You are what you read, and if your goal is to build a successful company, you might want to start with the following books.
- The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand
This book is recommended by self made billionaire Mark Cuban. He tells business Insider that this book is required reading for every entrepreneur. Not other book sums up the entrepreneurial passion and spirit better than The Fountainhead. The story follows his battle to practice modern architecture while opposed by an establishment centered on tradition.
- The Effective Executive by Peter Drucker
This is one of the three books that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos had his senior managers read or a series of all day book clubs. It comes with the commonplace ideas about management. The Effective Executive explores the time management and decision making habits that best equip an executive to be productive and valuable in an organization.
- The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton Christensen
It is one of the all-time most influential business books and a top pick of several other founders and VCs. In this book Clayton finally was able to diagnose why and propose solutions for large companies. Entrepreneurs should read this book to beat large companies in their own markets. It comes with great insights into the dynamics (change over time) of markets.
- Business Adventures by John Brooks
This book became Bill Gates all time favorite business book after Warren Buffett recommended it to him in 1991. Business Adventures is as much about the strengths and weaknesses of leaders in challenging circumstances as it is about the particulars of one business or another. In that sense, it is still relevant not despite its age but because of it.
- Benjamin Franklin by Walter Isaacson
Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, says this book is one of his all time favorites. Franklin was an entrepreneur. He started with just nothing. He was just a runaway kid. This book is recommended to all entrepreneurs because it provides encouragement for new startups of business.
Think and Grow Rich was written in 1973 by Napoleon Hill. Think and Grow Rich was considered as personal development and self improvement book. Hill writes in his book that he was inspired by a suggestion from business magnate and later philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. The book title and much of the text in the book concerns with increasing in income, the author insists that the philosophy taught in the book that can help people to success in any line of work, to do and be anything they can imagine.
It was first released as a limited edition of 118 copies and was given to many of Americas most successful individuals. The law of success is an edited version of Napoleon Hill’s first manuscripts which was reworked under advisement of some the contributors and was first published in 1928. The version of this book was initially published as a multi-volume correspondence course. The lesson 1 of his book teaches you how to save the wasted effort which the majority of people extend in trying to find their life work. In short this book comes up with different lessons i.e. lesson one is a definite purpose, self confidence, initiative and leadership, imagination, action, enthusiasm, self control, habit of performing more service than paid for, attractive personality, accurate thought, concentration, tolerance, failure, cooperation, habit of saving, the golden rule.
The lean startup shows how today’s entrepreneurs use continuous innovation to create radically successful businesses. In this book he described lean startup strategy for startup companies. Ries developed the idea for the lean startup from his experience as a startup advisor, employee and founder. The lean startup provides a scientific approach to creating and managing startups and gets a desired product to customer’s hands faster. The method of lean startup teaches you how to drive a startup, how to steer, when to turn and when to preserve and grow a business with maximum acceleration.
The 100$ startup was wrote by Chris Guillebeau, who is an American nonfiction author, blogger and speaker. This book is great not because it paints a romantic picture about how easy building a startup from your home can be, but because it opened my mind to all the possibilities that are out there. This book help the reader to think that we all live in a completely different economy, where time put in doesn’t necessarily translate into money. The book detailed step by step methods of the things that you could be doing for your startup. Because of most books about business are too generic. They are filled with platitudes instead of data and real instructions.
- Conscious Capitalism by John Mackey and Raj Sisodia
Kip Tindell, cofounder and CEO of The Container Store, tells Business Insider that this is a must read for entrepreneurs and business leaders. Tindell is close friends with John Mackey, cofounder and co-CEO of whole foods Market, and says that they both believe in Conscious Capitalism that a win-win is what’s most profitable and that no one has to lose. Business schools have discovered it, studied it and found that companies that practice it are more successful.