DS News

12 Good Reads Expand your skills, gain insight, and get inspired with these top picks. Watchdog: How Protecting Consumers Can Save Our Families, Our Economy, and Our Democracy By Richard Cordray In Watchdog: How Protecting Consumers Can Save Our Families, Our Economy, and Our Democracy, inaugural Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Director Richard Cordray discusses his time as Director, from the Bureau's inception to the current administration, and the landmark cases Cordray took part in. "In the leadup to the financial crisis, which occurred almost a decade ago and was the worst economic collapse we had suffered in the United States since the Great Depression, it became understood among people in Washington that there was a hole in the system," Cordray said. "ere was nobody looking out for consumers in the financial marketplace." Go behind the scenes of one of this important but often controversial Bureau in Cordray's own words. Bubble in the Sun: The Florida Boom of the 1920s and How It Brought on the Great Depression By Christopher Knowlton In the Roaring 1920s, Florida was a place of incredible excess, immense wealth, and precipitous collapse. In Bubble in the Sun, Christopher Knowlton shows readers the artistic and entrepreneurial visions behind Coral Gables, Boca Raton, Mar-a-Lago, Miami Beach, and other storied sites. It was a time when the nightlife raged more raucously than anywhere else in America; workers, mostly black, who built and maintained the boom endured grievous abuses; and the pure beauty of the Everglades suffered from the rapid expansion. Knowlton also dives into the four forces that made and/or broke Florida in the time: the real estate moguls Carl Fisher, George Merrick, and Addison Mizner, and the looming Great Depression. Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don't By Simon Sinek In Leaders Eat Last, Simon Sinek explores why while some teams are willing to put their lives on the line for each other, others will fight no matter what. Sinek's answer came when he watched as the most junior Marines ate first while the most senior Marines took their place at the back of the line. From military to big business, many workplaces are driven by cynicism, paranoia, and self-interest, but the best ones foster trust and cooperation because their leaders build what Sinek calls a "Circle of Safety" that separates the security inside the team from the challenges outside. The Catalyst: How to Change Anyone's Mind By Jonah Berger For changing minds, sometimes it isn't about pushing harder, but about taking a new approach. In e Catalyst, Jonah Berger examines successful change agents, who know it's not about pushing harder, or providing more information, it's about being a catalyst. According to Berger, catalysts remove roadblocks and reduce the barriers to change. Instead of asking, "How could I change someone's mind?" they ask a different question: "Why haven't they changed already? What's stopping them?" Whether you're trying to change one person, transform an organization, or shift the way an entire industry does business, this book will teach you how to become a catalyst.

• Cover