13 Must Read Books For Every Entrepreneur [Part II]

Entrepreneurs are people who predict the future, know the sky-high stakes before they make headlines and ponder over ideas of the future. They are innovators who make coherent policies and also products to achieve a far-reaching market and know how to go up the career escalator.

Previously we shared 20 must read books for entrepreneurs, this time we bring to you books written by investors, marketeers, innovators and entrepreneurs on how to overcome problems of building a startup.

1. The Startup of You: Adapt to the Future, Invest in Yourself, and Transform Your Career

Author: Reid Hoffman and Ben Casnocha

LinkedIn cofounder and chairman Reid Hoffman and author Ben Casnocha laid an excellent route for entrepreneurial hopefuls on how to succeed in the progressive startup ecosystem. “The Startup of You” explains that everyone should be in “permanent beta” mode if they want to adapt and survive in today’s business world, which means to always be starting and to forever have work in progress. Strengthening professional network, taking proactive risks, adapting to career plans are certain advices given by these entrepreneurs of Silicon Valley.

2. Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age

Author: Paul Graham

Graham here talks about the “intellectual Wild West”. He advises business owners should understand and embrace the constantly developing tech era or their startups will likely never take flight. Graham, who created the Yahoo Store, provided a collection of essays that offer a better understanding of everything from the impact of the open source movement to website design. If you are a tech savvy, you would want to read this one.

3. Entrepreneurial DNA: The Breakthrough Discovery that Aligns Your Business to Your Unique Strengths

Author: Joe Abraham

Joe Abraham, who has launched more than 20 companies has mined his own experiences for prospective entrepreneurs. He invites his audience to answer some key questions like what kind of entrepreneur are you, what are your strengths and weakness and who are the people you’re working with. By answering these questions, readers can discover how to succeed and stand apart from other entrepreneurs.

4. The Signal And The Noise

Author: Nate Silver

Silver’s powers of prediction rose to prominence after almost perfectly forecasting the outcome of the 2008 elections. The feat was repeated in 2012, after The New York Times started hosting his blog, FiveThirtyEight.com. The book holds his examination of the world of prediction and data, and why we’re so bad at understanding uncertainty. It is the “prediction paradox”: The more humility we have about our ability to make predictions, the more successful we can be in planning for the future.

5. From Resource Allocation To Strategy

Author: Joseph Bower

Bower offers a comprehensive guide drawn from thirty years of research on resource allocation, including studies from Harvard Business School, Stanford, London Business School, and INSEAD. The book tells us how organizations work, how to develop an effective corporate strategy, and how to prevent breakdowns in the system.

6. How To Win Friends And Influence People

Author: Dale Carnegie

Since its release in 1936, How to Win Friends and Influence People has sold more than 15 million copies. This one holds potential information on scaling social skills. It’s essential to understanding the fundamentals of how to get people to like you, make good conversation, and win people over to your way of thinking — in other words, what you need to succeed in business.

7. The Innovator’s Dilemma

Author: Clayton Christensen

This book talks about concept of disruptive innovation — or the idea of how new, low-end products can eventually completely take over a market (companies like Netflix). Using the lessons of successes and failures from leading companies, “The Innovator’s Dilemma” presents a set of rules for capitalizing on the phenomenon of disruptive innovation.

8. The Startup Game: Inside the Partnership between Venture Capitalists and Entrepreneurs

Author: William H. Draper III

Draper dives deep into the history of venture capital and the culture in Silicon Valley. The Startup Game is the first up-close look at how the relationship between venture capitalists and entrepreneurs is critical to enhancing the success of any economy.

9. Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative

Author: Austin Kleon

You don’t have to be a genius to be creative. You just need to be yourself. That’s the message from Austin Kleon, a business guru and artist who has some fantastic insights about creativity. The book is a short, easy, very personal read that’s packed with practical tips to help kickstart creativity.

10. Jab, Jab, Jab Right Hook

Author: Gary Vaynerchuck

This blueprint to social media marketing strategies. Gary says great marketing is telling people your story in such a way that they are compelled to buy what you are selling. This is a must read to strategies of a successful marketer.

11. Steve Jobs

Author:  Walter Isaacson

It is a tribute to the greatest innovator and the face of Apple. The biography includes exclusive interviews taken by the the best-selling author Walter Isaacson in the last three years of Job’s life. It goes without saying, can’t skip this.

12. Who moved my cheese

Author: Dr. Spencer Johnson

“Who moved my cheese” has a very interesting plot where the cheese found by the mouse and the “little people” are compared to our lives, jobs, career, relationships or anything valuable. The message is, what you are afraid of is never as bad as what you imagine. The fear that you let build up inside your mind is worse than the situation that actually exists.

13. The E-Myth Revisited

Author: Michael E. Gerber

This books revolves around the idea of two business myths – 1: the myth that most people who start small businesses are entrepreneurs 2: the fatal assumption that an individual who understands the technical work of a business can successfully run a business that does that technical work. Gerber talks about why most small business don’t work and what to do about it. It was voted #1 business book by Inc. 500 CEOs.

Tell us which one is your favourite one or any book that we might have missed out in the comments!

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