If you chance upon every second person in a crowd, you can definitely hear their best past-time to be reading. It’s definitely not surprising, but every individual has an innate quality to consume information through reading. For some, it’s a pleasure, for a few it’s cumbersome, and for the rest it’s a mandate. While it’s not necessarily a qualification for product folks to inculcate the habit of reading, the ones who do it don’t go without returns.

With a bevy of well-known books written for anyone who wants to kickstart or ascend in a product career, including UI/UX design, product marketing, product management, development, and more, here’s contrary to the obvious — the least-expected books that can actually relate to product-building and launching!

While these four may be hard-core business, leadership, or memoir books, there are some top lessons every product-centric person can pick from these.

Let’s look at the run-through:

Hit Refresh

One of the most-famous releases in 2017 is ‘Hit Refresh’ by Satya Nadella, the CEO of Microsoft Corporation. In one word, this book can be called MAGIC. Bringing in a grounded and valuable perspective from Nadella, there’s a deep discussion on opportunities created by technology, the human-tech relationships, progression and the future of the world. From what turned out as the biggest blow to Microsoft, this piece by Nadella describes what the company did to grow past its failures and emerge as the most-trusted and empathetic brand of today’s times.

One of the prime (and obvious) reasons to pick this up is to master (or at least get exposed to) business strategy. The what-why-how cycle is well explained with every note. As for product folks, there are two underlying thoughts that are very transformational:

i. Empathy is the king in a disruptive and progressive tech world.

As product makers and professionals, one of the key concepts that we need to understand is who we’re building products for and why. Leaving behind personal apprehensions, what matters more is how empathetic and responsive we are to existing concerns and needs of the growing customer population. Where there’s necessity, there’s market, hence birth meaningful products.

ii. The ability to constantly rediscover and reinitiate the purpose, what Nadella beautifully calls as raison d’être of an organization.

Now, let’s apply this to the products we handle. How helpful would it be if we as teams reinstate and analyze to discover the “why” behind our operations! The vision of products lies not just in what the company states in papers but the collective thoughts and purpose for which the product was introduced in the first place.

Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead

This classic from Sheryl Sandberg is something that any assertive and ambitious leader would love to pick. Apart from the bold and groundbreaking lessons this book imparts in every woman (and man), there’s even appreciative product thoughts this book leaves behind:

i. Sense of community is an oft-quoted yet not-oft-practised concept.

In today’s product environment, building a community has become mainstream. Collecting people, forming a medium, and propagating messages have by far been the easiest of tasks, thanks to the rapidly-growing technology. What has perhaps taken the most-difficult title is the impact and the motive behind forming a community. A community of like-minded product individuals, a community of customers, a community of tech leaders — there’s no dearth to forming a clan. But, where we have to seal the lack is understanding the purpose of existence and encouraging members of the community to strive for bigger and better, together.

ii. Raising opinions and ideas around every product decision.

It’s easy to get a nod from a room full of folks; the only difficult thing is to tackle a denial. A product team where there’s acceptance from everyone in the long run turns into a room of plaintive minders. This doesn’t mean people need to be naysayers. Instead, what’s required is calculative criticism, bold candidness, and the ability to oppose decisions with validation. What dominates should be clarity of thoughts and not extreme misogynism, ego, or jealousy.

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck

This counterintuitive approach to life by Mark Manson is like eating ice cream in winters — as farcical as it sounds, it has a deeper meaning and a methodology. Anything but a dud, this book is what every reader picks up for some soulful, non-fictive read. What product lessons can we find here, you ask? Here are the gems for you:

i. Flawed is fine.

Accepting one’s inferiorities and addressing self limitations can seem depressing but rewarding. Why? Let’s apply this to our product world. It’s no longer going to help when all’s good in the products we market. Nor does it help to mask a poorly-functioning product and faking it to be a stable fit. What’s instead needed is acceptance that the product needs periodic enhancement and embrace the current failures that the product teams endure. Likewise, giving room to constant feedback from customers erases the delusionally high and sabotaging thought-web we create for putting down our own products.

ii. In life, it’s better to follow the limited-f*ck mechanism — mind only what matters out of your adversities.

Don’t you think this helps great with fixing and fine-tuning products for the market? When there are hundreds of requests and features to be handled, minding what matters more in terms of impact and future revenue road-map instead of trying to be happy aka adopting every little suggestion is savvy.

This doesn’t mean you’re mediocre; instead, you become a mindful product leader.

When breath becomes air

One of the beautiful and heart-wrenching memoirs written by an ailing surgeon, Paul Kalanithi, this book is like a zephyr that vanishes, leaving you with lingering thoughts. From addressing what makes life worth living at the verge of dying to battling with the uncertainty of an ephemeral future, Paul’s writing teaches you to appreciate your miraculous life.

What Paul imparts in us, the product people, is very subtle — the perseverance and will to look beyond deadlocks and logjams. Seeming to be morbid to our product growth-map, there are things beyond even a founder or manager’s control. How to handle situations wherein your product team is collapsed or taken over by someone? What to do when your GTM strategy gets misled? What happens when an IPO fails, or say, your VCs don’t get their returns from your startup?

The list of deadly moments can be numerous, and as Paul states in his memoir, “You can’t go on. You’ll go on.” (read in first person!)

Go on and cross every barrier in your product career, for all you need is the acceptance of reality and the willingness to start over, every time you fall.

And, little was the realization that these four books from different genres could tie together to speak volumes about focusing on product-thinking and building meaningful products for the world!

P.S. This article of mine has been used for publication on TheProdcast.