# Why most bestselling business books are BS  ## Episode metadata - Episode title: Why most bestselling business books are BS - Show: Nudge - Owner / Host: Phill Agnew - Guests: [Alex Edmans](https://share.snipd.com/person/c647eecb-e0bf-47a2-a022-f15107bb3f76) - Episode publish date: 2025-02-03 - Episode AI description: Alex Edmans, a finance professor at London Business School and author of 'May Contain Lies', delves into the pitfalls of bestselling business books. He discusses how cognitive biases, like confirmation bias, distort our understanding and acceptance of oversimplified advice. Edmans critiques popular concepts, from the Atkins diet to Simon Sinek's 'Start With Why', highlighting the danger of black-and-white thinking. He urges listeners to critically evaluate the claims made in these books and emphasizes the importance of nuanced, evidence-based insights. - Mentioned books: [May Contain Lies](https://share.snipd.com/book/67499c26-f442-4105-86ea-897f6a357b4c) by [Alex Edmans](https://share.snipd.com/person/c6a4b14a-f2b7-46a8-95d1-d7bdca5c0554), [Grit](https://share.snipd.com/book/53b6ee6f-0be4-48ae-8c35-bce6f2ae9684) by [Angela Duckworth](https://share.snipd.com/person/b639e5d5-8d0f-4fd2-93b1-024885ed37e0), [Outliers](https://share.snipd.com/book/6faf0815-c31c-429e-b59f-f4167787f449) by [Malcolm Gladwell](https://share.snipd.com/person/4abdc15e-5f70-43fc-bb68-4384c2617470), [Grow the Pie](https://share.snipd.com/book/0f570ecd-b253-4c01-8595-39f3b9614cc4) by [Alex Edmans](https://share.snipd.com/person/c647eecb-e0bf-47a2-a022-f15107bb3f76), [Dr. Atkins' Diet Revolution](https://share.snipd.com/book/6e88d8fe-be18-4124-9cb5-8024a8a34284) by [Robert C. Atkins](https://share.snipd.com/person/a8b59666-5f05-4f13-80da-6027d95243b8), [Start with Why](https://share.snipd.com/book/d85ee33f-c6a7-479a-82cf-9aa6b251beb3) by [Simon Sinek](https://share.snipd.com/person/1e8c0fab-e1a0-4d27-9f7d-f9c747b80ce6) - Duration: 27:06 - Episode URL: [Open in Snipd](https://share.snipd.com/episode/8e85b1d7-c4f2-4cd4-b972-6479df14e03b) - Show URL: [Open in Snipd](https://share.snipd.com/show/368e312d-6ad3-475a-91a9-12d5e97283fb) - Export date: 2026-02-11T20:06:35 ## Snips ### [Black-and-White Thinking Bias](https://share.snipd.com/snip/b364e9f9-8cdb-4dee-9716-4d480f64f34b) 🎧 02:41 - 03:59 (01:18) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/09ab9768-f397-423a-8a24-4859d10877a9" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Black-and-white thinking, a bias from our ancestors, simplifies complex situations. - This simplification can lead to misjudgments even in today's world. #### 💬 Quote > Black and white thinking allowed our hunter-gatherer ancestors to act decisively when speed was at the essence. But this bias remains within us, despite living in a very different world today. > — Phil Agnew Phil Agnew on the origins and persistence of black-and-white thinking. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** But that is just one of the biases that leads to misjudgment. There is another bias that's just as bad and one that I'm yet to share or nudge. It is called black and white thinking. **Alex Edmans:** Certainly. So there's two biases that I use throughout the book and I believe that this leads to nearly all the misinformation we see out there. So one I mentioned was confirmation bias and that's the idea that if I have view of the world, I look for evidence that confirms it. And you might think, well, there's many topics where I have no view of the world. Yes, there might be pre-existing views on climate change or immigration or gun control, but there's certain things where people have no pre-existing view. And if there's nothing to confirm, then confirmation bias doesn't exist. But the idea of black and white thinking is that even if I have no preconceived view, I might have a tendency to view something as always good or always bad. Alex **Phill Agnew:** writes how life for our hunter-gatherer ancestors was short and harsh. It required quick decisions to hunt, gather and survive constant threats, a necessity that shaped our instinct for snap judgments. Black and white thinking allowed our hunter-gatherer ancestors to act decisively when speed was at the essence. But this bias remains within us, despite living in a very different world today. --- ### [Atkins Diet Example](https://share.snipd.com/snip/142dcf25-c97e-4100-89a5-a48ef1e97d5a) 🎧 04:00 - 07:01 (03:01) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/5fda33e0-55ad-4c00-bc73-e84b56e63543" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - The Atkins diet, which demonizes carbs, exemplifies black-and-white thinking in nutrition. - Its simplicity made it popular, despite being potentially harmful long-term. #### 💬 Quote > The Atkins diet demonized carbs and says they are all bad. [...] So he didn't say, well, make sure carbs are no more than 30 percent of your daily calories. He said just have as few carbs as possible. