New Books in Business, Management, and Marketing

Why do our attempts to control uncertainty often leave us feeling more adrift? What if our greatest source of stress could become our deepest well of creativity? Drawing from neuroscience, psychology, and two decades of experience across advertising and venture capital, Dessy T. Levinson offers a radical reframing of how we relate to intensity. From Overwhelm to Flow: Sailing the Seas of Self with Courage, Meaning, and Resilience (Crate Mind, 2025) reveals how our nervous system actually processes complexity-and how understanding this transforms our relationship with uncertainty. Through intimate stories and cutting-edge research, the book introduces CRATE-a framework that combines cognitive insight with emotional intelligence to build lasting resilience. At its core, this book challenges our default response to overwhelm. Rather than trying to eliminate intensity or bypass emotion, we learn to welcome these experiences as portals to deeper understanding. Whether you're a founder navigating startup chaos, a leader building psychological safety for your team, or simply someone seeking to understand why your emotions feel like they're steering the ship, you'll discover practical tools for charting a new course. The journey unfolds in three parts. First, we dive into the science of how our minds and emotions actually work, discovering why traditional approaches to managing stress often backfire. Next, we explore the CRATE framework-Clarity, Regulation, Agency, Trust, and Energy-learning how to transform these insights into practical tools for navigating complexity. Finally, we discover how personal transformation extends beyond the individual, creating ripples that enhance our relationships, teams, and communities. More than just another self-help manual or management guide, this is an invitation to remember what we've always known but perhaps forgotten: that our struggles become our strengths when we learn to sail with, rather than against, the seas of our nature. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Organizations have more data at their fingertips than ever, and their ability to put that data to productive use should be a key source of sustainable competitive advantage. Yet, business leaders looking to tap into a steady and manageable stream of “actionable insights” often, instead, get blasted with a deluge of dashboards, chart-filled slide decks, and opaque machine learning jargon that leaves them asking, “So what?” Analytics the Right Way: A Business Leader's Guide to Putting Data to Productive Use (Wiley, 2025) is a guide for these leaders. It provides a clear and practical approach to putting analytics to productive use with a three-part framework that brings together the realities of the modern business environment with the deep truths underpinning statistics, computer science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence. The result: a pragmatic and actionable guide for delivering clarity, order, and business impact to an organization’s use of data and analytics. The book uses a combination of real-world examples from the authors’ direct experiences—working inside organizations, as external consultants, and as educators—mixed with vivid hypotheticals and illustrations—little green aliens, petty criminals with an affinity for ice cream, skydiving without parachutes, and more—to empower the reader to put foundational analytical and statistical concepts to effective use in a business context.Joe Sutherland has worked as an executive, public servant, and educator for the Dow Jones 30, The White House, and our nation's top universities. His firm, J.L. Sutherland & Associates, has attracted clients such as Box, Cisco, Canva, The Conference Board, and Fulcrum Equity Partners. He founded the Center for AI Learning at Emory University, which focuses on AI literacy and integration for the general public.Caleb Zakarin is editor at the New Books Network.Let's face it, most of the popular podcasts out there are dumb. NBN features scholars (like you!), providing an enriching alternative to students. We partner with presses like Oxford, Princeton, and Cambridge to make academic research accessible to all. Please consider sharing the New Books Network with your students. Download this poster here to spread the word.Please share this interview on Instagram, LinkedIn, or Bluesky. Don't forget to subscribe to our Substack here to receive our weekly newsletter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today I spoke with Mike Ganino about his new book Make a Scene, Storytelling, Stage Presence, and the Art of being Unforgettable in every Spotlight (Authors & Co., 2025)“The most powerful asset whether you want to lead a team, whether you want to pitch a deal, whether you want to close business, whether you want to interview for a new job, your most powerful asset is the way you communicate. So I would say if you're out there and you're someone who is working in the business world and you're looking at numbers and crutching things and you're under this stress, don't let your most powerful asset atrophy.”