When more is not better

The words ‘more’ and ‘efficient’ should ring a bell in our heads and hearts. The word ‘enough’ never occurs. There always seems to be something missing in our lives, requiring that next purchase or experience. And, even after the additional purchase or experience, we are left wanting more. More has become an obsession and efficiently procuring it, the next illusion. Because, more does not make our lives better, it simply increases the quantum of what we have. Unfortunately, even educated individuals have trouble understanding this.

Why is more not automatically better? This is an interesting topic for all of us to think about. With increasing technological prowess, economic efficiency makes things cheaper. It also makes performance better. The question to ponder is – what does ‘more’ make better and what does ‘more’ make worse? Roger Martin’s recent book titled ‘When more is not better’ raises this question with regards to America’s Democratic Capitalism.

I am a fan of Roger Martin. I have included many of his Harvard

Business Review articles in my course reading lists on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. I particularly loved his book ‘Playing to Win’, which i have referred to many of my students and entrepreneur friends. I also enjoyed reading his book ‘Creating Great Choices’. So, i was surprised and happy to see a book on this topic from Prof Martin, the strategy professor. The book attempts to ask how democracy and capitalism can coexist?

The first part of the book focusses on the problem. It highlights the challenges America faces today, in sustaining and making the efficient model, continue to deliver on the ‘American Dream’. Unfortunately this dream is under threat, and Roger deftly handles how this can be overcome. While he does balance between theory and practice, the book is interesting because he uses his strategic approach to problem definition. While he uses secondary data to showcase the macro trends, he uses interesting data from projects done at the Martin Prosperity Institute to supplement what aggregate data misses to capture. The responses by citizens and how they seem disconnected with both the democratic and the capitalist systems, is worrisome to all who believe in them. Additionally, this section highlights the challenges of relying on proxies to measure performance and progress. Two big problems with proxies are: choice of proxies and their atomistic nature. The section is filled with many interesting cases, but the one that caught my attention was the way a pediatric hospital attempted to include performance metrics into the incentives of the CEO. WOW! The response from the CEO (will let you, the reader, savor it yourself), and the lesson it provides is alone worth the price of the book.

The second half of the book presents solutions. It presents an agenda at four levels – business executives, political leaders, educators and citizens. I particularly enjoyed the chapter ‘An Agenda for Educators’ where he talks about the experiences of teachers, especially K-12. It gives a glimpse into why the world still thrives – there are still selfless people who strive to make the lives of others better. All the solutions presented are drawn from existing practices, although practiced in pockets. When i read through the second part of the book, I was reminded of another interesting book by Professors Sutton and Rao titled ‘Scaling up Excellence’ where they discuss why excellence exists in pockets and how it needs to be spread around. This scaling up of excellence, is in effect what Prof Martin proposes. But as he warns, this is both challenging and necessary.

The book is an interesting read. Apart from the cases, stories and data-driven logical conclusions, the voices of individuals (ordinary citizens) is a great reminder that we are a society of individuals with diverse emotions and reasons. In today’s world of aggregate numbers and reductionism, let us not forget that every one of us has feelings, and thoughts which needs to be heard, acknowledged, and taken into account, before any major decision. This is equally important to the CEO of a small and medium enterprise, the leader of a large organization, and leaders of nations. Individual voices matter. Not listening to them will be disastrous to the peace and well-being of our world.

Reference: Martin, R. L. (2020). When More is Not Better. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press.

Flourishing as Sustainability

Since January 2020, I increased my study of sustainability. Though previously I restricted myself to the academic literature on sustainable entrepreneurship, I soon realized that sustainability was too important an issue to be viewed through a narrow disciplinary lens. Therefore, I began reading widely on the topic. This helped me, not only improve the delivery of my Masters’ course on “Social and Sustainable Entrepreneurship”, but also delve deeper into fundamental research questions that are driving my academic research today.

Sustainability can mean many things to many people. Most people refer back to the popular report by the Brundtland Commission which defines sustainable development as “development which meets the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987). From being commercially sustainable, to exploring environmental sustainability, there are as many schools of thought as there are people thinking about sustainability. This is good, because a complex and wicked problem like “sustainability” cannot be solved by any one person, institution, perspective or school. It requires transdisciplinary thinking, which is becoming challenging in today’s increasingly hyperspecialized world.

