My boss recently bought a couple of books that he expected my team to read.
In the past when previous bosses have done this, I've generally gained a lot out of reading the books, even if I disliked some aspects of their arguments I've been able to get a lot of insight from the arguments and evidence presented.
But this book is complete garbage. Truly first rate trash. It barely qualifies as a book. Conquer Your Rebrand, is ostensibly meant to be a business strategy guide to branding. But it is more like a long winded LinkedIn post. It's clearly an attempt by the author to fill his sales pipeline that's barely disguised as him passing on 'expertise.' It presents no compelling arguments, no evidence, is severely lacking in any sort of citations and is written like someone desperately trying to flog a timeshare at a weekend convention. I have redlined the shit out of it but I got so infuriated reading it that I can't imagine how to have a decent discussion with my boss about this book without seeming like my low opinion of this book reflects back on him (which in reality it really does.)
I think it's so much worse because I just finished two brilliant books on my own time —Jack Welsh: The Man Who Broke Capitalism and When McKinsey Comes To Town: The Hidden Influence of The World's Biggest Consulting Firm — that both present compelling arguments, detailed referencing and excellent writing.
How would you handle this?
This. Plus you can soften it with "I recently read X and Y, which taught me A and B plus a lot more, so maybe I'm just spoiled by a really high bar."
Your boss may not have fully developed their confidence in leadership yet. This is ok. We all can grow, including them. You may have an opportunity to teach your boss something here, which is also great since we should be open to learning from anyone, but avoiding any purposeful harm to their ego would be a nice gesture. Not required of course.
Definitely! Though I would say avoiding purposeful harm to their ego should be more than a nice gesture. That's just basic respect. Trying to avoid accidental harm, sure.