Looking to revamp your workplace and bring in some fresh ideas? We’ve made a list of the best company culture books that will shake things up and change the way you work.
While bite-sized information is readily available these days, nothing beats the depth and insight gained from a good old-fashioned read. With the world of work constantly facing an existential crisis, there's no shortage of thought leadership out there. From business leaders, academics, and commentators, there’s plenty of ideas for how to navigate this landscape.
Whether you're looking to transform a toxic workplace culture or build a strong, cohesive team, these are some of the best books out there, offering practical advice and fresh perspectives to set your business on a new course.
(We’ve included some links for convenience - there’s no affiliation, we’re not making any money if you click, and you’re just as welcome to request them at your local library instead.)
The ten best company culture books
1) It Doesn't Have to Be Crazy at Work - Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson
A distillation of wisdom from two sensible thinkers in the world of company culture - the authors of Rework and founders of Basecamp.
This book is about their new strategy for an ideal company culture - the ‘calm company’. No stress, anxiety, office politics, excessive workload or pointless meetings. Just a level-headed way of doing things based on what actually works.
They say it’s time to stop being proud of missing sleep or staying late at the office - we agree. They say unlimited holiday allowance does’t work, but people need to take more holidays – we agree. Definitely worth a read.
2) Range: How Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World - David Epstein
Pushing back against the 10,000 hours to success concept, Epstein argues that instead of laser-focusing our attention on the mastery of one subject, we should widen our skills and gain a breadth of experience. By developing range, he says, we can gain a stronger hold in areas like business, sport, music and more.
Taking these lessons into people management - will helping your team members broaden their skill set instead of specialising, make them more effective? You might have to read it to find out.
3) Conscious Capitalism: Liberating the Heroic Spirit of Business - John Mackey & Raj Sisodia
John Mackey is the founder of Whole Foods Market, the eco-friendly supermarket now owned by Amazon. Reimagining an entire economic system is rather ambitious, but having spent his career building a business that really lives by its core values, he knows a thing or two. He also made a ton of money along the way, so it’s a story worth reading.
'Conscious Capitalism’ aims to serve customers, employees, suppliers, investors, society, and the environment. Easy!
(If you’re considering how to transform your own business into a force for good, why not consider becoming a B Corp?)
4) Lab Rats: Why Modern Work Makes People Miserable - Dan Lyons
Dan Lyons's previous book Disrupted was a hilarious look into his journey into new employment as a 50-something, when he joined HubSpot - a deeply weird, cult-like marketing startup in Boston. His cynical eye for seeing through wide-eyed corporate guff got him a job as a writer for the excellent comedy show Silicon Valley.
Lyons’ second book provides a more targeted skewering to the ridiculousness of corporate life - “Personality tests. Team-building exercises. Forced fun. Desktop surveillance. Open-plan offices. Management fads.” Startup life being a "beanbag dystopia” is a particularly nice turn of phrase.
5) Bullshit Jobs: The Rise of Pointless Work and What We Can Do About It - David Graeber
A nice complement to Dan Lyons, this angrier tome is written by a professor of anthropology at the London School of Economics. It’s a hilarious and nightmareish look into the world of utterly pointless jobs, which have grown in number throughout the digital age. It’s a useful reminder that people need to feel valued in whatever they do. You won’t get much employee engagement in job roles that don’t need to exist.
6) Nine Lies About Work: A Freethinking Leader's Guide to the Real World - Marcus Buckingham and Ashley Goodall
There are some big delusions we all participate in throughout the workplace. The authors of this book claim we’re victim to many such faulty assumptions at work, and offer ways of doing things differently for the good of managers and employees.
Ideas like "people don't want constant feedback, they want helpful attention” and “people care more about the teams they work for than the companies” are challenging but evidence-backed. The authors actually argue that business culture isn’t as important as insightful employee data. Depends on how you look at it, but we could be persuaded.
