As our leaders remind us, it is increasingly important for every American to embrace greater literacy and higher standards if we are to meet the competitive challenges of the coming century. A key component of higher standards in business is, of course, exposure to age-appropriate reading material. As a public service, the Consultant Debunking Unit (CDU) has applied standard reading-level assessment formulas* used by educators to some of the most popular management texts. How does your favorite guru rate?
| Grade level | Best-selling Business Book |
|---|---|
| 10th | Now, Discover Your Strengths (Marcus Buckingham, Donald O. Clifton) |
| 10th | The Five Dysfunctions of a Team (Patrick M. Lencioni) |
| 9th | Rich Dad, Poor Dad (Robert T. Kiyosaki) |
| 8th | Fish!(Stephen C. Lundin, et al.) |
| 8th | Good to Great (James Collins, Jerry I. Porras) |
| 7th | Think and Grow Rich (Napoleon Hill) |
| 7th | Who Moved My Cheese? (Spencer Johnson, Kenneth H. Blanchard) |
| 7th | Who Moved My Cheese? For Kids (Spencer Johnson, Steve Pileggi) |
| 6th | Who Moved My Cheese? For Teens (Spencer Johnson) |
| 5th | The Automatic Millionaire (David Bach) |
| 5th | Trump: Think Like a Billionaire (Donald J. Trump, Meredith McIver) |
* Average of Dale-Chall and Flesch Reading Ease scores of representative text selections
CDUniversity
sporty (adj.) optimistic, e.g., "25% growth in the dried-milk sector seems really sporty to me."
Martin Kihn is author of House of Lies: How Management Consultants Steal Your Watch and Then Tell You the Time (Warner Books, 2005).
A version of this article appeared in the January 2005 issue of Fast Company magazine.
