Summer is a great time to catch-up on things. Between beach vacations, lazy afternoons on the porch, and slow times at work, we thought we'd make some suggestions for great reading. This three-part series features three books we highly recommend.

Here at Engenius, we go to a lot of meetings. Many are great. Some are bad. Occasionally, one may even end up being terrible. You know the ones we're talking about, where lots of things are said, nothing gets done, and nobody really remembers what happened, except that it was an hour of your life you'll never get back. Bad meetings happen, but did you know they can even cause death?

Death By Meeting gets to that point. Okay, okay, so it actually has nothing to do with death. It does get to the heart of bad and terrible meetings, what causes them, and how to do something about it.

This book is far from a summer fiction novel to read with sand between your toes, but what we appreciate most is that it's a parable. Patrick Lencioni does a fantastic job of making the story easy to read. This not only helps ensure that death is not a result from reading the book, but also ensures the principles of the book are understood and learned to prevent the same from being a result of meetings where you're at the helm.

Not only does Engenius recommend this book, we actually practice what we preach. The format Lencioni presents for his meetings is the same we use ourselves (with slight adaptation). We can't be positive, but we think it might also help with our life insurance rates.

Happy reading!