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Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

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Re: Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

#111

Here are some suggestions on the more creative and less tactical spectrum. How To Get Rich: Felix Dennis Don’t be fooled by the title. A lifetime of insights and experience from a pioneering publishing magnate condensed into a light enjoyable read. Creativity Inc by Ed Catmull goes into great detail about the early days of Pixar. So many actionable lessons about entrepreneurship and operating a creative organization.…

The concept of Resistance put forward by Pressfield in the book The War of Art is very profound and practical. I have this book summary hanging on my wall. Gets me up every time I feel like not wanting to do the grunt work.

Re: Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

#112
I like books that are actionable. Lots of books are inspirational but not that useful (e.g. crossing the chasm). I run a curriculum in my company which uses a few books I have read over the years.

emyth revisited (how to think about and structure an org)

getting to yes (negotiation)

influence the psychology of persuasion (negotiation)

spin selling (enterprise sales, supplanted by sandler)

You cant teach a kid to ride a bike at a seminar (sandler sales)

5 dysfunctions of a team (one of the best leadership books)

first break all the rules (management)

accounting for dummies

purple cow (differentiation)

blue ocean strategy (differentiation)

traction (strategy/operations)

rocketfuel (strategy/operations)

for professional services:

managing the professional services firm

getting naked

Re: Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

#113

Most posts offer the obvious suggestions (The Mom Test, High Growth Handbook, The Personal MBA, The Power Law, Hard Thing about Hard Thing, Will It Fly, etc), so I'll focus on some non-obvious suggestions. For tactical advice, I find talks/podcasts and mastermind groups more useful than books. My favorite podcast (by far) is Rob Walling's Startups for the Rest of Us, which is oriented towards building a capital-effic…

Thanks for the list! Your last phrase hits home. At the moment, one of the things I'm very focused on is understanding why do I want to become an entrepreneur in the first place.

Good luck on your journey!

Re: Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

#115
I am not an entrepreneur (yet) but I still want to share a few titles with you:

- "Maverick or The seven day weekend" by Ricardo Semler

- "Rework" by Jason Fried and David Hansson

- "Startup - an insider's guide to launching and running a business" by Kevin Ready

- "Bookkeeping and Cost Accounting for Factories" by William Kent (1918)

- "Practice what you preach" by David Maister

- "Don't oil the squeaky wheel" by Wolf Rinke

- "Selling The Wheel: Choosing The Best Way To Sell For You Your Company Your Customers" by Jeff Cox

- "The power of stupidity" by Giancarlo Livraghi

- "How to write a good advertisement" by Victor Schwab

- "How to Make Money Out of Thin Air" by Brian Sher

- "Good manners and business etiquette. Illustrated Guide" by Elena Ber

- "Don't just roll the dice: A usefully short guide to software pricing" by Neil Davidson

- "Message to Garcia" by Elbert Hubbard

- the TopLeaf course of 36 video lectures on management by dr. Izhak Adizes can be purchased on https://vimeo.com/ondemand/topleaf or found on ru tracker (if you have access)

Re: Ask HN: What books helped you in your entrepreneurship journey?

#116
post #38
post #23

The E-Myth - creating systems and processes The Personal MBA - crash course MBA Founders At Work - understanding how different startups survived Buy Back Your Time - management and delegation The Charisma Myth - to help w/ charm for sales SPIN Selling - this + The Charisma Myth more than doubled our sales conversion rate These books were the most crucial for me

I second E-Myth and Founders at Work. And let me add Crossing the Chasm, which totally shaped my understanding of who buys what when.

I came here to make sure Crossing the Chasm was on the list.
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