February Resource Roundup

If you’re a fan of the written word, you’re in luck, because this month’s resource roundup has enough books and articles to keep you busy for months—if not the entire year. Coming out of Design Leadership Camp Santa Fe, we have an impressive list of design leadership books. Plus a handful of business / business development reads recommended by Owner Summit alumni. And don’t forget tools and services. This month, we have recommendations for stress testing, user testing, team recognition and more.

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Books Recommended by Design Leaders

• Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull and Amy Wallace

• The Laws of Simplicity (Simplicity: Design, Technology, Business, Life) by John Maed

• The Design of Everyday Things by Don Norman

• Rise of the DEO: Leadership by Design by Maria Giudice and Christopher Ireland

• Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug 

• 9 Things a Leader Must Do: How to Go to the Next Level—And Take Others With You by Henry Cloud 

• Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity by Kim Scott

• Change by Design: How Design Thinking Transforms Organizations and Inspires Innovation by Tim Brown

• Org Design for Design Orgs: Building and Managing In-House Design Teams by Peter Merholz and Kristin Skinner

• Dark Matter and Trojan Horses: A Strategic Design Vocabulary by Dan Hill 

• The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups by Daniel Coyle

• The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Impact by Chip Heath and Dan Heath 

• Multipliers: How the Best Leaders Make Everyone Smarter by Liz Wiseman and Greg Mckeown 

• The Go-Giver: A Little Story About a Powerful Business Idea by Bob Burg and John David Mann

• The Four Tendencies: The Indispensable Personality Profiles That Reveal How to Make Your Life Better (and Other People's Lives Better, Too) by Gretchen Rubin

• The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier

• The Humane Interface: New Directions for Designing Interactive Systems by Jef Raskin

• Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport

• True North: Discover Your Authentic Leadership by Bill George and Peter Sims 

• Orbiting the Giant Hairball: A Corporate Fool's Guide to Surviving with Grace by Gordon MacKenzie

• The Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst

• Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen

• Principles: Life and Work by Ray Dalio

• Universal Principles of Design by William Lidwell, Kritina Holden and Jill Butler

• Pantone's Guide to Communicating with Color by Leatrice Eisemann

• 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People by Susan Weinschenk 

• First, Break All The Rules: What the World's Greatest Managers Do Differently by Jim Harter and Marcus Buckingham 

Worth the Read

• Bureau of Digital: The Pause Clause

• Fastspot: Fostering a Supportive Culture

• Fresh Tilled Soil: I need a new website. Do I really need a CMS?

• Sparkbox: How We Do Discovery

• Dan Mall: The Only-ness Statement

• Four-day week: trial finds lower stress and increased productivity

• Blameless PostMortems and a Just Culture

• Inclusive Language

• How to Use Bridges’ Transition Model to Facilitate Change

Business & Business Development Books

• The Starfish and the Spider: The Unstoppable Power of Leaderless Organizations by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom

• Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap...And Others Don't by Jim Collins

• The Snowball System: How to Win More Business and Turn Clients into Raving Fans by Mo Bunnell

• Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind: How to Be Seen and Heard in the Overcrowded Marketplace by Al Ries and Jack Trout

Tools & Services for Teams

• Talent assessment: Mettl

• Team feedback / recognition: Bonusly, Lattice, HeyTaco!

• Standups: Standup Alice

• PEO: TriNet, Justworks

Load & User Testing Tools

• Stress testing: Load Impact, Azure DevOps, Telerik, Tricentis Flood, Apache JMeter, Artillery

• User testing: CrossBrowserTesting, BrowserStack