In reading the thoughts of many philosophers, scholars, changemakers, and responsible individuals, my ideas and research questions about the shift to a sustainable world is expanding. While some are more conservative in their identification of the challenge and possible solutions, others have radical views. I believe it is important for individuals to read through the literature, see the implications of unsustainability in the real world, reflect over the topic, and personalize the sustainability challenge through their own worldviews.

Among the many books and periodicals I have read recently, one book particularly

impressed on me the importance of seeing things as they are. This is a slim volume titled “Flourishing – A Frank Conversation About Sustainability” by John R. Ehrenfeld and Andrew J. Hoffman. The book is an elaboration of the ideas of the first author, John R Ehrenheld, who has been pioneering the efforts towards sustainability, even when the term did not enjoy today’s fancy. The second author who engages John in a conversation, is Andrew Hoffman, a professor of sustainable enterprise, and at an earlier time John’s student.

While i do not want to spoil the fun for those of you who will eventually read the conversation, here are some thoughts and ideas that struck me hard:

1. Hybrid cars, LED lamps, electric building, etc.,. give a feeling that we are turning sustainable when in fact we are making things worse.
2. Greening everything will soon result in a sustainability fatigue.
3. Reducing unsustainability is not the same as creating sustainability.
4. John’s idea that instead of sustainability, we should call it ‘sustainability-as-flourishing’
5. John’s definition of sustainability: “the possibility that humans and other life will flourish on the Earth forever” (p.7). To know more about the loaded meanings of these terms, read this book.

To whet your appetite further, here are some inspiring quotes:

“In making ourselves materially rich, we are making ourselves existentially and psychologically poor.” (p.31)

“The encroachment of the market into areas that used to be personal and relational is becoming grotesque. I recently read that you could hire a potty trainer for your child.” (p.44)

“It is exceedingly difficult to detect authenticity in someone else’s actions.” (p.82)

“Skilled, rational arguers often are not after the truth but after ‘winning’ with arguments supporting their views.” (p. 101)

I have so many markings all over the book and have been re-looking at it so many times, I believe this is a book, I will re-read many times over. The book moves across the physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual realms and addresses all aspects of the reader’s personality. If you care about sustainability, this book can trigger change in you.

Overall, if i have to summarize the book’s central message, it is this: John urges us to take the first step towards sustainable living ourselves, and challenges us to live an authentic life, ourselves. I use the word ‘ourselves’ with care and responsibility, to remind us that if we do not change, nothing else will.

Reference: Ehrenfeld, J. R. & Hoffman, A. J. (2013). FLOURISHING: A Frank Conversation About Sustainability. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press.

Seeing Around Corners

Spotting inflection points is critical to staying in business, and spotting them early could give the much needed advantage to stay ahead in the game. But spotting them is easier said than done. Inflection points – a word popularized by the legendary CEO of Intel, Andy Grove – represents a point in time when the very fundamentals (assumptions, knowledge) of a business change forever. They appear slowly, grow steadily and seem to happen instantaneously. It is therefore no surprise that when not identified in time, inflection points result in disruptions, and quickly turn established organizations into obsolescence. The more successful the organization today, the more its leaders should worry about inflection points. Today’s advantages blind and slow the search for tomorrow’s advantages. Therefore, revitalizing today’s advantages and creating new advantages for the future are two big challenges facing large corporations. Some of the other concepts that deal with similar ideas include organizational ambidexterity and strategic entrepreneurship.

Change is certain. Sensing them is not. Leaders struggle with sensing changes. For leaders of organizations, sensing emerging trends or changes provide opportunities for replacing old strengths with new capabilities and/or an opportunity to renew old capabilities. Both are urgent and necessary. The urgency for venturing and renewal has only accelerated with emerging trends such as digitalization, sustainability, and pandemics. Surviving and thriving in uncertainty is today becoming the norm. But embracing uncertainty and thriving in it requires new tools and capabilities. One such tool was introduced to us by Rita McGrath several years ago. In a new book, she builds on those ideas and provides several new tools to engage in spotting inflection points in a more disciplined manner.

All entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial leaders need to see around corners and Rita McGrath’s book shows how this can be done in a disciplined and repeatable manner. The book provides tools to sense inflection points. It also talks about what qualifies as a disruptive change, explore how leaders can decide whether a change is to be acted upon now or requires continued sensing, who are best placed to sense such changes, and how leaders can humbly make use of such sources for the greater good of organizational success. Her ideas build on her prior work, Discovery Driven Growth, and I particularly liked the idea of placing ‘little bets’. My work on corporate accelerators fits with this books’ ideas, particularly the approach of placing ‘little bets’ to validate signals, before making large investments. The two pathway model of corporate accelerators allows corporations to sense different types of changes – incremental and radical – and place ‘little bets’ before diving deep into developing new capabilities. Therefore, corporate accelerators seem to be one possible innovation space where large organizations can encourage experimentation and exploratory activities. Moving interesting and useful findings from such centres to the main business, calls for handling several challenges, but that would be a nice problem to have and solve. While the book provides several models, tools, and frameworks, it is also filled with innumerable cases of organizations that have been both successful and unsuccessful in sensing and adapting to change. Rita McGrath’s style of interspersing theory and cases makes the book a highly useful read for any practitioner. I have written notes to myself all over the book and looking at these I sense scholars of innovation, strategy and entrepreneurship may also find the book useful. Though not a difficult read, the book is best suited for slow consumption by thoughtful practitioners.

As a scholar of corporate innovation and entrepreneurship, I have always enjoyed Rita’s work and recommended her books and articles to my students. Thanks Rita for another thought provoking addition to this already fantastic list.

Reference: McGrath, R. G. (2019). Seeing Around Corners: How to spot inflection points in business before they happen. New York, USA: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Leading Yourself First

Very few topics elicit the kind of attention that “Leadership” does. Yet, it remains plausibly the most difficult concepts to grasp. This is one reason why so many books on leadership get written every year, again and again. In spite of the vast literature available, few books make an impact. One such exception is “Lead Yourself First”.

Leadership is one of society’s fundamental challenges. Too many people have written about the lack of leaders at every level and the urgent need to develop them. While most advocate a call for turning others into leaders, very few indicate that good leaders create themselves, principally by leading themselves. And, how they do this, is beautifully rendered in this book by Ray and Mike. They show how leading oneself is the foundation to leading others. But what is leading oneself?

One widely used definition of self-leadership provides a hint: “leading oneself toward performance of naturally motivating tasks as well as managing oneself to do work that must be done but is not naturally motivating” (Manz, 1986, p. 589). It appears that, “to do what one ought to do”, especially in the face of adversity, is the essence of leading oneself. When one has not mastered self-leadership, leading others is more dangerous than not leading at all. How does one lead oneself ?

Based on five years of research, on both contemporary and historical leaders, Raymond Kethledge (a judge) and Michael Erwin (a combat veteran) find that the central foundation to good self-leadership is solitude. They define solitude as  “a subjective state of mind, in which the mind, isolated from input from other minds, works through a problem on its own.” They believe that finding this space where one can focus on their own thoughts without distraction, helps bring the mind and the soul together, and build clear-eyed conviction. The world needs more leaders with principled convictions. Developing this requires embracing silence. While it is easy to understand the difficulty of finding quiet time for reflection in today’s hyperconnected world, the authors showcase why doing this may be the only solution we have to solve complex challenges.

Using interviews with several contemporary leaders (a few you may have heard about, many not), and historical cases (Eisenhover, Goodall, Lawrence, Lincoln, Grant, Suu Kyi, Churchill, King, and Pope John Paul II), they wonderfully present how embracing solitude enhances: clarity (both analytical and intuitive); creativity; emotional balance (through acceptance, catharsis and magnanimity); and moral courage. Finding solitude, and spending time in reflection, helps leaders develop their own first principles without losing one’s dignity by conformance. The choice of cases, the writing style, and the conceptual abstractions are all equally engaging.

Entrepreneurs are leaders. They have to lead others, and before that they have to learn to lead themselves. While entrepreneurship education teaches entrepreneurs to embrace opportunity, uncertainty and manage teams, it leaves a gnawing gap when it comes to self-leadership. In fact, they need self-leadership most desperately. In my opinion, this book is fills this great need for entrepreneurs.

Thanks Ray and Mike for a great contribution. All those who wish to make change happen need self-leadership and every one of them will find this book a soulful and thought provoking read. I am sure it will also spur action.

Reference: Kethledge, R., & Erwin, M. (2017). Lead Yourself First: Inspiring Leadership Through Solitude. New York, USA: Bloomsbury Publishing.

