Group Coaching
Book Study Group
Business life keeps us busy. We often don’t have the opportunity to return to first principles. And even more rare, to do so in communities where we can develop shared understanding and connection.
The book study group is an answer to this challenge. Every second month for six months, 10–12 leaders gather around a single book. In total three books representing the pillars of my coaching practice: strategy, soul and self. The reading and dialogue bolsters our pattern recognition capabilities, enriches our mental models and expands our professional community.
Between sessions, I send provocative questions, favourite passages, an associated article – all designed to keep nudging you along the reading, whilst enriching your learning. There are three groups: Johannesburg, Cape Town and online. Email me if you’d like to join one or if you’d like me to run one in your business.
Current book study group
Sept 2026 – Jan 2027
Email me about this group: Sept 2026 – Jan 2027-
Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future
Dan Wang
Described by Tyler Cowen as “The Best Recent Book on China, on China and America, and, arguably, the best book of the year flat out”, it explores the mechanisms behind China’s tremendous growth and the costs thereof. I chose it for two key reasons. The first is obvious: understanding the world’s largest economies is useful for any leader. The second, less obvious: Wang contrasts China’s engineering-led approach with what he calls the US’s lawyer-led approach. It contrasts building and policy; single-mindedness and the power of plurality. It is an analogy that holds for any large complex organisation: the tension between creating the future and governing the present.
-
What to Make of a Life
Jim Collins
Using his trademark methodological rigour Collins pairs 34 case studies (amongst others Toni Morrison, Carlos Santana & Meryl Streep) exploring how to build unique lives whilst leveraging universal truths. He comments “Life does not happen in nice neatly prepackaged stages. Life is not linear; it is unfolding, layered and organic”. Collins calls it his largest project and says it transformed his life.
-
Churn: The Tension That Divides Us and How to Overcome It
Claude M. Steele
He shows how settings can prevent us from contributing our best. Drawing on extensive research, he exposes how even when the setting itself is ostensibly neutral, prevailing narratives can undermine someone’s excellence. He gives powerful examples of how we can create spaces in which we can both connect more easily and everyone gets to bring their best selves. Whilst philosophical and unequivocal in his values orientation, this is a deeply pragmatic book — and, like Steele himself, hopeful: providing proof and practices that trust between different people is something we can actively and, with intention, build.
Upcoming book study group
March 2027 – July 2027
Email me about this group: March 2027 – July 2027-
How Africa Works: Success and Failure on the World’s Last Developmental Frontier
Joe Studwell
Studwell’s book is an expansive sweep across our continent. The best strategy starts with understanding context, and Studwell provides it. The best strategy is accelerated through identifying excellence. He uses Botswana, Mauritius, Ethiopia and Rwanda to illuminate what is possible. It is an important contribution to understand the world in which we work.
-
A Way of Being Free
Ben Okri
Okri is a brief and challenging read. Not the kind of author, or register, ordinarily encountered in boardrooms or parliaments. However, this little book does something essential: it explores freedom and constraint in everything from politics to creativity. If we are to do the work that Studwell identifies, we must be able to imagine it.
-
Breaking Through: My Life in Science
Katalin Karikó
After decades of being dismissed, Karikó won the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 2023. Okri writes, “All I wanted to do was to remind myself at all times to just sing my song”. Karikó’s story is the lived embodiment of that ambition. Studwell shows us what must be done. Okri inspires us with what could be done. Karikó shows how it gets done. Strategy. Soul. Self.
Where the conversation has already been
Every group adds three books to the shelf. See what has been read in previous book study groups.
View previous book study groups