Radek Pietruszewski

Their words

Podcast (Part 2). Incentivizing people — punishing or rewarding (with bonuses, commissions, grades, public praise, and other bribes) is manipulative and doesn’t actually work. It seems to work, but only in the very short term and causes severe long-term damage.

Their words

A book about management in big organizations. Though still somewhat interesting if you work in small organizations for perspective.

Their words

Another good story of a big, multi-billion-dollar scam. They’re fun!

Their words

A story of a big, decade-long Silicon Valley scam. Good read.

Their words

Amusing anecdotes from Richard Feynman’s life. They never disappoint.

Their words

Biography of Encrico Fermi, and, among other things, another perspective on the Manhattan Project.

Their words

Nice read, but be warned: this is long.

Their words

Recommended read. If you want to spread FUD and lie to millions of people about issues such as tobacco smoking or global warming, this is a perfect handbook for you. If you don’t, you’ll learn their tactics.

Their words

If you don’t really understand or know a lot about China today, this is one perspective. Good book.

Their words

Fascinating story of how Peter Thiel masterminded the takedown of Gawker — with some help from Hulk Hogan.

Their words

Podcast. A simple system for managing money based around human flaws. Written for entrepreneurs, but you can adapt it for personal finance.

Their words

Podcast. Despite the apparent red flags about the book, it’s actually pretty genius! Read it with the right mindset (filter out bullshit), transform your relationship with objects, and declutter your life once and for all.

Their words

Ideas about developing teams that work together better. Underwhelming — took just a few base concepts and then stretched them very thin by applying to them a dozen different (not always compelling) stories.

Their words

Guide to transforming top-down organizations into lean ones, where everyone is a leader. Written by a submarine commander, it’s mostly useful to managers in big corporations and other institutions.

Their words

Richard Branson’s second autobiography. As someone not very familiar with his work, it was an interesting read (but as always with autobiographies, take it with a grain of salt).

Their words

Rough Notes. Never finished it to be honest, but the part about dieting supplements the classic Why We Get Fat (the former explains the theory well, while Ferriss’s book gives practical dietary ideas)

Their words

Podcast. Rough Notes. A brilliant guide to resolving conflicts with other people, cultivating empathy, and understanding other peoples’ feelings and needs.

Their words

Rough Notes. A rather dystopian prediction of the future of humanity. Can’t say I agree with it all, but definitely something to think about.

Their words

History of Lockheed Martin’s secret division that created many of USA’s greatest military innovations. I don’t care for the military, but to create an organization this lean and innovative inside a big, slow, bureocratic corporation is very rare.

Their words

Podcast. Rough Notes. Yet another history book about Apple and Steve Jobs through one person’s perspective. Not super inspiring, but entertaining.

Their words

Podcast (Part 2). A modern, approachable guide to Stoicism — a philosophy of life whose goal is to maximize the experience of tranquility. This is a seriously useful bag of psychological tricks.

Their words

Examples of good science, pseudo-scientific bullshit, and how to discern between the two.

Their words

Rough Notes. A very meta book with some serious advice on how to read books well. Frustratingly long for its content, though.

Their words

Podcast. Ramblings about randomness and all the ways in which our minds aren’t properly equipped to deal with it.

Their words

Podcast. Practical advice on how to improve the quality of your sleep. Quality is the key word — there are more factors come into play than just the amount of sleep.

Their words

A collection of stories from Richard Feynman’s life. Very entertaining.

Their words

Another biology-related book. Explores the role of parasites (and bacteria, disease, disgust) in human behavior, attraction, even politics, morality, religion. Some of this is is cutting-edge, speculative, or not fully proven — but very interesting stuff indeed.

Their words

An earlier biology book by Nick Lane. With his characteristic richness of detail, it explores the evolution of DNA, photosynthesis, movement, sight, sex, consciousness, and death.

