I am not the best poster child for reading.

Unless I find the material fascinating, it takes me months to finish a book. And I promptly forget about 80% of what I read.

However, what I am good at is identifying principles and implementing them. Once I understand the underlying argument of a text, I run with what I’ve learned and apply it immediately.

Over the years, I’ve come to see that reading is not just about learning something new or gathering data. You can do that on YouTube or by listening to podcasts. But there are additional benefits to reading. Once you access these advantages, they will greatly enhance your career.

Reading has four value-adds:

1. Multi-disciplinary exposure
2. Increased attention span
3. Improved writing ability
4. Better pattern recognition skills

Expand Your Horizon

People who read widely tend to know a little bit about a lot of things. Beyond their industry specialization, they have a body of knowledge in their toolkit that they can apply in new situations.

Such professionals always have something fresh to contribute to meetings and brainstorms.

Discipline Your Attention

When you read, please do so on a dedicated device with no notifications or social media, or use hard copies. Take notes on a paper notepad or electronic tablet. Read chapters from books and long articles from magazines.

Reading long-form material disciplines and rebuilds the attention span you may have lost from constant social media use. It focuses your intellectual energies and increases patience.

Writing down your thoughts embeds the principles you’ve learned and improves recall.

Professionals who read not only have more knowledge than their peers, but they also develop stronger intellectual muscles and a greater capacity to deal with large amounts of information.

Improve Your Writing

When you read consistently, you’ll learn new words and how to combine them with effortless poetry.

In particular, if you read business magazines and journals, you’ll learn formal writing that can be applied to report and proposal development.

Boost Your Pattern-Recognition Skills

If you’re an avid reader, you’ll soon learn that there’s nothing really new under the sun. What you’ll find are many creative applications of basic principles.

And so, you’ll become adept at spotting those principles.

You’ll see how someone has handled a challenge before without having to experience the pain personally. And you’ll become faster at solving problems—almost intuitively.

In Closing

Reading doesn’t just happen serendipitously. People make time to read. They commit to a few chapters or pages a day until it becomes a habit. Try it for a month and see what happens to your mind.

To develop a reading list, go to ChatGPT or DeepSeek and type in a prompt asking for 5 recommendations. Insert your industry, interests, weaknesses, or life stage.

Please share the prompts that worked best for you, so others can benefit.

I wish you the best.

Writing down your thoughts embeds the principles you’ve learned and improves recall.

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For more, read A Well-Rounded Personal Development Guide