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Comment by alimoeeny | Hacker News Reader

I feel very uncomfortable that I cannot see what is so brilliant about this book that Bill Gates goes on and on about it. I tried to read it and was bored and stopped half way through it. Anybody can shed some light? Share what you've learned, please.

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In general, I have been horrified by the book recommendations about various fields, by experts in those fields. I used to teach, and the masters of the craft, folks who could silence a room with a glance, and inspired kids to harder work than they knew possible, used to recommend books that seemed embarrassingly trite.

I attribute it to the fact that they were natural experts, and not necessarily book lovers. It would be like asking a sparrow for their favorite work on the dynamics of flight.

I could see that.

Even if they weren't a natural, sparrow-like expert, they may have developed numerous skills... but one or two keystone skills lie hidden in an otherwise trite book that everyone else gets already and a long time...

that makes it seem like that trite book is the most important one.. but it's just the last one.. :)

> I attribute it to the fact that they were natural experts

I agree that professors often choose books poorly, but disagree with the idea of a "natural expert." No human is born with a mathematical understanding of flight dynamics. There may be people who grasp it relatively quickly, although in my experience that's usually because they're relatively quick learners in general, and because they're building on a very strong foundation. Yes, there are people who are just smarter than the rest of us. But there are just as many people, if not more, who put in tremendous effort to become experts at which point they may appear as naturals. (Furthermore, some may downplay these effort and cultivate this idea that they're a "natural" to impress their colleagues and students.) It's not always obvious what sacrifices they made along the way.

I liked that it was written as a piece of journalism rather than a didactic exposition of vital business truth, as most other books in the genre have a tendency toward attempting. Which is appropriate, because unlike hard sciences, business has few absolutes and is heavily context sensitive.

Also the writing style was great, Brooks had a knack for making the players in these case studies colorfully come to life.

This makes me want to read much more after reading Good to Great. What a train wreck of cargo cult science, he kept misusing science and stats to convince you about the vital business "truths" in the book. Just presenting the his research and letting us draw our own conclusion would have made for a 10 times better book.

If it helps, I feel that way about the Opera.

Over the years I've had both experiences where I've asked for someones recommendation and found it amazingly accurate, and found what was recommended ordinary or uninspiring. My take on it is that the way people absorb information is unique to the individual and some presentations get through that filter and some don't.

The other important thing I learned was that the filter changes, as you become more educated in a subject, you can pick up more with less if the author assumes you already know the basics. When writing for publication I sometimes felt I was explaining too much but my editor would dial that in for me, when I described to little she would gently prod me back to reality with "How the hell is someone reading this supposed to know what that means?" :-) When I went to far she would chastise me with "Everyone already knows that."

I've read Brooks, and in my opinion he writes for people who are already in the role of business leader and are trying to advance by not making the mistakes others have made. But is it brilliant? I don't know. Can it be brilliant for Bill and Warren and not for anyone else? Probably. I found it useful but not as useful as Larry Bossidy's "Execution: the discipline of getting things done" [1] which really helped me understand what "progress" was when you were a manager versus when you were an engineer and progress was "obvious" in the sense that the project got completed. But I can't say that Execution is more brilliant than Business Stories, they are just different and one was better for me.

Bottom line don't sweat it if you don't see the brilliance, note it and move on. Later if you find you can recall what you read differently, based on your experience, consider going back and re-reading it. See if it has become more, or less, brilliant given your additional understanding.

[1] http://www.amazon.com/Execution-Discipline-Getting-Things-Do...

  > Larry Bossidy's "Execution: the discipline of getting things done"

The "Most helpful review" for this is quite acerbic. Just shows there's no accounting for taste.

http://www.amazon.com/review/R2KRS1CQJCGZW0/ref=cm_cr_dp_tit...

I read it and reviewed it here :

http://davids-book-reviews.blogspot.it/2014/12/business-adve...

I concur to some degree: I did find it an enjoyable read, but "best business book ever"? I thought the stories were interesting, but ... no, I too failed to find it brilliant, which also makes me kind of uncomfortable.

You're not alone - I did the same, and can completely relate to the strange feeling of insecurity from "not getting" a book touted as the best-ever by Gates and Buffett.

This is how I feel about "The Rosie Project." It's Big Bang Theory in book form making fun of an autistic person. All of the jokes are about him not understanding social cues. Surprised someone like Gates thought that was funny.

Agreed. I also felt it was a book made with the intention of a movie in mind, which seems like it is happening now.

Serious question: what were you expecting to see from the best book about business?

Don't know. I expected some insights into how to build and run a business, how to deal with different forces that pull and push on you and your business, how to deal with your psychology when doing all of this, how to understand finance, .... I don't know, I know that I didn't expect to see what I saw in this book.

I agree, the chapters could have been condensed better. I guess the brilliance is that it tells you that some of the smartest people and the biggest companies make catastrophic blunders.

So you're telling me Bill Gates is no longer the paragon of intellectual honesty we all know and love?!

"Books I recommend" usually means:

A. Books that reiterate and reinforce my ideology.

B. Books that reiterate, sum up, and improve, my knowledge of something I personally and/or professionally, and very very subjectively, find interesting and/or useful (for whatever reason).

C. Books that opened my mind or lifted my sprirt.

There are probably one or two more categories.

Which of these are true for a particular recommendation depends on the reader's motivation for reading the book.

Whether it's A, B, or C, it just might not be useful to nor resonate with anyone else.

Though with B, sometimes the knowledge provided requires a certain level of experience with the subject matter. And if your experience level is either too low, or too high, the book will either not make any sense or will just seem useless, of little importance, lacking originality, or freshness.

Or they could mean they found the book to be worth recommending for any arbitrary reason outside of your little A, B, or C breakdown.

Sigh It's pompous comments like these that truly exhibit the kinds of obnoxious (and often pedantic), know-it-all people that use this site.

Thanks for reminding me to get off HN go outside today.

That's why the OP said "usually". It would have been better if you just went out for some fresh air instead of having this emotional reaction and attacking someone's constructive opinion just because it rubbed you the wrong way.

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