·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
The Art of Public Speaking
Insights from the book ‘Say It Well’ by Terry Szuplat, Barack Obama’s speechwriter
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
The Gist
D Shivakumar distills the essence of books you want to read
Contributors: D Shivakumar
53 articles
Latest in The Gist
·Business & Strategy
The Power of Like
Insights from Martin Reeves and Bob Goodson’s new book, ‘Like’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Character is about who we choose to be
Insights from General Stanley McChrystal’s new book ‘On Character: Choices That Define a Life’. The book is in Shivakumar’s list of best books of summer 2025
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Economy, Policy & Society
The global trends to watch in 2025
Insights from The Economist’s report ‘The World Ahead 2025’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Economy, Policy & Society
The new business theme: Love the product, hate the producer
Insights from economist John Kay’s new book ‘The Corporation in the 21st Century’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Technology & the Future
The Age of Information
Insights from Yuval Noah Harari’s book ‘Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
How to reinvent your career
Insights from Herminia Ibarra’s book, ‘working Identity’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
The principles of excellence
Insights from sportswriter Sally Jenkins’ book ‘The Right Call: What Sports Teach Us About Work and Life’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
Why being process-driven trumps being results-oriented
Insights on high-performance, distilled from Dr Dana Sinclair’s latest book
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Entrepreneurship, Startups & Innovation
The risk taker
What makes Elon Musk tick? Insights from the biography by Walter Isaacson
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
‘A leader’s role is to shape the decades ahead, not just react to the present’
Insights from Indra Nooyi’s memoir ‘My Life in Full’, on leadership in a world “where authority and brilliance, to many people, still look like an older gentleman”
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
‘Trust is not a matter of morality, but of predictability’
Predicting behaviour isn’t rocket science, say Robin Dreeke and Cameron Stauth in their book, ‘Sizing People Up’. It is a social science, and requires you to apply the right equation of logic, strategy, scepticism, observational skills, and the ability to accept unwelcome truths
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
How to live better into old age
In their book ‘The New Long Life’, Andrew Scott and Lynda Gratton say, as individuals and as a society, we need to reimagine work, career, learning and relationships, among other things. And both the young and the old will need to share the burden and opportunities of longer lives
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Business & Strategy
Anticipating inflection points
Insights from Columbia Business School professor Rita McGrath’s book ‘Seeing Around Corners: How to Spot Inflection Points in Business Before They Happen’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Economy, Policy & Society
The global trends to watch in 2020
Insights from The Economist’s report ‘The World in 2020’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
Becoming indistractable
Nir Eyal wrote the definitive book on how to design tech products that will get people hooked. His latest book ‘Indistractable’ has advice on how to avoid digital distractions and hold our own in this war for our attention. Some insights from the book
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Bosses need to be coaches in the new workplace
Insights from Jim Clifton and Jim Harter’s book ‘It’s the Manager’. The book is based on the largest global study by Gallup on the future of work
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
‘The power of coaching is to offer a different perspective’
Google’s Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle share what they learnt from their mentor, legendary coach Bill Campbell, in their book ‘Trillion Dollar Coach’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Forging strong, compassionate leaders
In their book, ‘Character Carved in Stone’, Pat Williams and Jim Denney talk about the values the United States Military Academy at West Point cultivates to make strong leaders
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Talent drives strategy in the digital era. Is HR ready?
Today business strategy means sensing new opportunities, and people are the key to creating value. So how do you approach human capital in this new era? Corporate guru Ram Charan, McKinsey’s Dominic Barton and Korn Ferry’s Dennis Carey explore in their book ‘Talent Wins’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Economy, Policy & Society
The trends to watch in 2018
Insights into the forces that will shape the world, from The Economist report, ‘The World in 2018’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Technology & the Future
Disruptive tech: There’s hope for the future. But fear too
We are facing an avalanche of disruptive technologies. But adapting to change will not be easy. Sometimes it will even seem traumatic. Some insights from Vivek Wadhwa with Alex Salkever's book ‘The Driver in the Driverless Car’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Entrepreneurship, Startups & Innovation
Celebrate authentic failures
In his new book ‘A Biography of Innovations’ R Gopalakrishnan, former Tata Sons executive director, talks about learning from mistakes and the importance of intellectual curiosity, collective ingenuity and storytelling
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
Get Smart: Making effective decisions
Think long term, plan for success based on real facts, and have clear goals, says Brian Tracy in his book ‘Get Smart!: How to Think and Act Like the Most Successful and Highest-Paid People in Every Field’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·FF Life
‘Playing boldly is a philosophy’: Life lessons from golf legend Arnold Palmer
Nicknamed The King, Arnold Palmer played a big role in making golf popular and not just a game for the elite. His rivalry with Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus is legendary. In his memoir ‘A Life Well Played’, he shares his experiences
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Business & Strategy
How Nokia rewrote its story
In his book ‘Against All Odds’, Nokia’s former CEO Jorma Ollila chronicles how a troubled conglomerate engaged in rubber, cable, forestry, electronics and power generation businesses became a global mobile phone behemoth, but lost out to the iPhone
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Making tough calls in business and life
In his book ‘Managing in the Gray’, HBS ethics professor Joseph L Badaracco presents a framework to arrive at the best possible decisions in a hard situation
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
When growth leads to a slowdown, how do you tackle the paradox?