Searching for entrepreneurial opportunities in India

India is a land of a billion people. Since people dream, I always say, “India is a land of a billion dreamers”. Since dreams take a lot of effort to turn into realities, it is not surprising that many of these dreams go unrealized. While lack of persistence is a cause for non-realization, a large portion of this is also due to the lack of sensing the right opportunities. Now, this is true in other parts of the world too, albeit at different proportions.

Sensing opportunities or creating them, depending on whichever school you believe in, require some skills. One of the common antecedents to sensing opportunities, as validated by several researchers, is access to information. Several decades back, information asymmetry was used by individuals to gain advantages. But, in recent times, with the democratization of information, more individuals have access to most information. Unfortunately, this has also resulted in people complaining about information overload, reduced attention, etc. In spite of all the struggles, access to information and the ability to make sense of information, remain critical factors in individuals’ seeing opportunities. I agree there are other factors involved too, but “access to information” seems to be fundamental. So, if you are in India and you are looking for some information that can trigger your ability to see opportunities, here is a book that contains a wealth of useful insights, some information, and pointers to various sources of further information: The book “Bridgital Nation – Solving Technology’s People Problem” by N Chandrasekaran and Roopa Purushothaman. While much of the challenges identified are widely known, the authors approach to potential solutioning is creative.

I enjoyed the book and have already recommended it to many of my students, especially in India. It takes a very different view to seeing some of the challenges facing India. I particularly liked two. First, the challenge of delivering quality healthcare to a billion Indians. Second, the challenge of turning our demography into an dividend rather than a liability.

Healthcare: India is a paradox when it comes healthcare. While India is becoming a global destination for medical tourism, she struggles with delivering basic domestic healthcare services. Most will agree that the domestic healthcare system, though well designed, is broken. People still need to be treated when they are sick, and taught how to be healthy. Big challenge: access.

Education: India churns out more degree holders than many other countries. Yet, unemployment is rampant. Everyone seems to agree that graduates (bachelor to doctoral levels) are unable to deliver on the job. Corporate recruiters almost run a full fledged university within their enterprises, to train recruited graduates on skills required for hands-on work. People need to be skilled and need jobs. Big challenge: jobs.

How can we bridge these gaps in the economy? The authors argue for greater use of technology and digitization to solve these challenges. Instead of the conventional solution to fixing the knowledge-doing gap, their approach to digitally enable semi-skilled workers is novel. While they highlight many of India’s challenges using largescale datasets, they also showcase specific case studies to illustrate how digitally enabled skilled individuals can bring out effective change. These stories are great examples, even if they are exceptions, of what the possibilities are for a digitally enabled and skilled India. If the macro-level data does not inspire you, the many stories in the book should.

Entrepreneurs interested in India as a market, must read this book. They must mark out the many “gaps” that exist in our education and healthcare sectors (or any other sector that interests them). They should pick specific a “gap” that inspires them. They should experiment solving it. Digitalization has made experimentation inexpensive and rapid. Entrepreneurs have a growing support infrastructure (incubators, corporate accelerators, labs, makerspaces, etc) to pursue such experimentation. India’s entrepreneurship ecosystem is growing. Individuals must tap into their entrepreneurial talents, make use of the support available, and bring about change. Venturing is a great way to make productive change happen.

Reference: Chandrasekaran, N., & Purushothaman, R. (2019). Bridgital Nation: Solving Technology’s People Problem. New Delhi, India: Penguin Random House India Private Limited.

Do you have a ‘Trillion Dollar’ Coach?

Every entrepreneur needs to ask herself or himself this question?

It is extremely important for entrepreneurs and founding team members to have coaches. Good coaches watch you closely, point your errors, provide tips to improve your performance, fine-tune your practices, and above all remain interested in your success.

If you ask ‘why do i need this?’ or ‘why do i need a coach?’ – stop reading this blog right now! Come back when you feel the need.

For those who agree that having a coach matters, or even better yearn for a good coach, read on.

The world is filled with more coaches than practitioners. The truth is highly visible in the arena of entrepreneurship. You come across many who claim to be entrepreneurship coaches. Unfortunately, many of them do not have any influence on entrepreneurs, and most toot their own horns. But, as Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle beautifully capture in this wonderful book — effective coaches are probably the team’s best kept secret.