-Elite speaking coach and Former TEDx Executive Producer Mike Ganino. With his Five Stage Languages and Rapid Prototyping Protocol, Ganino reveals the exact framework he's used to train over 5,000 speakers-from bestselling authors and TED stars to Fortune 500 executives. With equal parts attitude and expertise, he teaches you to: Master the art of authentic storytelling that captivates any audience; Transform nervous energy into magnetic stage presence; Own virtual presentations with more impact than a viral TED talk; Turn everyday moments into opportunities to shine; Craft messages so compelling, people forget to check their phones. Make a Scene is for anyone tired of playing it safe and ready to own the spotlight. Whether you're a professional speaker crafting your next keynote or a leader delivering a crucial presentation, this book will help you stop shrinking and start shining. It's time to make a scene-and make it count. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

In this podcast interview, Richard Lucas hosts Ben Bradbury, founder of Reading Rhythms, to discuss the back story leading to founding Ben's his unique reading-themed events. Ben sharing his entrepreneurial journey, including early influences and the inspiration behind Reading Rhythms, which aims to reduce loneliness through shared reading experiences. We learn about the early role model and nudges Ben had from his mother and uncle, his first steps in entrepreneurship and work as a teenager. We hear about the positive and importantly negative lessons he learned from those experiences. We hear how Reading Rhythms emerged from Ben solving a problem he had in his own life, of finding time to read, and making connections with other readers in New York, and their “breakthrough moment when the New York Times published an article about what Reading Rhythms/Richard and Ben explore the operational aspects of the business, highlighting its growth, revenue model, and the implementation of a management structure to address coordination challenges across multiple chapters, and work on efficiency and processes. We learn about their use of the Clifton Strengths assessment process, their rigorous and demanding approach to taking on and supporting new Group leaders and Ambassadors, and discuss similarities between Reading Rhythms, the TED-TEDx network and the NBN.The NBN as an organisation and Richard as the host of this channel, and very aligned with what RR is doing, and their enthusiasm is clear for the tone of the podcastLinks: 3 steps to turn everyday get-togethers into transformative gatherings - Priya Parker Mark McKergow Host Leadership - book Host Leadership - why "hosting" is an important type of leadership | Mark McKergow  How Village-in-the-City builds micro-local communities worldwide | Mark McKergow Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Robert Rosenkranz was described by Bill Bowder as “the most powerful titan on Wall Street you’ve probably never heard of." As CEO of Delphi Capital Management the value of its assets under management grew to U$20 billion, and its value grew 100 fold.While his book The Stoic Capitalist (Bloomsbury, 2025) – has the tag line “advice for the exceptionally ambitious” there are powerful lessons that anyone can take from his story.In the podcast, we hear about the power and impact of the negative role models his unemployed father and communist mother played, leading to intense financial stress Robert wanted to avoid in his own life.Robert shares many aspects of how a stoic philosophy guided him and can guide others.--The positive influence of his extensive reading of the biographies of those who succeeded--The important of regarding obstacles as opportunities for growth--The value of focussing on areas we have control over--The value of time--The importance of reason over emotion, without ignoring the importance and impact of emotions on decision making processes--When and how to take risk and go “all in”--How to interview people--The important of selecting the right partners in life and business--His own approach to philanthropy, including his work supporting research into Longevity, modern art, and the debate of ideas Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The secret insights of economics, translated for the rest of us. Should I buy or rent? Do I ask for a promotion? Should I tell people I’m pregnant? What salary do I deserve? Should I just quit this job? Common anxieties about life are often grounded in economics. In an increasingly win-lose society, these economic decisions—where to work, where to live, even how to live—have a way of feeling fixed and mistakes terminal. Daryl Fairweather is no stranger to these dynamics. As the first Black woman to receive an economics PhD from the famed University of Chicago, she saw firsthand how concepts of behavioral economics and game theory were deployed in the real world—and in her own life—to great effect. Hate the Game: Economic Cheat Codes for Life, Love, and Work (U Chicago Press, 2025) combines Fairweather’s