Their words

A fascinating book exploring the role of energy in biology and evolution. It explains how eucaryotic life emerged and why it grew in complexity, while bacteria have remained unchanged in their simplicity for billions of years. It also presents the best theory of abiogenesis we have, and a lot more.

Their words

Podcast (Part 2). Stories and case studies about the invisible forces that shape how productive we are — both individually, and in organizations. A good read.

Their words

The fascinating history of genetics, told from the very beginning up until today. Covers the broad range of genetics-related science, its development, and its implications. Long, but very well written, and a pleasure to read (or listen to).

Their words

The book’s stated goal is to convey an intuitive (as in: very little math) understanding of statistics, and I think it succeeds at that. It shows both the awesome power of statistics (for research, science, predictions) and the dangers of its misuse.

Their words

An interesting read about macroeconomics, the nature of money, the role of central banking, and other related topics. Lots of history, and packed into a very enjoyable and approachable book.

Their words

Podcast. More stories and insight on creativity. In particular, the book makes a strong case for just how ordinary creativity is, and makes you notice the things that hold us back from creating or lead us astray when we do.

Their words

Podcast. Good advice for generating, recognizing, and championing original ideas, as well as for creating resilient cultures that promote creative thinking, and resist groupthink. A lot of stuff to unpack, a good read.

Their words

Podcast. A system for pursuing goals, keeping track of progress, and making sure they ultimately get done. Useful in organizations and individuals. You won’t find the ideas very innovative, but the approach is helpful, and yet not something we tend to do. Worth a read if you have goals you have trouble actually finding time for.

Their words

We tend to focus on the “what” and “how” of our companies and products. This manifesto reminds us to always start with “why” — the reason we do the things we do, to let that guide our decisions, the whats and hows. Personally, I found the book neither very insightful nor inspiring, but YMMV.

Their words

An ecopragmatist book making a compelling argument that urbanization, nuclear energy, and genetic engineering are good for the environment and must be pursued. This is all counterintuitive — environmental movement traditionally despises those things. But we’ve gone so far changing Earth, there might not be another choice.

Their words

Podcast. Yes, yes, yes! We live very distracted lives and most of our working days are filled with shallow tasks and interruptions. Although programmers get the importance of flow, it’s so hard to achieve. Our environments don’t support it, and shallow work is just easier. The book makes a compelling case for why we should double down on deep work, and offers some practical strategies for achie…

Their words

Thoughts on building innovative new companies. There’s some startup BS in Zero to One that turned me off, but still enough interesting insight to recommend the book.

Their words

If you’re reading this blog, you’re probably well-prepared for what’s to come in the next few decades. Still, things will change, and this book offers one perspective at the industries that will flourish, and how wealth will be distributed in the world.

Their words

If you’ve enjoyed Narcos, you’ll like this book. The world of drugs, cartels, gangs, violence, and prisons looked at from the perspective of an economist.

Their words

Notes (More notes). A lot of knowledge about how our brains work, packed into useful, practical terms. Understanding this stuff will help you be more productive, deal with stress and emotions better, even get better at working with and influencing other people.

Their words

The history of humankind from 2 million years back all the way until today. Fascinating read. I liked that it wasn’t just a list of events, but an overarching “theory of history”. Also enjoyed that this one topic was presented through many lenses: history, evolutionary biology, archeology, economics, even philosophy and theology.

Their words

A research-based look at what causes companies to move from mediocre or good to great performance. Not super engaging to read, but the methodology behind the book gives its ideas more credibility.

Their words

A biography of Jeff Bezos and Amazon. An enjoyable read, some history, and some insight.

Their words

Podcast. Before I read this book, my understanding of what makes us fat (what made me fat!) was highly mistaken. That, or this book is bullshit. But I don’t think so. My research and experience applying the lessons so far seem to confirm it. Hard to argue with 10kg lost in 4 months with little effort.

Their words

A few great insights, but also some cringeworthy parts. Would recommend Essentialism over this one.