The story of Bill Campbell and why he was called “Silicon Valley’s Best Kept Secret” details in many ways who makes a good coach. The first and most critical aspect being Campbell’s willingness to be kept a secret. Despite being the coach to most of Silicon Valley’s greats, he virtually remained a non-celebrity. His relationship with Steve Jobs is not widely spoken about. Many wonder if a personality like Steve Jobs would care to have a coach. You will be surprised when you read this book. The list of who Bill Campbell coached has the who’s who of the entrepreneurship world, especially in Silicon Valley. Yet, the man remained virtually unknown.

There are many wonderful lessons that coaches and entrepreneurial leaders can take away — focus on people, treat them lovingly and compassionately, build teams, choose the best ideas, protect aberrant geniuses, listen carefully, give generously, etc. One aspect that stood out well, especially for coaches is — coach only the coachable. Who are these coachables — individuals who are honest and humble; willing to persevere and work hard; and remain open to learning.

But, in this story, also lies a subtle lesson for most people who claim to be or wish to be good coaches. The focus of coaching should be on the performance of the player, not the coach. For this, you have to develop the ability to avoid attention, avoid constant display of abilities, choose to remain quiet, develop compassion, be loving, and focus on developing oneself to help the other. These qualities border on what one claims to be philosophical, probably explaining why most so-called coaches don’t get far. Bill’s story explains how Earthly coaches work. His influence can be seen in the foundations and phenomenal success of trillion dollar organizations such as Apple, Google, and Intuit.

For entrepreneurs, the central message is – choose your coaches and mentors wisely. Be careful to choose someone who truly: values player performance; commits to your journey; remains available especially in difficult times; someone who shuns attention.  Apart from this central message, there are several interesting tidbits of wisdom all over the book. Many stories about how entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs, Eric Schmidt, Larry Page and hundreds of others. Soak it up and use it, until you find your own coach.

For scholars of entrepreneurship, similar lessons apply. While you may strive to find a good coach or mentor like Bill Campbell from the scholarly world, you may also explore research questions such as: what kind of entrepreneurs search for coaches; how does the coach-player connection come about; who makes a good coach; can coaches be trained/educated; should educators develop coaching skills, behaviors and attitudes; are these skills, behaviors and attitudes, values dependent? And so many more…

For those of you who may be interested in reading this book, here is the reference information: Schmidt, E., Rosenberg, R., and Eagle, A. (2019). Trillion dollar coach: The leadership handbook of silicon valley’s Bill Campbell. John Murray.

Silence

Entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial organizations, with whom I spend time, research and write about, need to develop this important ability — staying silent. It is only in those periods of silence that entrepreneurial minds will be able to reflect and learn from experiences and new knowledge. Many successful entrepreneurs find their silence zones in different ways – some at the end of each day and others taking weeks-off every half year. It is during these times, that the much sought after cognitive ability called “association” (Dyer, Gregersen & Christensen’s idea in Innovator’s DNA) can be honed. Considering the “always on” world in which entrepreneurs spend their days, this can be challenging. But with deliberate practice of silence, entrepreneurs will be able to create more value for themselves, their organizations and society.

How does one develop this ability?

I came across this little book on the topic which may provide some useful pointers. The book titled “Silence” has been translated from Norwegian to English. Though short, don’t consume it in one sitting. Read it slowly. The book builds on the experiences of the author’s (Erling Kagge) expeditions to Antarctica, Arctic and Everest – three corners (wonder?) of the world. As the author convinces us – we don’t have to get that far to feel silence.

I read it across days, stopping many a time to just put the book down and gaze out into space – wondering. According to Erling, “wonder is the very engine of life”. I could not agree more and was happy that I was “wondering” more often than I usually do while reading. If you can learn the art of staying quiet, as the author argues, then you open the possibility of living life more attentively.

The book is a great message in today’s information overloaded attention deficit world.

Most striking sentence: “… their heads are now filled with more ambitions than questions.” (p.2)

I am sure people who read the original (in Norwegian) will gain even more from the book. Hope I can read the original some day!

Edging on philosophy and biography, this little book stays pragmatic and highlights the importance of silence in life.

A book to be savored slowly.

The Abundance

Book Title: The Abundance – Narrative Essays Old and New

Author: Annie Dillard (http://www.anniedillard.com/)

Publisher: Harper Collins (https://www.harpercollins.com/9780062432971/the-abundance/)

I love spending time in the Library. If I need some fresh thoughts or want to clear my head, walking to the Library is a natural act. It was a Friday afternoon and I had been working on a paper most of the week. I wanted to clear my head and so I went to the University Library. For a change I saw a small well made book in English on the “New Arrivals” shelf. It was “The Abundance” by Annie Dillard. I quickly recognized Annie Dillard from an earlier book I had read  titled “The Writing Life”.

