100 Must Read Books For Global Changemakers & Social Innovators
If you were to ask 55+ global change-making leaders what books they would recommend to social entrepreneurs and innovators, which ones would come out on top?
We're happy to say that we have the answer!
The following list comprises of the 100 most recommended books from our social impact podcast series in 2017. Which ones have you read?
Benjamin Franklin once said, "Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing." We hope that insights from the following books build on your knowledge and provide some spark to get out there and continue to create some great impact in this world.
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The top 100 books for global changemakers
one
Let My People Go Surfing by Yvon Chouinard
two
Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
Three
The Art of The Start 2.0 by Guy Kawasaki
four
Long Walk To Freedom by Nelson Mandela
five
The Lean Startup by Eric Ries
six
Design a Better Business by Patrick Van Der Pijl, Justin Lokitz & Lisa Kay Solomon
Thirteen
The Metronome Effect by Shannon Byrne Susko
21. Blessed Unrest by Paul Hawken
22. How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas by David Bornstein
23. Start Something That Matters by Blake Mycoskie
24. Solving Tough Problems by Adam Kahane
25. Startup Communities: Building An Entrepreneurial Ecosystem In Your City by Brad Feld
26. Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder (Incerto) by Nassim Nicholas Talib
27. The Power of Unreasonable People: How Social Entrepreneurs Create Markets That Change The World by John Elkington and Pamela Hartigan
28. This Is Service Design Thinking by Stickdorn and Schneider
29. The Purpose Economy by Aaron Hurst
30. Social Enterprise In Anytown by John Pearce
31. Gamestorming by Dave Gray, Sunni Brown and James Macanufo
32. The Blue Economy by Gunter Pauli
33. Emotionally Durable Design by Jonathan Chapman
34. The Four Dimensional Human by Lawrence Scott
35. The New Culture Of Learning by Douglas Thomas and John Sealy Brown
36. Let Your Life Speak by Parker Palmer
37. Man's Search For Meaning by Victor Frankl
38. The Happiness Advantage by Shawn Achor
39. The Field Guide To Human Centred Design by Ideo
40. Perfume: The Story of a Murderer by Patrick Suskind
41. Leadership and the New Science by Margaret Wheatley
42. Birth of The Chaordic Age by Dee Hock
43. Happy City by Charles Montgomery
44. Recoded City by Thomas Ermacora and Lucy Bullivant
45. Think Like A Commoner by David Bollier
46. Convivial Toolbox: Generative Research For The Front End Of Design by Liz Sanders and Pieter Jan Stappers
47. Zero Waste Home by Bea Johnson
48. Failed It! How to Turn Mistakes Into Ideas and Other Advice for Successfully Screwing Up by Erik Kessels
49. Ten Types of Innovation by Larry Kelley
50. Talking to Humans by Giff Constable (free PDF)
51. Education and the Commercial Mindset by Samuel E. Abrams
52. Educar para ser: Vivencias de una escuela activa by Rebeca Wild
53. The Gift by Lewis Hyde
54. Ecological Communication by Niklas Luhmann
55. The Coming Community by Giorgio Agamben
56. Poor Economics by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Du Flo
57. Digital Kenya by Bitange Ndemo and Tim Weiss
58. Walk Out, Walk On by Meg Wheatley and Deborah Frieze
59. Here Comes Everybody - The Power of Organising Without Organisations and Cognitive Surplus by Clay Shirky
60. The Seven Day Weekend by Ricardo Semler
61. The Starfish And The Spider by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom
62. Getting Beyond Better: How Social Entrepreneurship Works by Roger Martin and Sally Osberg
63. Dark Matter and Trojan Horses by Dan Hill
64. Hooked: Creating Habit Forming Products by Nir Eyal
65. Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation by Stephen Johnson
66. Fooled By Randomness by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
67. This Is Service Design Doing by Lawrence, Schneider, Stickdorn and Hormess
68. Getting Everything You Can Out of All You've Got by Jay Abraham
69. Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki
70. Design for Sustainable Change by Anne Chick and Paul Micklethwaite
71. Design Revolution by Emily Pilloton
72. Designing for People by Henry Dreyfuss
73. Why Nations Fail by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson
74. Collapse: How Societies Choose To Fail Or Succeed by Jared Diamond
75. Half The Sky by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn
76. My Life On The Road by Gloria Steinem
77. The Clean Money Revolution by Joel Solomon
78. Beautiful Trouble, A Toolbox For Revolution, assembled by Andrew Boyd
79. The Advantage by Patrick Lencioni
80. Shoe Dog by Phil Knight
81. Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon
82. One Plus One Equals Three by Dave Trott
83. The War of Art by Stephen Pressfield
84. Creating Shared Value by Michael Porter & Mark Kramer
85. Conscious Business by Fred Kofman
86. Firms of Endearment or Conscious Capitalism by Raj Sisodia
87. The Power of Intention by Wayne Dyer
88. People With Purpose by Kevin Murray
89. The Purpose Effect by Dan Pontefract
90. Drawdown—The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warmingby Paul Hawken
91. The New Grand Strategy by Joel Makower, Mark Mykleby and Patrick Doherty
92. Integrated Investing: Impact Investing with Head, Heart, Body, and Soul by Bonnie Foley-Wong
93. Overcrowded by Roberto Verganti
94. Glut: Mastering Information Through The Ages by Alex Wright
95. Mission Inc. by Kevin Lynch and Julius Walls
96. Playing To Win: How Strategy Really Works by Roger Martin and A.G. Lafley
97. Understanding Social Enterprise: Theory and Practice by Rory Ridley-Duff and Mike Bull
98. An Intimate History of Humanity by Theodore Zeldin
99. Venture Capital For Dummies by Nicole Gravagna and Peter Adams
100. The Art of Living by Thich Nhat Hanh
What's a booklist without a bonus? On Episode 1 with Steve Williams, we were also recommended Buddism Without Beliefs and The Magic Pudding.
