On My Shelf with Gaurav Nemade — Product Manager at Google AI (Mountain View, USA)
About me
Product Manager with Google AI, focussed on bringing the best of AI research to products. I am curious & invested in technologies that will change the world in the next decade. Also, I’m big on empathy and love to meet people to share life experiences & ideas. My favorite quotes: “If you are not failing, you are not growing” and “Asking the right questions is as important as answering them.”
On my shelf
Crucial conversations
Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High
by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan & Al Switzler
My opinion
As a PM, I am often in situations where emotions run high and months of work is at stake. In such difficult times, it is easy to fall back onto our body’s natural responses which is fight or flight, i.e. we can lose our temper or we can shut down. This book is an amazing resource to understand, learn and improve how to handle difficult situations and make the most out of it without derailing the conversation because of ego, temper or personality differences. Learnings from this book are equally useful in personal life.
272 pages, McGraw-Hill Education 2011
Get this book (amazon.com, amazon.de)
Range
Why Generalists Triumph in a Specialized World
by Daniel J. Epstein
My opinion
This book highlights how breadth (not just depth) can fuel innovation. I am a generalist at heart and I like to learn about diverse fields. For many years, I thought of myself as an exception (in a negative way) for not being able to stick to one sub-area. I got bored of things quickly; I read books & watched tv shows ranging from technology to fashion to psychology to finance. The book gave me a good perspective that it may be a feature rather than a bug. Now, I try to build on this feature by seeking inspiration from different sectors in my work.
352 pages, Riverhead Books 2019
Get this book (amazon.com, amazon.de)
The Art of Negotiating the Best Deal
by Seth Freeman (Audible Audiobook)
My opinion
This is part of Audible’s Great Course series and is probably the best resource on negotiation I have encountered in my life. It covers various types of negotiations and strategies ranging from interest-based bargaining (situations where there is a potential for both parties to benefit) to distributed bargaining (situations where one party emerges stronger). It has a lot of interesting case studies, and the audio format is definitely engaging. The course is accompanied by a long pdf as well.
12 hours and 46 minutes, The Great Courses 2014
Get this audiobook (amazon.com, amazon.de)
The Everything Store
Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon
by Brad Stone
My opinion
This is an amazing account of how Amazon became what it is today. It highlights Bezos’ cunning business skills, wins and losses of Amazon as a company, and struggles of employees & partners in keeping up with the demanding boss. The biggest learnings for me as a PM were “obsess about the user” and “hypothesize and build for the future”.
384 pages, Little, Brown and Company 2013
Get this book (amazon.com, amazon.de)
How to Win Friends and Influence People
by Dale Carnegie
My opinion
Originally published in 1936, this book is close to a bible for managing and influencing people. It’s often said, “tech is easy, people are hard”, and this has been my personal experience. More often than not, my projects run into hurdles or fail because of people issues, not technological challenges. So as a PM (& as a US immigrant whose first language is not English), this has served as an excellent guidebook, and I highly recommend it.
228 pages, Pocket Books 1936
Get this book (amazon.com, amazon.de)
Our series “On my shelf” features product people from all over the world who are passionate about reading and sharing their best book recommendations with the community. If you want to join the movement and share your reading list with others send us a message. Let’s get better together 📚.
