You can’t expect to make more deals by just doing your best Sam Zell growl or Donald Trump hair toss. (Just kidding, that stuff’s made of steel.) Here are some outside-of-the-box books we've read that are generating huge buzz around the business community. Add them to your reading list to boost your performance at the closing table.

The Power Of Habit, Charles Duhigg

You won't improve your negotiating skills, management tactics, and relationship building without some serious self-reflection. This steeped-in-science read explains the mysteries of the habit loop (environmental cue, behavioral routine, reward), including how to drop your bad ones and pick up some winners. The hidden power of habits is they can influence group behavior and in turn, companies’ profitability. (And Duhigg’s engaging examples range from Rosa Parks to NFL locker rooms to the advent of Febreze.) The top takeaway: repetition breeds performance without thought (habit), a vital skill when selling a prospect on your property’s cash flow and long-term upside.

Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell

“It is not the brightest who succeed,” Gladwell writes. “Outliers are those who have been given opportunities... and who have the strength and presence of mind to seize them.” Most of all, making it to the top in your field requires a huge time investment (for those of you too caught up in the work/life balance movement). It’s the 10,000-Hour Rule: The Beatles shaped their sound after more than 10,000 hours of concerts played in Hamburg; Bill Gates began his 10,000-plus hours of programming at age 13; and you’ll need to pick up the phone and pound the pavement more than you think to up your closings.

Drive, Daniel Pink

Here’s a shocker. Even in real estate, people are motivated by more than money. Your prospective buyer, tentative seller, and broker on the other side of the table are also motivated by autonomy, mastery, and purpose, Daniel Pink writes. (Think Google employees’ free time for personal projects, feeling a great flow, and the sense of a higher calling.) In real estate, it might mean a seller that will take less money if they truly believe in the development’s community benefit (like affordable housing) or the buyer’s creative adaptive reuse (who wouldn’t love a warehouse-turned doggy daycare and cupcake factory?).