Category Report
Which titles are driving leadership and workplace conversations this month, based on mentions across leading business podcasts.
Biggest mover: CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest by Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, Vikram Malhotra #1, rising 200 places.
Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons & Dragons by Ben Riggs was the top newcomer at #4. In total 39 books had their debut mentions.
The Diary Of A CEO drove the most book chatter, with 14% of this months book mentions.
Across categories in December 2025, conversation clusters around two main interests: how top leaders navigate complexity over time and how individuals stay effective and resilient in turbulent environments. CEO Excellence and A CEO for All Seasons dominate the list, reflecting strong demand for structured, phase-based guidance on C-suite decision-making, succession, and long-term impact—especially in uncertain markets. The Innovator’s Dilemma and Once You’re Lucky, Twice You’re Good show continued focus on disruption, incumbents’ blind spots, and repeatable entrepreneurial success. At the personal level, Slow Productivity, How to Winter, and The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck highlight concern with sustainable performance, mindset, and boundary-setting. Mentions of Elon Musk’s biography and The Upper Hand point to interest in hands-on leadership, persuasion, and influence tactics. The prominence of the CEO-focused titles in particular suggests executives are seeking playbooks that blend strategic rigor with durability across economic and technological cycles.
CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest
Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, Vikram Malhotra
3
mentions
A CEO for All Seasons: Mastering the Cycles of Leadership
Carolyn Dewar, Scott Keller, Vikram Malhotra, Kurt Strovink
3
mentions
The Innovator's Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail
Clayton M. Christensen
3
mentions
Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons & Dragons
Ben Riggs
2
mentions
Elon Musk
Walter Isaacson
2
mentions
Slow Productivity: The Lost Art of Accomplishment Without Burnout
Cal Newport
1
mentions
How to Winter: Harness Your Mindset to Thrive on Cold, Dark, or Difficult Days
Kari Leibowitz PhD
1
mentions
The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life
Mark Manson
1
mentions
The Upper Hand: Mastering Persuasion and Getting What You Want with the Science of Social Engineering
Dr. Abbie Maroño
1
mentions
Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and the Rise of Web 2.0
Sarah Lacy
1
mentions
CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest to #1.
Significant outlier with 2.7x as many mentions as the average book.
Slaying the Dragon: A Secret History of Dungeons & Dragons to #4.
Highest ranking new entry to the chart.
CEO Excellence: The Six Mindsets That Distinguish the Best Leaders from the Rest to #1.
Up 200 places from #201 last month.
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine to #121.
Down from #1 last month
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine to #121.
No mentions after ranking #1 last month.
No mentions after ranking #2 last month.
The shows that surfaced the most book mentions this month.
Mentions recorded per 30-day window (past 8 months)
How many of the mentions were for the top 10 books.
The entrepreneurship podcasts included in this report are curated by MavenSignal to represent the voices founders and operators trust most for playbooks, launches, and long-term strategy.
We ingest public RSS feeds, analyze each episode, extract book mentions with AI, and validate with humans. The resulting data is normalized and deduplicated, building the canonical signal for the MavenSignal platform. Every insight and ranking is drawn from that verified layer.
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