The National Quality Center (NQC) has compiled a list of ten books on quality improvement that are “must reads.”  These are not text books or manuals.  While some offer specific strategies, most of the books offer broad perspectives. 

1. Escape Fire: Designs for the Future of Health Care by Donald M. Berwick

2. The Checklist Manifesto: How to Get Things Right by Atul Gawande

3. Switch: How to Change Things When Change Is Hard, Chip Heath by Dan Heath

4. The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki

5. Better: A Surgeon's Notes on Performance by Atul Gawande

6. Diffusion of Innovations by Everett M. Rogers

7. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell

8. Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn

9. The Upside of Irrationality: The Unexpected Benefits of Defying Logic at Work and at Home by Dan Ariely

10. Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation by Steven Johnson