I spent much of my free time over that weekend reading “The Abundance”. It contained essays from her earlier works. Since I had not read any of her earlier works except The Writing Life, the content was new to me. As stated by Geoff Dyer in his foreword, “Dillard can only be enjoyed by a wide-awake reader.”

The essays from the writing life was a nice reiteration of some great tips for writers such as myself – be careful of what you read; be careful of what you learn, non-conformity may be your only hope, the writer ought to know his/her field, you can shape literature only if you know it, and don’t hoard what seems good for a later time or place — the central message is “give it, give it all, give it now”

Though I enjoyed every essay in the book, I especially soaked in the many pieces excerpted from “Teaching a stone to talk” and “Pilgrim at tinker creek”. They provide enough material for reflection on the truths of life. At times it appears to border on the metaphysical but Dillard does such a good job of keeping you firmly grounded.

I could not connect much with the essays from “Holy the firm” and “From an American childhood”, but I am sure they are due to my limited knowledge of the context. Towards the end of the book the essays from “For the time being” nicely sums up the collection. Two sentences from this section particularly drive home the point and will stay with me for a long time:

“All that is really worthwhile is action”

“If you stay still, earth buries you, ready or not”

Brilliant is the only word that comes to my mind, though it is not a great expression of the wisdom expressed in this book. I do not have to recommend Annie Dillard as an essayist to people who know her, but for those who don’t, this is a great book into the world of her writings.

It was a great way to spend my weekend absorbed in thought over the wisdom received. I can only thank nature for offering me the solitude and the chance to enjoy such great company.

Daring Greatly

Book Title: Daring Greatly

Author: Brene Brown 

This book opened my eyes to the truth about shame and vulnerability. Most of us go through them in life, as Brene Brown says, unconsciously. Being non-cognizant of these emotions gives a temporary relief, but bothers us in the longer term. Therefore it is important to acknowledge them and become mature enough to handle them.

A student of mine told me that something stopped her from speaking out and taking action. She told me that she was worried that people may think of her as silly or stupid and this stopped her. But eventually when she heard someone else being appreciated for an idea that was similar to hers’, she would feel bad. I’m not sure why I asked her to read this book. She did! Nothing happened. I told her to read it again. Nothing happened! I told her to keep at it. About a month back the same girl called back to share that recently she boldly presented her ideas in a certain forum and was pleasantly surprised to see people appreciate her ideas. It was the first time, but the positive response gave her confidence to do it over and over again. In just over a few months she has become confident and changed as a person. I can see the change in this student of mine – she is beaming with confidence! She is also much happier! Isn’t she daring greatly?

While I do not want to tell you how Prof Brown deals with overcoming shame and vulnerability, I wish to share the one section of the book that I particularly loved reading – the “Ten Guideposts to Wholehearted Living”. The most interesting thing about this list is that, the way to achieve a happy life is by “letting go” as many things as we can in life! Surprised!! I was, too! How can you gain happiness by letting go? It gave me hope! I knew I was onto a very different kind of book. I also was tempted to drop this book and pick her earlier book (The gift of imperfections) that espoused the ten guideposts to wholehearted living – but I resisted.

The reason I bought this book was due to my research interests. I wanted to explore shame and vulnerability among entrepreneurs and see if it influences their ability to identify/discover/develop opportunities. There are some interesting academic papers on this topic. But the reason I read it, like the way college kids read novels, is because of the message and how it is presented. Amazing is the only word to describe the book. If you don’t read this book, you are truly missing an important element of life.

tsundoku

I have always been a great admirer of many things Japanese. Last year I remember readings books about “KonMari” and “Ikigai”. While the former made me think about decluttering my world, the latter influenced me deeply about well being and the well lived long life.

In recent times I have heard about one another Japanese word which seems to connect with me and hopefully many of you who are #book #lovers – “tsundoku” – which refers to the act of acquiring reading materials (books) and letting them pile up without being read. As a bibliophile myself and an equally voracious reader, I can tell you honestly that I always buy more books than I can ever finish reading. This ensures that many books remain on the shelf that I wish I could read, but remain unread.

Are you a tsundoku? or Do you tsundoku? — not sure which one is the right usage, but I am sure you get the meaning 🙂