Just as remarkable as this incredible growth is the fact that Starbucks has managed to maintain its renowned commitment to product excellence and employee…
I am a Creative Director turned Brand Strategist who loves creating clarity for brand transformations. I do so for small companies and Fortune 500s alike, but the thrill is the same. At the end of the day that hands-on (actually more of a ‘brain on’) work coupled with my books on branding and my podcast Hitting The Mark (where I talk with some of today’s most mesmerizing founders about the intersection of brand clarity and startup success) is doing my part in creating more admired brands in this world. I hope the books on this list will inspire and enable you to do the same for your own company.
It was a tough decision, and I definitely still want you to read Seth Godin’s books, but I settled on the late Tony Hsieh’s Delivering Happiness since great company culture is the foundation to an admired brand. I strongly believe in that and spreading how Tony created the phenomenon that is the Zappos culture, you will realize that paying your top employees hard cash to quit is actually one of the many ways to set your company on the path of becoming an admired brand.
- Pay brand-new employees $2,000 to quit - Make customer service the responsibility of the entire company-not just a department - Focus on company culture as the #1 priority - Apply research from the science of happiness to running a business - Help employees grow-both personally and professionally - Seek to change the world - Oh, and make money too . . .
Sound crazy? It's all standard operating procedure at Zappos, the online retailer that's doing over $1 billion in gross merchandise sales annually. After debuting as the highest-ranking newcomer in Fortune magazine's annual "Best Companies to Work For"…
At 29 I was one of the first female traders on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, building my own all-female trading company. I lost everything in 1987, which gave me a stellar opportunity to understand my power to choose how I responded to the turmoil. Now, I’m an internationally credentialed Master Certified Coach, Board Certified Coach, University of Chicago-trained psychotherapist, and Licensed Clinical Social Worker. Over 25 years ago I founded my coaching company, Jody Michael Associates. We focus on building emotional intelligence, executive presence, and mental fitness. When we help our clients learn to lead lightly, they take themselves, their teams, and their organizations to new levels of awareness, discernment, and performance.
This classic has stood the test of time because it artfully intertwines psychology and business in a way few books do.
Dr. Abraham Maslow is known for his work on the hierarchy of human needs and self-actualization. I also like the fact that he had the experience – the street cred, if you will – as a factory worker, where he gained a very practical basis for his psychological theory and research.
This book offers great insight into what drives people at their core. It will make you a better observer of people and will give you greater capacity to understand yourself and others better.
A seminal work onhuman behavior in the workplace-now completely updated "At last! We have all been quoting Maslow for years and to now have such an excellent compilation of his seminal thoughts on management and organization comes like a timely gift from heaven. The values and principles he taught decades ago are even more relevant today." -Stephen Covey, author, The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People. "Maslow's book is a readable, impressionistic masterpiece that extolled the virtues of collaborative, synergistic management decades ahead of its time. This edition reveals just how much the management thinkers of our day, including Peter…
I strongly believe that anyone who is willing to reflect thoughtfully on life can make progress toward inner peace and contentment. I have pursued my lifelong interest in human development first through a Ph.D. in applied linguistics (with a focus on individual differences in second language development) and then through the study of Stoic moral psychology and philosophy. These days I have ample opportunity to study human nature in the best laboratory of all: parenthood!
You’re probably familiar with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, an undergraduate psychology staple that explains how a person’s basic needs (such as security) are foundational to higher needs (such as self-actualization). But did you know Abraham Maslow never actually drew that pyramid? Popular psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman follows in Maslow’s footsteps, tracking down his later research and personal writings to uncover what the famous humanist really thought about personal development. It turns out that the image of the pyramid is both misleading and incomplete: it is missing its top level, self-transcendence.
Kaufman walks us through an updated vision of Maslow’s work, culminating in our ability to rise above everyday affairs and connect with our higher aspirations and ideals. In the process, we learn how to cultivate the proper mindset for growth and turn our aspirations into reality. Transcend is not about parenting per se, but it is chock full of insights…
How to realise your full potential and live your most creative life. When psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman first discovered Maslow's unfinished theory of transcendence, sprinkled throughout a cache of unpublished journals, lectures, and essays, he felt a deep resonance with his own work and life. In this groundbreaking book, Kaufman picks up where Maslow left off, unraveling the mysteries of his unfinished theory, and integrating these ideas with the latest research on attachment, connection, creativity, love, purpose and other building blocks of a life well lived.
Kaufman's new hierarchy of needs provides a roadmap for finding…
The origin story on my blog reflects some of my story best. After a period of reflection several years ago, I realised I was accumulating more in my life. More things that didn’t matter. More commitments I wasn’t truly passionate about keeping. More friction! So, I started to take some action. That action has meant: I have made good on long-term threats to write and for the last 10 years I have been writing at my blog and authored an expanding list of short books full of big ideas (all under the umbrella of simplifying life). I have accumulated less material possessions but enjoyed more (travel and holidays, events, life experiences).