In their book ‘The Founder’s Mentality’, Chris Zook and James Allen, partners in Bain & Company, talk about what leaders can do for sustainable and profitable growth
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Ask these questions to make your coaching and leadership effective
Coaching is an essential leadership skill. And questions are a good way to open doors, says Michael Bungay Stanier in his book ‘The Coaching Habit’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Entrepreneurship, Startups & Innovation
When Nike just did it
Quick takes from the book ‘Shoe Dog’, Phil Knight’s account of creating Nike
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
The secret of power: Not ruthlessness, but empathy
American psychologist Dacher Keltner says, those who gain power are the ones who work for the good of others. But paradoxically, power can lead to selfishness—and loss of power
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Building a business in complicated times
Dynamic times call for dynamic leadership. Here are some insights from the book ‘The Hard Thing About Hard Things’ by Ben Horowitz, co-founder of venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Entrepreneurship, Startups & Innovation
What a fable about meerkats tells us about innovation
Discipline and maverick ideas—both are necessary for dealing with rapid change and coming out ahead, say John Kotter and Holger Rathgeber in their book ‘That’s Not How We Do It Here’
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Are you persuadable?
An ability to change decisions is not about inconsistency, it is about flexibility. Insights from Al Pittampalli’s book ‘Persuadable: How Great Leaders Change Their Mind to Change the World’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
What makes a winner
Insights from Larry Weidel’s book ‘Serial Winner: 5 Actions to Create Your Cycle of Success’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
How we think and how we can get better at collaboration
Insights from Dawna Markova and Angie McArthur’s book, ‘Collaborative Intelligence: Thinking with People Who Think Differently’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Managing the matrix: How to cope with ambiguity and change
A matrix organization is more flexible and better able to respond to dynamic situations. But working in a matrix requires a different set of skills than in hierarchical structures. Insights from Kevan Hall’s book ‘Making the Matrix Work’
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
The most successful football manager shares how to be a great leader
Insights from the book ‘Leading’ by Alex Ferguson, former manager of Manchester United with Michael Moritz, chairman of Sequoia Capital.
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
How to make meetings purposeful
Insights from Al Pittampalli’s book ‘Read This Before Our Next Meeting’ on how to get more done
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Does your team have runners or passive riders?
In his book ‘Move Your Bus’, Ron Clark talks about the different kinds of people companies typically have—high performers, the dependables, average workers and deadweights—and what leaders can do to get the best out of their teams
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
How to be an objective leader
Seeing things as they are, without letting our biases distort things, is key to taking the right actions, says Elizabeth Thornton in her book, 'The Objective Leader'
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Work, Careers & Personal Mastery
How To Be Your Best
In his book 'Are You Fully Charged?' Tom Rath says, pursue meaningfulness, not money to find joy in work and life
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Get your people to unleash their own potential
The onus of motivation is on the individual, says Susan Fowler in her book 'Why Motivating People Doesn't Work'. It also tells leaders what they can do, but not control, to motivate people
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Entrepreneurship, Startups & Innovation
Ideas from outside can jumpstart your innovation effort
Every industry thinks it is unique and has little to learn from someone else. Ramon Vullings and Marc Heleven’s book, 'Not Invented Here: Cross-Industry Innovation', shows how you can learn from other industries
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Shaping an Organization's Culture
The success of any change is linked to human dynamics—the culture. Yet cultures have a way of maintaining the status quo. Senn Delaney's Larry Senn and Jim Hart tackle that dilemma in their book 'Winning Teams, Winning Cultures'
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Business & Strategy
So You Think You've Got a Strategy
The best approach depends on the problem at hand, says the book—Your Strategy Needs a Strategy by Martin Reeves, Knut Haanaes and Janmejaya Sinha
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Leaders with character deliver higher value
Insights on leadership, the character of leaders and executive teams from Fred Kiel's book - Return on Character.
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
What separates good leaders from the inconsequential
Insights into adaptive leadership from Travis Bradberry and Jean Greaves’s book, Leadership 2.0: The secrets of adaptive leadership
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
What leaders can do to become effective coaches for their teams
Business leaders are also expected to be effective coaches. Here's what they can learn from executive and life coach Keith Nelson's book, Your Total Coach
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D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International
·Leadership & Organisation
Successful leaders are humble, accountable, and encourage participation
Korn Ferry International CEO Gary Burnison talks about the traits that successful leaders share in his book - Lead
DS
D Shivakumar
Operating Partner | Advent International