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans on the Atkins diet as an example of black-and-white thinking. #### 📚 Transcript **Alex Edmans:** let's give a concrete example. So let's think about diet. So most people have a view about fat. They think it's bad. It's called fat because it makes you fat. Most people have a view about protein. Protein is good. It builds a muscle. It strengthens you. But most people are quite neutral on carbs. It's not clear whether it's good or it's bad. But if you suffer from black and white thinking, you're much more likely to latch onto any study which suggests it's at one extreme or the other. And one such study or one such piece of advice was the Atkins diet. So the Atkins diet demonized carbs and says they are all bad. All types of carbs are bad, not just refined sugar, but complex carbs and at all levels. So he didn't say, well, make sure carbs are no more than 30 percent of your daily calories. He said just have as few carbs as possible. was so black and white, it was so binary, it was so simplistic, it was easy to implement. So you don't need to understand whether carbs are simple or complex or refined. You just look at the carbs label on a box of food and this tells you whether you should be eating it. And also you don't need to track your daily carb intake and see am I yet at 30%. You just avoid anything with carbs. But notice, had his advice been completely the opposite, eat as many carbs as possible, and not protein and fat, that could have equally been just as successful. Why? Because it's easy to implement. So to write a bestseller, Atkins didn't need to be right he just needed to be extreme. The **Phill Agnew:** book Dr Atkins Diet Revolutions contained no references footnotes or even a bibliography. It offered just one rule avoid all carbs. The rule was simple and that simplicity made it so appealing. A more balanced approach to diet where individuals consider moderation of different nutrient types would have just been a bit too complex to catch on. The Atkins book became the best-selling weight loss book of all time, not because it was the smartest advice, but because it was the easiest advice to follow. A study in the Lancet Public Health found that a low-carb diet of under 30% intake reduces life expectancy by four years compared to moderate intake of 50-55%. The Atkins diet is a near 0% carb approach and that approach is very risky. Research has linked the diet to kidney problems, heart disease, and this is due to the high protein and saturated fat intake. Atkins himself suffered a heart attack and posthumous reports suggested heart disease possibly linked to his diet. Alex Wright that demonising carbs as entirely bad, or anything as entirely good, ignores the importance of balance. --- ### [Nuance Over Extremes](https://share.snipd.com/snip/72aaaa4e-181f-4c91-9730-f1b71abd3fb3) 🎧 07:10 - 09:18 (02:08) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/c62cc96a-b2ff-406c-af56-2be985e8ddcc" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Black-and-white thinking affects various topics, from Brexit to company diversity. - Recognizing nuances and avoiding extremes is crucial. #### 💬 Quote > So we like to see something as having only benefits and no costs or only costs and no benefits. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans on the tendency to view things in absolutes. #### 📚 Transcript **Alex Edmans:** Yeah, so we like to see something as having only benefits and no costs or only costs and no benefits. And was something that happened around the Brexit referendum. And again, let me point the finger at myself. So I was a strong remainer. I thought that Brexit supporters were racist or xenophobic, or they just didn't understand basic economics. And then when I went to a Brexit talk, I was shocked by how logical I found the arguments, even though I didn't agree with the conclusions. I could see there was a lot of logic behind what people were saying. But because I'd had such a black white view on something like Brexit, I thought that this was just only in one direction. And so after my view was moderated, it meant that even though I was disappointed with the referendum result, I certainly wasn't one of the people claiming we need another vote. This result was completely wrong, because even though I personally didn't agree with it, I could at least see reasons for why people would have supported Brexit. And we can think about this with other debates, which are topical issues right now. So let's take the link between diversity and company performance. So I, as an ethnic minority, would love to believe that diversity is always good. And certainly there are benefits of diversity, right? Diversity leads to a greater range of opinions, and we are able to just have different types of expertise. But this doesn't mean that we want to have maximum diversity, because if people speak different languages, at least figuratively, it's hard for people to actually communicate with each other if their backgrounds are so different. Sometimes we actually like to hang out with people who are similar to us who we have common interests. So yes, there can be benefits of diversity, but does that mean we want to have maximally diverse organisations? Companies should force every team to have a broad mix of demographics, not necessarily because sometimes it could be that for some cases you would want to prefer to have people similar to you. It means that you don't need to run every decision by committee and run it to have consensus. Sometimes that could just lead to a lot of delay in making decisions. Sometimes we do want alignment. --- ### [Overhydration Dangers](https://share.snipd.com/snip/dfed1292-bc47-496b-a340-68205d56aa19) 🎧 09:35 - 10:47 (01:11) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/4c4a608d-85fa-498d-bc4c-a976d98d60b2" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Overhydration, even with something beneficial like water, can be harmful, as seen in the London Marathon tragedy. - This highlights the danger of black-and-white thinking. #### 💬 Quote > So even if something is clearly good such as water when running a marathon there's still some point at which it might have negative benefits but if you're black and white um in terms of your mindset you think that something you never have negatives, it only has upsides. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans on the dangers of oversimplifying even positive things. #### 📚 Transcript **Alex Edmans:** X clearly led to success, if X were diversity or sustainability or whatever, well, if it was that simple, then any company which was not doing this would be out of business. And that's not the case. So it could be that these things work in some settings, not others. It could be this works up to a point and after that point, then you actually have too much of this. And we see this black and white thinking in, again, so many other areas. Why I use lots of health examples in the book is this relates to us as an individual. So I've talked about health in terms of carbs, but carbs are seen as a bad thing. Let's think about a good thing, water. So when you run a marathon, and I've done this a couple of times, they tell you to hydrate as much as possible, drink little and often. Every time there's a water station, drink from it. And there are some people who've died because of water intoxication they've drunk so much water that they dilute essential minerals to fatally low levels so even if something is clearly good such as water when running a marathon there's still some point at which it might have negative benefits but if you're black and white um in terms of your mindset you think that something you never have negatives, it only has upsides. --- ### [Study on Non-Binary Outcomes](https://share.snipd.com/snip/322c6c17-7401-4194-9a22-892dc2d205b3) 🎧 11:48 - 13:27 (01:39) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/6715a636-ef26-4cc1-a10c-2cc7730eed30" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - A study showed people struggle to predict non-binary outcomes, even with clear mixed evidence. - We're wired for black-and-white thinking. #### 💬 Quote > So we are wired to think in black and white ways. So even if the evidence is clear that it goes in both directions. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans summarizing a study on how humans process information. #### 📚 Transcript **Alex Edmans:** so there was a study by some psychologists called Edward Deloche, Jerome Busmeyer, and Mark McDaniels. And what they did is they took data on the effect of ingesting some substance on human arousal. So why the study was on human arousal rather than something more mundane is beyond me. But what they did is they took some subjects and they said, here's some data on how much you consume of the subject of this substance and how aroused you end up being. And so there were different conditions. So a third of them got data which the relationship was always positive. The more you eat, the more aroused you are. Others got data where the relationship was always negative, where the more you eat, the less aroused you are. And then the third set of people got data which was in two ways. So up to a point, the more you eat, the more aroused you become. And then when you have too much, then the arousal falls down to zero. And so people in the first two conditions were much more able to predict the relationship than the people in the third condition. So we are wired to think in black and white ways. So even if the evidence is clear that it goes in both directions. So the third group saw data suggesting that eating zero leads to no arousal, eating 100 leads to no arousal. They still had in mind that the relationship had to be either always positive or always negative. And they had to figure out which of the two it could be, when in fact, the true relationship was it goes up and then after a it goes down. --- ### [Start With Why Critique](https://share.snipd.com/snip/772fbdfa-5ba4-443e-a76e-2e982c09361f) 🎧 15:28 - 16:15 (00:46) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/a6ccd3f1-474f-459e-b5a1-15a3aeae57e5" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Simon Sinek's "Start With Why" lacks evidence and relies on cherry-picked examples. - Following it blindly can be detrimental. #### 💬 Quote > It is a bestseller. It is rated 4.5 on Amazon and it explains how great leaders and organisations inspire action by focusing on their purpose, their why, and they should do that before thinking about their processes or their products. > — Phil Agnew Phil Agnew introducing Simon Sinek's book. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** Hello and welcome back to Nudge with me, Phil Agnew. Now, I previously worked at a tech company called Hotjar. As part of my onboarding, all of the new hires, including me, were encouraged to read Simon Sinek's book, Start With Why. It is a bestseller. It is rated 4.5 on Amazon and it explains how great leaders and organisations inspire action by focusing on their purpose, their why, and they should do that before thinking about their processes or their products. It's an easy to read book and I finished it feeling very inspired, but there is a problem with this book. There is a lack of evidence. Although the book made reasonable points that I was inclined to agree with, these points weren't based on any scientific rigour, and if I followed them closely, I could actually do harm to the company I worked at. --- ### [Start With Why - Onboarding Example](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c3a25407-19c0-4c3f-9a27-ced9f7350412) 🎧 15:34 - 15:50 (00:15) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/54069c2d-d7b0-4377-a3f9-7488b36a0ac3" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - As part of onboarding at Hotjar, new hires were encouraged to read Simon Sinek's 'Start With Why'. - The book emphasizes focusing on purpose ('why') before processes or products. - It's a bestseller, rated 4.5 on Amazon, and easy to read, leaving readers inspired. - However, it lacks evidence to support its claims, despite making reasonable points. #### 💬 Quote > As part of my onboarding, all of the new hires, including me, were encouraged to read Simon Sinek's book, Start With Why. It is a bestseller. It is rated 4.5 on Amazon and it explains how great leaders and organisations inspire action by focusing on their purpose [...]. > — Phill Agnew Phill Agnew on being encouraged to read "Start With Why" at Hotjar. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** As part of my onboarding, all of the new hires, including me, were encouraged to read Simon Sinek's book, Start With Why. It is a bestseller. It is rated 4.5 on Amazon and it explains how great leaders and organisations inspire action by focusing --- ### [Sinek's Oversimplification](https://share.snipd.com/snip/36e81db3-54e0-472d-941e-7fed1cf985c7) 🎧 16:21 - 18:31 (02:10) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/bb6aa362-05f0-4cc2-8e1a-720b8e18d023" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Sinek's "why" theory oversimplifies success and plays into confirmation bias. - It doesn't acknowledge other factors. #### 💬 Quote > So he says, well, this is what's key to a company being successful. And so how does this play into our biases? Well, first, there's the narrative fallacy. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans explaining the flaws in Sinek's reasoning. #### 📚 Transcript **Alex Edmans:** So let me first stand in Simon Sinek's and present what he's arguing. He says that if a company has a why, it has a purpose, it has a mission, it has a vision, it becomes successful. So he gives examples of Apple, clearly successful, first company to be worth $1 trillion. He gives examples of non-profits. So Wikipedia, this beat the Encyclopedia Britannica as the world's founding for knowledge. It had a why. He gives the example of Martin Luther King. He said, I have a dream, not I have a plan. And this is why having a why is so important. It connects with people. It's something which inspires hearts and minds. So he says, well, this is what's key to a company being successful. And so how does this play into our biases? Well, first, there's the narrative fallacy. There could be tons of other reasons for why Apple was successful. It could be that Steve Jobs was adopted, according to Walter Isaacson. It could be that Steve Jobs was really great at design. It could be that he was extremely demanding. He'd come down on you like a ton of bricks if you made a mistake or did not share his passion for perfection in design. There could be tons of other answers, but why he wanted to have the idea that they started with why, that's a nice narrative. And why is it a nice narrative? It plays into the biases, confirmation bias. Again, we want to believe that you can achieve something that you want to, as long as you have a passion and a why. And it also plays into black and white thinking. A why is what we need in all companies at all times. It applies to companies, it applies to nonprofits, it applies to people, when this might not be the case. It might be that sometimes, well, the secret to success is just hard work. You don't need to think about a broader mission or vision, just get the details correct. but the idea that the why is a secret source of success, if he sells that, then everybody will buy his book, irrespective of whether you're running a company or a non-profit or whether you're an individual. --- ### [Flawed Evidence](https://share.snipd.com/snip/10e263c1-a7d7-4e41-8f65-0b48152f0f98) 🎧 18:32 - 20:06 (01:34) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/a22a0abf-45ee-4f55-a799-88f223cd1816" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Sinek's sample lacks a control group and alternative explanations, making his evidence unreliable. - Black-and-white thinking can distract companies from other important factors. #### 💬 Quote > His sample didn't contain those who had a Y who also failed. There's also no control group, so those without a Y who succeeded. > — Phil Agnew Phil Agnew pointing out the methodological flaws in Sinek's approach. