The 15 best-selling business books of the year

Flash Boys by Michael Lewis is about a small group of Wall Street guys who figure out that the U.S. stock market has been rigged for the benefit of insiders and that, post–financial crisis, the markets have become not more free but less, and more controlled by the big Wall Street banks. Working at different firms, they come to this realization separately; but after they discover one another, the flash boys band together and set out to reform the financial markets. This they do by creating an exchange in which high-frequency trading — source of the most intractable problems — will have no advantage whatsoever.

Published by: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.

In his latest book picking up from where his last personal finance book left off, entrepreneur Kevin O'Leary presents another fifty common money mistakes. He provides all the tools you need to avoid making them and to keep more of your hard-earned cash in your bank account.

Published by: Doubleday Canada

What are the grand dynamics that drive the accumulation and distribution of capital? Questions about the long-term evolution of inequality, the concentration of wealth, and the prospects for economic growth lie at the heart of political economy. But satisfactory answers have been hard to find for lack of adequate data and clear guiding theories. In Capital in the Twenty-First Century, Thomas Piketty analyzes a unique collection of data from twenty countries, ranging as far back as the eighteenth century, to uncover key economic and social patterns.

Published by: Harvard University Press

In 2007, building on the initial assessment and language from StrengthsFinder 1.0, Tom Rath and Gallup scientists released a new edition of the assessment, program, and website, dubbed StrengthsFinder 2.0. Rooted in more than 40 years of research, this assessment has helped millions discover and develop their natural talents.

Published by: Gallup Press

The creators of the Freakonomics phenomenon Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner turn your brain inside-out with Think Like a Freak. Levitt and Dubner analyze the decisions we make, the plans we create and the morals we choose, and they show how their insights can be applied to daily life to make smarter, harder and better decisions.

Published by: HarperCollins Publishers Limited

In the sequel, David Chilton dispenses with the device of characters, representing his advice this time in his own voice. The book is divided into 54 short chapters, dispensing advice on miscellaneous topics in savings and investments, with a particular focus on avoiding reckless spending behaviour.

Published by: Financial Awareness Corporation

Filled with brazen wake-up calls (“You are not a special snowflake”), cunning and frank observations (“Failure is your invention”), and behind-the-scenes stories from Nasty Gal’s meteoric rise, #GIRLBOSS by Sophia Amoruso covers a lot of ground. It proves that being successful isn’t about how popular you were in high school or where you went to college (if you went to college). Rather, success is about trusting your instincts and following your gut, knowing which rules to follow and which to break.

Published by: Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Creativity, Inc. is a book for managers who want to lead their employees to new heights, a manual for anyone who strives for originality, and the first-ever, all-access trip into the nerve center of Pixar Animation—into the meetings, postmortems, and “Braintrust” sessions where some of the most successful films in history are made. It is, at heart, a book about how to build a creative culture—but it is also, as Pixar co-founder and president Ed Catmull writes, “an expression of the ideas that I believe make the best in us possible.”

Published by: Random House of Canada

Malcolm Gladwell's Blink reveals that great decision makers aren't those who process the most information or spend the most time deliberating, but those who have perfected the art of"thin-slicing" - filtering the very few factors that matter from an overwhelming number of variables.

Published by: Little Brown & Company

Since it was first published in 1949, Benjamin Graham's investment guide, which emphasizes loss minimization over profit maximization, has sold over a million copies and has been praised by such luminaries as Warren E. Buffett as "the best book on investing every written."

Published by: HarperCollins Publishers

In All In, Arlene Dickinson tells the truth about the dangers of believing your own hype, listening to naysayers and ignoring naysayers, too. Dickinson explains why the need for control is a double-edged sword that can get a business off the ground, then cause it to stall. She also discusses what the need for control does to a marriage and how success can test family relationships even more than failure.

Published by: HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Why are some people and organizations more innovative, more influential, and more profitable than others? Why do some command greater loyalty? In studying the leaders who've had the greatest influence in the world, Simon Sinek discovered that they all think, act, and communicate in the exact same way-and it's the complete opposite of what everyone else does. People like Martin Luther King Jr., Steve Jobs, and the Wright Brothers might have little in common, but they all started with why.

Published by: Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Through forceful storytelling and sharp insight, Freakonomics by Levitt and Dubner reminds us all that economics is, at its root, the study of incentives—how people get what they want or need, especially when other people want or need the same thing. Among the questions it answers: Which is more dangerous, a gun or a swimming pool? If drug dealers make so much money, why do they still live with their mothers? What makes a perfect parent? And, of course: What do schoolteachers and sumo wrestlers have in common? (Answer: they both cheat.)

Published by: HarperCollins Publishers Limited

The PMBOK® Guide—Fifth Edition is the preeminent global standard for project management. It provides project managers with the fundamental practices needed to achieve organizational results and excellence in the practice of project management.
Published by: Project Management Institute

In Stop Over-Thinking Your Money!, Preet Banerjee explains in five simple rules how to think about money and focus on the 20 percent of what you really need to know to confidently take charge of your money.

Published by: Penguin Group (Canada)