We come more up-to-date with my third book recommendation. However, this book was no less transformative for me. Richard Koch’s books around the 80/20 principle were a paradigm-shifting fork in the road for me personally. They came at a time in my life when I was feeling somewhat overwhelmed and really needed them. I credit them with being one of the main reasons I became invested in my own simplicity journey.
This book (and others by the same author on 80/20) had such a profound effect on me that they influenced the name of my own company when I set it up 10 years ago. 80/20 is a concept I return to often in my own writing and I believe it is a close relative to simplicity. A powerful tool we can all learn to leverage.
If you knew that you could always get more of the great things that life has to offer, with less effort and cost, would you be interested? If you could find a simple solution to your problems by following a way that always works, would you be interested? If you could work a two-day week, and yet get much better results and pay than you do for a full week now, would you be interested? If that way applied not just to making a living, to money, or success, but also to the even more important areas of life -…
I was born, raised, and living in Iceland, the country that has been number 1 in the world for gender equality for decades. I am a leadership & personal branding coach, mentor, and Ambassador for the New Paradigm for Gender Equality. My mission is to empower people to become better, bolder, and brighter as the leading light in their industry by branding their x-factor, that gift what they were born to be.
In the book: The Passion Test, you gain a deeper understanding of your true passion and purpose in life. The authors, Janet and Chris, take you as the reader into a simple yet powerful process for one to live a life of purpose. The book is fun and valuable for anyone who wants to live a more authentic life filled with love and purposeful events. I know Oprah loved this book, and so did I!
The inspirational and life-changing New York Times bestseller that will help you discover the meaning behind your life.
Can a simple test change a person's life? Through their New York Times bestseller The Passion Test, Janet Bray Attwood and Chris Attwood have inspired thousands to shape their lives by discovering their passions and living according to what matters most to them. Readers can identify their top five passions by taking the Test, and then learn exactly how to align their lives with their priorities by following the Attwoods' easy-to-follow step-by-step program of action.
Combining powerful storytelling and profound wisdom from…
I’m a person like you who has lived difficult situations, has had losses, made mistakes, and deals with bad days wondering about my existence and purpose in life. I have a gift, and it's writing; I began sending reflective messages to the people at my office and that’s when I noticed that people loved them. Years later, after reading several books and accumulating more experience, I realized that there are several experiences that are common to all, but few questioned. Therefore, I decided to share my insight and thoughts in my second book, hoping to help people be a better version of themselves and live their lives to their fullest.
I needed a different book and found it in this one. The author wrote it based on interviewing more than 200 people over 60. And I learned a lot from it!
If you want to make a checkup about your life and how you live it, this is the book you need. The 5 secrets will help you to see if you are on the right path.
What shocked me was to learn that happy people aren’t afraid to die. People who live life wisely accept death as part of life. When I read that, I committed myself to putting into practice the 5 secrets because I want to be like those the author interviewed: nothing to regret.
“What brought you the greatest joy? What do you wish you had learned sooner? What ultimately mattered and what didn’t?” asks Dr. John Izzo. Based on a highly acclaimed public television series, this book takes the reader on a heartwarming and profound journey to find lasting happiness.
Imagine for a moment that you are about to take a foreign vacation to an exotic destination. You have saved your entire life to travel there. It is a destination with almost unlimited choices of how to spend your time and you know you will not have enough time to explore every opportunity.…
As both a professor of graphic design and creative director of Fast Company, I’m dedicated to helping others be more creative. At Fast Company, my job is to ensure the visuals for the world’s leading business media brand are consistently innovative. (Yea…no pressure.) Honestly, sometimes it’s tough to be innovative when I’m faced with a squeezed schedule, a towering to-do list, and a bargain basement budget. But, as a marathoner, I’ve learned that if you want to be successful, you need to push through sub-optimal circumstances. That’s where these five books come into play: they all provide relatable stories and insights into achieving success, despite tough odds. Let’s do this.
Paul Arden’s book teaches you how to be an optimist—an essential trait for meeting your milestones. He writes: “You must develop a complete disregard for where your abilities end.” Focus on who you want to be, not who you are.
This is a tool called positive visualization, one I’ve harnessed in my career path as a creative director, an author, and a professor. By envisioning who I want to be, I take the necessary steps to achieve success.
It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want to Be is a handbook of how to succeed in the world: a pocket bible for the talented and timid alike to help make the unthinkable thinkable and the impossible possible.
The world's top advertising guru, Paul Arden, offers up his wisdom on issues as diverse as problem solving, responding to a brief, communicating, playing your cards right, making mistakes, and creativity - all endeavours that can be applied to aspects of modern life.
This uplifting and humorous little book provides a unique insight into the world of advertising…
