Shaun Abram

Technology and Leadership Blog

Book summary: Made to Stick, Chip & Dan Heath

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die is a book by brothers Chip & Dan Heath. It tries to explain what makes some ideas memorable or interesting. The book has a somewhat similar style to Malcom Gladwell and explicitly references him:

We adopted the “what sticks” terminology from one of our favorite authors, Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point, which examined the forces that cause social phenomena to “tip,” or make the leap from small groups to big groups.

I liked this book. The SUCCES framework (a Simple Unexpected Concrete Credentialed Emotional Story) is useful enough, but I think I actually liked these 3 topics from early sections the most:

The Curse of Knowledge: Once we know something, it is hard to imagine what it was like not to know it. Our knowledge has “cursed” us. And it becomes difficult for us to share our knowledge with others, because we can’t readily re-create our listeners’ state of mind. Since we can’t unlearn what you already know, the suggests using the SUCCES framework to transform your ideas to beat the Curse of Knowledge.
Don’t bury the lead: The first “lead” sentence of a story contains the most essential elements. Don’t allow writing to become so steeped in the details that you lose the core message — what readers will find important or interesting.
The inverted pyramid: After the lead, information is presented in decreasing order of importance. Journalists call this the “inverted pyramid” structure — the most important info (the widest part of the pyramid) is at the top. The inverted pyramid is great for readers. No matter what their attention span, the inverted pyramid maximizes the information.

Finding the core and writing the lead both involve forced prioritization. The SUCCES framework can help you structure and communicate the points for best effect.

See below for summary notes on each chapter.

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Tags: 2026, bookreviews, books, reading

14 Mar 26 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

Book review: Focus, by Daniel Goleman

Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence (amazon.com), by Daniel Goleman

Overall I found this book just an OK read. Some parts good and interesting. Some parts read like a Malcolm Gladwell book. But ultimately, I just didn’t have any big takeaways. I do find the subject matter interesting, but something about the style or flow just didn’t work for me. The theme is focus, but the book jumps around a lot in a way that left me wondering what the point really was.

I agree with some of the reviews on Goodreads, such as “a mishmash of ideas, supposedly linking all with the focus of focus. It didn’t work for me.” and “Book did not have enough ‘focus’ to hold my interest.”

Still, I made some notes below on the parts that were more interesting to me.

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Tags: 2026, bookreviews, books, focus, reading

31 Jan 26 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

2025 Books

I read a dozen or so books in 2025, including:

The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway (re-read)
A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
Tortilla Flat, John Steinbeck (re-read)
Inner Excellence, Jim Murphy
The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe (DNF)
Dead Lions, Mick Herron
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, Frederick Douglas
The Lessons of History, Will & Ariel Durant
The Richest Man in Babylon, George S. Clason
Make Your Bed, William H McRaven
Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World, Cal Newport
Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI
Moonwalking with Einstein, Joshua Foer (re-read)
The Psychology of Money, Morgan Housel

See reviews below, but the highlights from 2025 as a whole are:

Most enjoyable read: The Old Man and the Sea, but since it was a re-read, l’ll mention “Dead Lions” by Mick Herron too.
Most inspiring book: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, by Frederick Douglas
Best motivational book: Deep Work

See some notes and reviews below.

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Tags: 2025, bookreviews, books, reading

03 Jan 26 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

Book review: The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel

The Psychology of Money, “Timeless lessons on wealth, greed, and happiness”(amazon.com) is a book by Morgan Housel, a writer and a partner at a a venture capital firm.

I found this book to be an easy read, reading it over one ski weekend. It’s not a bad read, although for me I felt it underlined some beliefs I already had, rather than changing my thinking much. Entertaining albeit nothing new or groundbreaking. You can see a decent summary here.

Some chapter notes from me below.

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Tags: 2025, bookreviews, books, finance, reading

03 Jan 26 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

2024 Books – second half

I read 7 books in the last half of the year (excluding “work” books and what I read with my daughter):

The Power of Now, Eckhart Tolle
The 5AM Club, Robin Sharma
A Perfect Spy, John le Carré
Slow Horses, Mick Herron
Quiet: The Power of Introverts, Susan Cain
Leonardo Da Vinci, Walter Isaacson
Moving to Great, Eric Boles

See reviews below, but the highlights from 2024 as a whole are:

Most enjoyable read: I should probably say “A Perfect Spy” or “The Spy Who Came in from the Cold” by John le Carré, and I really enjoyed both. But Slow Horses, by Mick Herron, wins because it’s just such an easy read.
Most inspiring book: Leonardo Da Vinci, by Walter Isaacson.
Best motivational book: The 5am Club, and Moving to Great were both good.
Least favorite book: Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn. Some people loved it. I was not one of those people.

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Tags: 2024, bookreviews, books, reading

04 Jan 25 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

Book review: Moving to Great, by Eric Boles

We were fortunate enough to have Eric Boles as our keynote speaker at a company event in June 2024, and I decided to follow up by reading his book Moving to Great.

Boles is a motivational speaker & leadership coach and shares his path from a scrawny kid to a “collegiate All-American” athlete, being drafted for the NFL, playing professional football for the NY Jets & the Green Bay Packers, being cut, working as a janitor, and then setting and achieving a goal to become a motivational speaker. It is a fascinating story.

He shares what has worked for him over the years and, being a motivational coach, what can work for you.

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Tags: 2024, bookreviews, books, ericboles, motivation, reading

04 Jan 25 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

Book review: Leonardo Da Vinci, by Walter Isaacson

After reading The Mona Lisa Vanishes by Nicholas Day with my daughter, I expressed an interest in learning more about Leonardo Da Vinci. Sure enough, she gifted me the wonderful Leonardo Da Vinci, by Walter Isaacson as a Christmas gift, and I had finished the 600+ pages by New Year’s Eve. I loved it.

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Tags: 2024, bookreviews, books, leondardodavinci, reading

31 Dec 24 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)

Book review: The 5AM Club, Robin Sharma

“Own Your Morning. Elevate Your Life” is the tag line of this self-improvement book. It advocates for an early start (obviously, given the title), followed by a period of exercise, reflection (e.g. meditation, journaling) and growth (e.g., learning, reading). Read on for a full review…

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Tags: 2024, bookreviews, books, reading

03 Sep 24 | Uncategorized | Comments (0)