7) The Emotionally-Intelligent Office: 20 Key Emotional Skills for the Workplace - The School of Life
The School of Life is an organisation that teaches how to live, love and work, led by philosopher Alain de Botton. They’re big on self-knowledge, compassion, and honesty without being prescriptive.
So a book like this really is their forté - "an in-depth exploration of what really lies behind our problematic behavioural patterns in the workplace, and a blueprint for the emotional skills we need to overcome them.”
If you want to drive culture change and build a successful business, this book gives a deeper, more thoughtful perspective than some of the other options.
8) Bring Your Human to Work: 10 Surefire Ways to Design a Workplace That Is Good for People, Great for Business, and Just Might Change the World - Erica Keswin
This one wins the prize for longest title. But it’s a thoughtful, evidence-backed call for better relationships within your work environment. Keswin uses loads of case studies to show how respecting staff wellbeing, autonomy and relationships can lead to better performance.
"The most successful leaders are those who actively form quality relationships with their employees, who honor fundamental human qualities-authenticity, openness, and basic politeness-and apply them day in and day out. Paying attention and genuinely caring about the effects people have on one another other is key to developing a winning culture where people perform at the top of their game and want to work."
9) The Joy of Work - 30 Ways to Fix Your Work Culture and Fall in Love with Your Job Again - Bruce Daisley
The title makes it sound suspiciously like a boss wrote it to fire up his underperforming staff, but it’s actually the real deal. Daisley backs up his ideas with actual experiments:
"Are lunch breaks for wimps, or do they actually make us more productive? Is it true that you can improve team performance simply by moving the location of the kettle or coffee machine? Why are meetings so often a waste of time, and how can they be fixed?”
If you’ve ever been in an office job and thought “surely we could do things a bit better?” - as a manager or employee, this one’s for you.
10 - Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup - John Carreyrou
This is a fabulously readable 'what not to do’ guide. It’s an award-winning story that tackles the astronomical rise and fall of Theranos, a multi-billion-dollar medical tech company that was based on a product that basically didn’t work.
If you want a healthy and stable corporate culture, just don’t do what Theranos did.
Further reading: even more insights into workplace culture
Craving more company culture insight?
Here’s some further examples you might be interested in – names that pop up all over the web as exemplary company culture books. Many of them end up on the New York Times bestseller list, and as such are a bit US-centric. But the overall theories can apply to successful companies around the world.
- Delivering Happiness: A Path to Profits, Passion, and Purpose – Tony Hsieh: The CEO of Zappos shares his story about creating a customer-centric business.
- Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity – Kim Scott: a guide to effective leadership, focusing on the importance of honest communication, feedback, and building strong relationships with your team.
- Leaders Eat Last – Simon Sinek: The TED talk supremo and organisational culture maven explains how great leaders prioritise their team's well-being and happiness to create a strong and positive company culture.
- The Five Dysfunctions of a Team – Patrick M. Lencioni: This famous business consultant teaches you to identify the five most common challenges that teams face, and offers strategies to overcome them to build a cohesive, high-performing team. His other book, “The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business“, is another popular title.
- Work Rules!: Insights from Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead – Laszlo Bock: This substantially-titled story from inside the search giant teaches you how to create a company culture that’s both structured and creative.
- The Culture Code: The Secrets of Highly Successful Groups – Daniel Coyle: an exploration of the principles and practices driving highly successful groups and organisations, offering actionable insights on how to build a strong, positive, and high-performance culture.
Read your way to culture change
Investing in your organisation's culture can have a profound impact on your team’s performance, retention rates, and overall success. By getting stuck into the best books on company culture, you can learn from the experts on how to build a great culture and foster teamwork within your own organisation.
If you’re really dedicated, you can attract top talent, create a positive work environment, and build a strong foundation for future growth. Don't underestimate the power of a well-crafted people operations strategy and a focus on your organisation's culture - they can be the key to unlocking your team's full potential.