Confessions of a bibliophile - If Nothing Changes, Nothing Changes

#BookReview: The Nick Donofrio Story by Nick Donofrio with Michael DeMarco

I had a hard time putting down this book once I started. Part of it was how Nick Donofrio's story connects with immigrants like me - humble beginnings of his immigrant grandparents and parents and values of hard work and quality they instilled and how they encouraged him to follow a path that ultimately led to his incredible success and role in reinventing IBM.

The Nick Donofrio Story has laid out in practical terms how to embrace a market-centric focus, push for new ground-breaking technologies, and redefine innovation in a way that broke down decades-old siloes.

Nick Donofrio - sometimes called the "Godfather" for making things happen behind the scenes at IBM - had an illustrious 44 year career in engineering, innovation and leadership at IBM. The book chronicles through personal anecdotes and accounts by notable senior IBM leaders and industry personalities how he transformed IBM by redefining innovation and sparking worldwide collaboration leading to the company embracing a market-centric focus. I was intrigued and glued to it due to the fact that I could personally relate to many things including the “T shape” career development framework he advocated and we adopted as IBM launched the Globally Integrated Enterprise initiative. (Full disclosure - I am ex IBMer myself and loved it). Nick's penchant for promoting diversity and inclusion during his time at IBM and external industry bodies and also his support for nonprofit orgs that promote inclusion, youth empowerment and STEM education is commendable - all of which resonated with me since these values have shaped me during my formative career years as well.

All in all, this book illustrates the leadership principles Nick has lived his life at IBM and beyond and is compelling on multiple levels as he continues to be active on advisory boards post retirement. Some sample quotes I loved are below :

* Telling people to do something lasts only short time. People have to be convinced;
* Engineering is just the application of science to everyday problems
*Believe in a better tech enabled tomorrow for all if we work for it
*The law of unintended consequences has been proving itself since the dawn of human Kind

And above all "If nothing changes, nothing changes" - a deep thought instilled into Nick by his father that had a lasting impression not only on him but onto many generations of colleagues and mentees that came in touch with Nick and now a message to the world through this book.

Highly recommended read!