September Reading List

September always feels like a fresh start — new projects, new ideas, and of course, new things to read and listen to. So we asked our brilliant faculty of design leaders (and our ever-curious community) what’s been sparking their thinking lately. Here is a hand-picked list of books and podcasts that will keep your creative brain buzzing all month long.

How Brands Grow by Byron Sharp

Recommended by Ciaran McClellan, Growth Director at ME+EM

How Brands Grow presents decades of research in a style that is written for marketing professionals to grow their brands. It tackles issues such as how brands grow, how advertising really works, what price promotions really do and how loyalty programs really affect loyalty.

Good Strategy Bad Strategy by Richard Rumelt

Recommended by Matt Fenby-Taylor, Chief Product Officer at Unobravo

Good Strategy Bad Strategy dispels popular misconceptions about strategy — such as confusing it with ambitions, visions or financial goals — by very practically showing that a good strategy focuses on the challenges a business faces, and providing an insightful new approach for overcoming them.


Positive Intelligence by Shirzad Chamine

Recommended by Julia Whitney, Leadership Coach

Positive Intelligence reveals how to achieve one's true potential for both professional success and personal fulfilment. The breakthrough tools and techniques included have been refined over years of coaching CEOs and their teams, and Shirzad shows how you, too, can unleash the vast, untapped powers of your mind.

Small Giants by Bo Burlingham

Recommended by Monika Linton, Founder of Brindisa

Small Giants explores fourteen remarkable private companies that rejected the endless pressure for growth to pursue different success metrics: excellence in their field, exceptional workplace culture, customer service perfection, and community contributions. It offers valuable lessons for creating truly great businesses beyond size alone.



Uncensored CMO with Jon Evans

Recommended by Ciaran McClellan, Growth Director at ME+EM

The Uncensored CMO explores the good, the bad and quite frankly downright ugly truth about marketing theory & practice.

The Crazy One with Stephen Gates

Recommended by Albert Patrashku, Principal Product Designer, Design Lead at Corlytics

The Crazy One is an award-winning podcast about creativity, leadership, and making ideas happen. Hosted by global design leader and CRZY founder Stephen Gates, each episode delivers honest insights, practical advice, and powerful stories from a career spent building world-class teams, brands, and experiences.

How I Built This with Guy Raz

Recommended by Lottie Whyte, Founder & CEO of MyoMaster

Guy Raz interviews well-known entrepreneurs about how they built their iconic brands. Founders reveal their moments of doubt and failure, and share insights on their successes. How I Built This is a master-class on innovation, leadership and how to navigate challenges of all kinds.


Re:Thinking with Adam Grant

Recommended by Ekaterina Solomeina, Co-Founder of Future London Academy

In Re:Thinking with Adam Grant, he has lively discussions and debates with the world’s most interesting thinkers, creators, and leaders. Diving inside their minds, Adam uncovers bold insights that can make us all a little bit smarter.

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