elite knowledge of these principles with her singular voice in describing how they can be harnessed. Her great talent, unique among economists, is her ability to articulate economic trends in a way that is not just informative, but also accounts for life’s other anxieties. In Hate the Game, Fairweather fixes her expertise and service on navigating the earliest economic inflection points of adult life: whether to go to college and for how long; partnering, having kids, both, or neither; getting, keeping, and changing jobs; and where to live and how to pay for it. She speaks in actionable terms about what the economy means for individual people, especially those who have the sneaking suspicion they’re losing out. Set against her own experiences and enriched with lessons from history, science, and pop culture, Fairweather instructs readers on how to use game theory and behavioral science to map out options and choose directions while offering readers a sense of control and agency in an economy where those things are increasingly rare. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

John Kay's The Corporation in the 21st Century: Why (Almost) Everything We Are Told about Business Is Wrong (Yale UP, 2025) is an accessible and entertaining reappraisal of what business is for and how it works. Full of history and written in a compelling narrative style, this book describes a shift in the underlying assumptions of the relationship between capital & labor. Kay describes how and why we have come to "love the product" as we also "hate the producer". Kay discusses areas of particular change such as the relationship between business & finance, the concept of the "hollow" corporation, what we mean when we say "growth", and the motivations and standards of industry leaders. Old ideas of owning the means of production are redundant as workers are increasingly the means of production. Capital is now often a disconnected service contracted from a specialized supplier, and businesses are run by professional managers whose main skill is exerting authority.Author recommended reading: Good Strategy, Bad Strategy by Richard RumeltHosted by Meghan Cochran Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Little Red Barns: Hiding the Truth, from Farm to Fable (City Lights Books, 2025) is a groundbreaking investigation of factory farms and the unprecedented measures being taken to hide their impact -- on animals, public health, and the environment -- from the public.Hiding behind the little red barns that dot the landscape of rural America and decorate so many of the animal-based products we consume is a dangerous truth and a very real threat.Little Red Barns is the record of a harrowing journey that took investigative journalist Will Potter from factory farms to international climate summits, from congressional hearings to neo-Nazi fascist groups.As Potter uncovers the frightening truth about animal agriculture's role in accelerating climate collapse, he shows how the authoritarian measures being taken to maintain control over this key aspect of the global food supply chain are directly linked to the proliferation and empowerment of far-right militias.Writing in an engaging, personal style, he invites his reader to accompany him on the journey as he confronts a maelstrom of disturbing information, asking searching questions along the way about the role of a journalist and the impact of "bearing witness" in a world where we're bombarded with images, real and faked. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I sat down with Tinatin Japaridze to explore how history shapes her work as a geopolitical risk analyst at the Eurasia Group. We discussed the role of historical context in forecasting geopolitical risks and how historical training fosters deep curiosity about the world. Tinatin shared her unconventional path to the field—one that took her from composing a Eurovision song to journalism, a regional studies MA at Columbia, and even New York's local politics. She reflected on balancing the personal and professional in her work and how these diverse experiences ultimately made her a stronger analyst. We also dove into her book Stalin’s Millennials (2022) and why talking to taxi drivers can be more insightful than you might think. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

To be successful you need to be Weird, Selfish, Shameless, Obsessed, Nosy, Manipulative, Brutal, Reckless, and Bossy. And that takes courage.As a former Google leader and top career coach who chased an attractive stranger off the subway and later married him, Jenny Wood knows her way around courage. In this book, Wood shatters conventional wisdom about achieving your goals. She gives you permission to ditch your fear and chase after what you want, unapologetically.Wood reclaims nine traits from their negative shackles and teaches you how to apply them in a savvy and sane way to supercharge your success, whether you’re trying to impress your new boss, snag a stretch promotion, or land a life-changing deal. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices