I love talking to people about their favorite book

Depending on when you read this, we’re somewhere around 31 episodes into the Stacking Knowledge podcast and going strong. Every episode features me speaking with a guest about a business/life book that they got something out of, and the conversations have been phenomenal. The wisdom that my guests have brought has been amazing.

In a few cases, though, it’s clear that we’ve touched on something special. In those cases we’re not talking about “a” book that they enjoyed, but rather the book that shaped their life in incredible ways. Three examples come to mind.

The first time this happened was when Brian Marcos and I discussed “Chess Not Checkers”. I could tell things were different because while Brian certainly used some notes from time to time, 90% of his comments came directly out of his head and he knew this book amazingly well. He’d share quotes from the book and then tie them all back to his experiences in leadership. It was awesome.

It happened again a few episodes later with Moira Vetter sharing her thoughts on “The Art of War”. Her copy of the book was very well-worn and tattered, as she’s read it many times. During the show she shared “Instead of reading a book a day, I read the same books over and over trying to go deeper into the content and trying to find new aspects of applying subject matter” and it was undoubtedly true.

Most recently it happened when Justin Smith and I went through “The Ideal Team Player”. The concept of the book is very simple: the ideal team player is humble, hungry and smart. That’s it. However, unpacking those can get quite deep and Justin shared a wealth of information about the differences between them, what happens when a person is just missing one of those three, and he shared detailed example of every situation. Like Brian and Moira, he had some notes with him but the very best stuff came directly from his brain. He’s taught on this book many times, and his deep understanding of it made for some amazing insights.

Every person I’ve interviewed has been fantastic, and I don’t think there’s bad episode that we’ve published. Sometimes, though, when you get people to talk about their very favorite book it can bring some real magic.

What is the most impactful book that you’ve ever read?