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** Sinek argues that starting with why is the universal key to success, citing examples like Apple's dominance, the Wright Brothers' first flight, and Wikipedia surpassing in Carter. However, this simplicity overlooks a lot of key flaws. One of the flaws is that Simon Sinek pre-selected his sample of companies. His sample didn't contain those who had a Y who also failed. There's also no control group, so those without a Y who succeeded. And there's no consideration of alternative explanations. The Y companies, for example, may have many other things in common, like talented CEOs, favourable market conditions, or innovative tech. Cynic's evidence isn't reliable because it's cherry-picked. This black and white thinking can actually distract companies from the more pertinent things they need to work on. A one-size approach was used by Malcolm Gladwell too. He claimed that 10,000 hours was enough to become world-class at anything. And yet the study he cited was only about violin players. So **Alex Edmans:** Malcolm Gladwell quotes a study on violin playing and claims that it applies to any field that you're interested in. And why does he do this? He doesn't want to write a book about the secret to success in violin players. That's not going to be bought by many people only a violin player would buy that book but if he claims a universal secret to success then everybody would buy his book and indeed having gone through the publication process myself what do publishers look for they look for books which are going to appeal to the widest possible audience so you want to be as black and white and blanket as possible and claim that your book is generally applicable. --- ### [Grit's Limited Applicability](https://share.snipd.com/snip/c66b1751-6865-4e1a-9361-f862995cb3f7) 🎧 20:06 - 22:56 (02:50) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/2a6b908f-dfad-4935-8c0e-257a41a85193" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Duckworth's "Grit" suffers from restriction of range, limiting its applicability. - What's true for a select group isn't universally applicable. #### 💬 Quote > So what is true among a small set of people who have already gotten to West Point is not true for the population in general. So this is why I call it restriction of range. > — Alex Edmans Alex Edmans explaining the "restriction of range" problem in Duckworth's research. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** Other books fall for the same bias, but in a slightly different way. Take the bestseller Grit by Angela Duckworth. The book claims that passion and perseverance will triumph over talent in achieving long term success. But **Alex Edmans:** Angela Duckworth, here what's interesting is the black and white nature of it is on a slightly different dimension. So let me explain what the book is about. So it claims that to be successful, you need not raw talent, but you need grit, which is passion and perseverance. And you might think, well, this sounds a little bit like Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000 Hours, but it's slightly different in the following way. So what she does is she backs it up by evidence, and she is a great scientist. I respect her work. It's more the challenge of this popular book rather than her science. Well, her most famous study took men and women who'd got into West Point. That's the United States Military Academy. And after you get into West Point, you're not automatically let into the army. You have to complete a difficult six-week course called Beast Barracks. And so this is a really hard physical challenge. She wanted to look at what predicts success in Beast Barracks. Well, what do you think predicts success? Well, you might think it's physical fitness, but she finds it's not. She found that something which was even more important than physical fitness was your grit, which is your passion and perseverance, which she measured with a survey. Now, that sounds really compelling. And if indeed grit is more powerful than fitness for a physically demanding challenge like Beast Barracks, then grit must be what everybody should develop and how you develop it, you buy her book. However, what she suffered from was a problem known as restriction of range. So this is not a problem of misapplying something from the army to a different context. Even if your only goal was to be in the army, you should be concerned of this range issue. So what do you mean by this range issue? The people who'd already got into West Point were already extremely fit. So if there's diminishing returns to fitness, then indeed fitness won't matter because everybody is already fit to begin with. And that's why other things like grit seem to be more important. But if you were to take the average person who wants to join the military, then he or she might be better off working on their fitness than their grit. So what is true among a small set of people who have already gotten to West Point is not true for the population in general. So this is why I call it restriction of range. What's true for a range of very fit people isn't true for the population in general, which has a big deviance in terms of how fit they are. --- ### [Be Wary of Simple Solutions](https://share.snipd.com/snip/618f941b-310e-46e1-9b5c-560c5ca95466) 🎧 24:26 - 25:31 (01:05) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/7af00859-1ff0-4381-af23-c34b0abab5e6" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Be wary of business books offering simplistic solutions to complex problems. - Nuance, evidence-based insights, and humility are crucial for understanding success. #### 💬 Quote > The real problem with many business books is that they package incomplete or oversimplified ideas as universal truths. > — Phil Agnew Phil Agnew summarizing the core issue with many business books. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** many business books aren't useful. Too many share success stories out of context. They claim to reveal the keys to Apple's success without citing a control. A why purpose can't be the sole reason behind Apple's success. If it was, every company would have copied it by now. Other books share ideas that fall to black and white thinking like Gladwell's 10,000 hour rule or the Atkins diet revolutions. They tell us that one thing is good, others are bad, but this oversimplifies the complexity of life and leads us draw irrelevant conclusions. And other books like Grit, well they suffer from a restriction of range. Traits like fitness or grit matter only up to a point. While grit was key for the already fit West Point cadets, an average aspiring teenager might benefit far more from just improving their fitness before working on their grit. The real problem with many business books is that they package incomplete or oversimplified ideas as universal truths. To truly understand success, we need nuance, evidence-based insights, and a little bit of humility. --- ### [Be Wary of Oversimplified Business Books](https://share.snipd.com/snip/7c201303-41d7-4d23-b4f0-fbaa3e6102b7) 🎧 25:24 - 26:51 (01:26) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/9506043a-06ae-4149-b531-ed4a4cff336a" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Be cautious of business books that present simplistic solutions to complex business problems. - Many of these books offer incomplete or oversimplified ideas as universal truths, lacking nuance and evidence-based insights. - Growing a business is challenging, and books claiming to have one simple trick for transformation often fall short. - Look for books with reliable, evidence-backed advice instead. #### 💬 Quote > Any book that claims to have one simple trick that can transform your business [...] is bound [to] fall short. > — Phill Agnew Phill Agnew on the limitations of many business books. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** To truly understand success, we need nuance, evidence-based insights, and a little bit of humility. Growing a business is exceptionally hard. Some business books might help a bit, but any book that claims to have one simple trick that can transform your business, well, that's bound fall short. That is all for this week's episode of Nudge thank you so much for listening today we've covered a lot of business books that aren't worth reading but I didn't want to leave you thinking that there is nothing worth reading so I have put together a 2025 reading list it is packed with 25 incredible business books that you should read this year and it also contains five that I would recommend you would avoid. And they are not just the books I've spoken about today. There's some other ones there as well. There's no BS business books in my list. Only books with reliable evidence-backed advice. And the list includes a bit of a mix of big name classics and hidden gems that you might not have come across yet. If you're looking for some fresh inspiration this year about what to read just go check out the reading list it's a great place to start. You can grab the full list for free at www.nudge forward slash reading list that's nudge.kit forward slash reading list or just click the link in the show notes you'll find it there. One of the best books I included in the reading list is may contain lies by this week's guest alex edmund it is easily one of the best books i read last year i've --- ### [How to Choose Business Books](https://share.snipd.com/snip/ae988885-76bb-4f37-bbe3-8fa9a2a570b5) 🎧 25:24 - 26:07 (00:42) <iframe src="https://share.snipd.com/embed/obsidian-player/snip/7a7c05ca-113c-42e5-b5de-867e85eb48bf" width="100%" height="100" style="border: none; border-radius: 12px;" sandbox="allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-forms allow-popups allow-clipboard-write" ></iframe> - Many business books present incomplete or oversimplified ideas as universal truths. - To truly understand success, look for nuance and evidence-based insights. - Be wary of books claiming one simple trick to transform your business, as business growth is complex. - Seek books with reliable, evidence-backed advice instead of oversimplified solutions. #### 💬 Quote > The real problem with many business books is that they package incomplete or oversimplified ideas as universal truths. > — Phill Agnew Phill Agnew on the core issue with business books. #### 📚 Transcript **Phill Agnew:** To truly understand success, we need nuance, evidence-based insights, and a little bit of humility. Growing a business is exceptionally hard. Some business books might help a bit, but any book that claims to have one simple trick that can transform your business, well, that's bound fall short. That is all for this week's episode of Nudge thank you so much for listening today we've covered a lot of business books that aren't worth reading but I didn't want to leave you thinking that there is nothing worth reading so I have put together a 2025 reading list it is packed with 25 incredible business books that you should read this year and it also contains five that I would recommend you would avoid. --- Created with [Snipd](https://www.snipd.com) | Highlight & Take Notes from Podcasts