Great Books on AI for Business Leaders

From hands-on practical strategies to visionary predictions, 5 of the best titles on AI today 

Artificial intelligence (AI) and data are here — and every business needs to know the best practices around using them. There’s never been more of an imperative when it comes to understanding what to do, how to do it, when, and why.

These five books all look at the best ways to harness AI and data for businesses and beyond, and provide business leaders with a vision for navigating the present as well as the future. The overall message: we’re no longer contemplating the future of work: we’re in it, and those who don’t get AI and data right are going to fall behind. Here’s how to make sure you’re on the right side of the digital divide.

1. Co-Intelligence: Living and Working with AI by Ethan Mollick was a bestseller the instant it came out in April 2024. Professor Mollick (he teaches at Wharton) is a brilliant examiner and explainer of AI with an avid following; his substack One Useful Thing has some 275,000 subscribers. But he’s not just a proselytizer: as he notes in his book, it’s a mistake to lose our identity and point of view to AI.

   It’s risky to defer to its decision making without making sure the results benefit humanity. Instead, Mollick advocates for learning everything we can about using AI so we’re not passive recipients, but active partners. There’s incredible value in AI for business, as well as for education, he notes if we know how to think and work with smart machines. One bonus to this book are all the real-life use cases and anecdotes, which make it easy to imagine the immense new potential for collaboration. Another bonus — knowing how quickly this technology is evolving, Mollick points towards the future, making compelling productions about what happens next. A book to keep on hand as we navigate this transformation.

2. Analytics the Right Way: A Business Leader’s Guide to Putting Data to Productive Use by Joe Sutherland and Tim Wilson is another book with 20/20 vision as well as essential best practices. The authors clarify what businesses so often get wrong about using data and AI — and how to get it right. Sutherland and his co-author are seasoned experts and practitioners with a knack for explaining the complexities of these innovations with a kind of edgy simplicity. They’re great representatives of the intelligence that actually went into AI — and it’s clear they want their readers to gain enough wisdom and perspective to understand why the best intentions around harnessing innovations like machine learning and predictive analytics can go so south, so fast.

   This book is packed with terrific and relatable examples as well as insights that may set you back on your heels a bit. For those leaders insisting they’re going to eliminate uncertainty by sticking to data, or that gaining actionable insights doesn’t require that much advance work, the book is a wakeup call. As the authors insist, don’t give up strategy, don’t give up intention, know what you’re measuring, and pay attention. These authors have a proven track record — Sutherland is also a policy maker (in Obama’s White House) and founded Emory University’s Center for AI Learning, and his firm works with clients such as Canva and Box; Wilson’s a Fortune 500 Global consultant and has been in the field of analytics for decades. Their book is a friendly, authoritative, confidence-making, and absolutely useful guide.

3. The Worlds I See: Curiosity, Exploration, and Discovery at the Dawn of AI by Dr. Fei-Fei Li landed on Barack Obama’s list of recommended books on AI. Its author is a renowned AI scientist, Stanford professor, scholar and industry leader. She also co-directs Stanford’s Human-Centered AI Institute, and was the creator of ImageNet — which played a key role in the development of modern AI.

   In other words, Dr. Li is an essential insider when it comes to AI. She’s also got a lucid take on the relationship between humanity and AI, including the dangers and the risks  This isn’t a book against progress: on the contrary, the author knows just how profound the AI-led transformation will continue to be. But within that future there are a number of choices to be made, and we don’t want to make the wrong ones. This is a fascinating read by a brilliant mind with a remarkable story — and in its telling we’re reminded of the powers of human intellect and curiosity.

4. A Platform Mindset: Building a Culture of Collaboration by Marcus Fontoura offers an integrated vision of technology that starts at inception. If you’re a new company or an established one looking to transform its existing systems, it’s best to adopt a platform mindset. The approach integrates company systems to ensure that technology brings the most value in support and alignment with the business’ culture.

   As leaders drive for  scalability and efficiency, they need a means to avoid the silo’d, independent kind of decision-making that can mar startups and hold them back — and Fontoura makes a solid argument for this one. A platform mindset brings everyone under the same umbrella — and that offers tremendous competitive advantage over time. The author is big tech veteran and innovator (and now the CTO of fintech and software solution firm Stone). He’s certainly overseen enough transformations in his career — and it’s his in-the-trenches wisdom that makes this book a must for any company that plans to expand and scale its processes.

5. AI 2041: Ten Visions for Our Future, by Kai-Fu Lee and Chen Quifan is a great book for grasping the big picture. Lee is a pioneering and extremely successful technologist who, luckily for us, is a gifted storyteller, particularly when paired with science fiction writer Quifan. They collaborated to create a vision of the near future that is uncanny, intriguing, and unsettling: in a mere 16 years, we won’t even recognize the AI technologies we use every day.

Why is this on a list of books for businesses? This is a good read, lauded by The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times. Leaders need inspiration, and frankly, may need a break from dry practicalities as well. Further, one proven way to prepare for the future is to see it in fictional form. The authors crafted 10 short stories that are worlds in themselves. They present new realities that may feel eerily familiar — deep learning, robotics, AI — but expanded into our lives and businesses exponentially. These futures haven’t happened yet, but it’s very likely they will.

The next time you’re headed on a long flight, grab one (or many) off this list and settle in. It’s far too common to just add AI and data to our processes without truly taking the time to grasp the implications and the applications. These authors bring a tremendous scope of experience — intellectual as well as practical — and offer invaluable wisdom and strategies.

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