How To Write A Business Book That Explores, Not Preaches

Most business books aim to educate us. They introduce a new idea or approach that outlines a path towards success. Jim Collins’ Good to Great, Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur’s Business Model Generation, and Ethan Mollick’s Co-intelligence are examples of business book bestsellers doing exactly that. But how do you write a business book without pitching an idea? Is it possible to write one that is more like joining an adventure?

In other genres that is pretty common. Think of autobiographies, history books, and travel guides. In these books it’s often the thrill of exploration, rather than the desire for a road map, that keeps readers enthralled.

I talked to Martin Reeves, one of the co-authors of the forthcoming book, Like: The button that changed the world, to find out how something similar can be done for a business book. Reeves’ previous books were classical business books but the new one deliberately omits all the usual staples. There are no summaries or bullet points, no single core message, and not even a clean imposed structure. He pointed at three characteristics that drive such a book.

Lesson #1: Show, don’t tell

For a business book to work, it usually narrows our focus on a very specific issue. Stories are told to highlight the core message and all the ambiguity and complexity of the real world is pushed aside. Business book writing 101 suggests that you tell the readers how your idea works and then sprinkle in some great stories to bring this to life. Like takes a different stance.

“For a book like this, you show, you don’t tell,” Reeves explains. “You don’t lead with a theory.”

By the time you are done reading, you start to get a sense what the authors are trying to tell you, but more in shades of grey, rather than black and white. For example the story of the like button suggests that innovation is not the result of one hero standing tall but a serendipitous social affair. Multiple people contributed and nobody at the time knew how important this new artefact will become.

For aspiring innovators and entrepreneurs that initially seems less useful than “three steps to build a breakthrough innovation”. Ultimately though, it is more practical as you can consider building the right environment that enables ideas rather than planning a linear trajectory.

Lesson #2: Become a detective

The book’s journey started with a coffee house conversation between the authors. Bob Goodson, a notorious hoarder, had recently moved house. Packing up, he stumbled across an old sketch of a like button. Showing it to Reeves, he noticed that it pre-dated its first use by Facebook.

“Are you saying you invented the like button, Bob?” Reeves recalls their conversation. “And he replied, well, no, of course not. Well, maybe.”

This triggered three years of conversations and research. But instead doing the research first, then creating a well-structured list of insights, they decided to create a book that worked like their own journey of exploration. They started with one question that triggered other questions. From “Who invented the like button” they moved to “How does innovation happen?” (spoiler alert – it’s a social exercise with lots of recombination of ideas). They then progress to “Why is the design what it is, i.e. a thumb?” This takes you into a journey of design, brain science, cultural artefacts, and so on.

It’s almost like joining a team of detectives who try to find not just the murderer but also understand the conditions and the motive. A side benefit of following the story (rather than proving a theory) is that the author has permission to engage with many interesting topics and is not limited by having to prove expertise in a narrow field.

Lesson #3: It’s the small things (rather than the big ones) that matter

“I’m a person who is inclined to neglect details, but you cannot neglect details if you want to tell a story,” Reeves explains.

They interviewed over 100 people and Reeves admits that his questions were initially too high level. Early on, he focussed on questions like, “What is the history of the like button?” When you ask questions like this, you get high level answers. This does not work in a book that is driven by stories. Think of a novel that takes reader into the very specific situation of a protagonist. That’s the approach you need to adopt when writing a business book in this style.

Eventually, Reeves started to ask more granular questions. Questions like, “What were you doing in such and such a year?” Or “LinkedIn was one of the last companies to incorporate a like button. Why was that?” When you ask such specific questions, you get the rich answers you need to tell an engrossing story. And once you present these stories, you can leave it up to the reader to fully make sense of them.

Beyond writing the book

Writing the book is obviously just the starting point. As with all business books, success will greatly depend on networks, smart marketing, and the plausible credentials of the author team. You can learn more about this in my two-part series on how to become a management guru.