Thinkers50, the global authority on management thinking, has unveiled its 2025 Management Classics Booklist. This annual curation honours management and business books that have withstood the test of time and remain powerfully relevant today.
What are the books every manager should read?
Every year Thinkers50 announces 10 more classic titles to create the ultimate management library, books which have stood the test of time and remain powerfully relevant today.
‘The Classic Management books are the ones that have had and continue to have a long-term impact on the way people think about and practice management,’ says Thinkers50 co-founder, Stuart Crainer. ‘They are the coping stones for modern management and remain important reading for managers everywhere.
In alphabetical order of author, this year’s top 10 Management Classics are:
1. Competing on the Edge: Strategy as Structured Chaos by Shona L Brown and Kathleen M Eisenhardt (HBR Press, 1989).
2. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey (Free Press, 1989).
3. Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux (Nelson Parker, 2014).
4. Conscious Capitalism by John Mackey and Raj Sisodia (HBR Press, 2014).
5. Thinking in Systems by Donella Meadows (Chelsea Green Publishing, 2008).
6. Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone by Satya Nadella, Greg Shaw, and Jill Tracie Nichols (HarperCollins Publishers, 2018).
7. The End of the Nation State: The Rise of Regional Economies by Kenichi Ohmae (HarperCollins Publishers, 1995).
8. Dynamic Administration by Mary Parker Follett (Pitman Publishing and later Routledge, 1941).
9. Good Strategy, Bad Strategy by Richard Rumelt (Profile Books, 2011).
10. The New Long Life: A Framework for Flourishing in a Changing World by Andrew J Scott and Lynda Gratton (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2020).