Decision Sprint (Part 1 of 2)

          

PIC No. 45A: Pails in Comparison (June 20, 2023)

• Title: Decision Sprint: The New Way to Innovate into the Unknown and Move from Strategy to Action (Part 1 of 2)
• Authors: Atif Rafiq
• Publisher: McGraw Hill (April 25, 2023, 304 pages)
• Management Bucket #20 of 20: The Meetings Bucket

Welcome to Issue No. 45 of PAILS IN COMPARISON, the value-added sidekick of John Pearson’s Buckets Blog. This blog features my “PICs”—shorter reviews of helpful books—with comparisons to other books in my 20 management buckets (core competencies) filing system. 

Decision Sprint: Sneak Peek (Part 1 of 2)

Read my full review at John Pearson’s Buckets Blog—but I couldn’t wait to tell you about this extraordinary book. It will revolutionize your meetings (and more). [2026 update: read the full review here.]

Atif Rafiq was the first Chief Digital Officer in the history of the Fortune 500. After serving at Amazon, he was the first Chief Digital Officer at McDonald's. Then Volvo and MGM Resorts.

How important is this book? I underlined nearly every sentence in the first four pages. I still don’t know what I will title my full review in Part 2 of 2—because I already have over a dozen memorable phrases. (Way too much good stuff!)

POP QUIZ! I’m thinking, for Part 2 of 2, I might write a 49-question Pop Quiz, with these starters:

   #1. Was your last meeting an input meeting or an output meeting?

   #2. You’ve just arrived as the CDO at McDonald’s and there “are no fewer than 25 apps for McDonald’s in the US app store.” How do you fix this?

   #3. What is the “ultimate superpower” of companies?

   #4. True or False? “In this era of leadership, we need more people and teams comfortable with tackling unknown territory rather than doing more of the past a little better.”

   #5. Why did the former president and CEO of Volvo Cars say that “Asking why with a smile five times is very efficient.”

There’s more coming next week! In the meantime, listen to Tiffani Bova’s podcast interview with Atif Rafiq on “A New Way of Decision-Making” (31 minutes). Click here. And read my review of Bova’s WSJ bestseller, The Experience Mindset.

P.S. I have a couple of surprises up my sleeve for “Part 2 of 2” of Decision Sprint. 

PAILS IN COMPARISON: Reading this book reminded me of several other must-read books in the Meetings Bucket, plus other buckets/core competencies. 

[  ] BOOK: The Experience Mindset: Changing the Way You Think About Growth, by Tiffani Bova. (Read my review.)

[  ] PODCAST: Tiffani Bova interviews Atif Rafiq on her What’s Next? podcast—about his book, Decision Sprint. Topic: “A New Way of Decision-making.”

[  ] BOOK: The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book That Will Change the Way You Do Business, by Clayton M. Christensen (Order from Amazon.)

[  ] BOOK: Fall in Love with the Problem, Not the Solution: A Handbook for Entrepreneurs, by Uri Levine (Read my review.)

[  ] BOOK: The Amazon Management System: The Ultimate Digital Business Engine That Creates Extraordinary Value for Both Customers and Shareholders, by Ram Charan and Julia Yang (Read my review.)

To order from Amazon, click on the title for Decision Sprint: The New Way to Innovate into the Unknown and Move from Strategy to Action, by Atif Rafiq. Listen on Libro (8 hours, 39 minutes). And thanks to the author for sending me a review copy.

MORE RESOURCES:

   • John Pearson’s Buckets Blog
   • Subscribe: Your Weekly Staff Meeting eNews
   • John Pearson’s book reviews on Amazon
   • Management Buckets website
   • Governance of Christ-Centered Organizations Blog

Note: This is the NEW location for John Pearson's Pails in Comparison Blog. Slowly (!), the previous 100+ blogs posted (between 2022 and 2025) will gradually populate this blogsite, along with new book reviews each month. 

© 2026 John W. Pearson. All rights reserved. New blogs for Pails in Comparison are posted every once in a while. We do not accept any form of compensation from authors or publishers for book reviews. As an Amazon Associate, we earn Amazon gift cards from qualifying purchases. As a Libro.fm Affiliate, we earn credits. By subscribing to Your Weekly Staff Meeting, you acknowledge that your information will be transferred to Mailchimp for processing.