I'm currently in the middle of my second start-up, ShapeStart Measurement Systems. My first start-up, 3DScanCo, ended in a successful exit. I've learned a few things along the way, mainly by listening to other successful entrepreneurs but also by reading. I've put together a list of books I found useful (in no particular order). I also provide a quick summary, mostly for me to remember the key points of the book but you might find the summaries useful as well.
- Getting Things Done Compartmentalize tasks so that you're not always worried about them. As the author puts it, keep the open loops in your life to a minimum.
- Eat People An inspirational book for entrepreneurs, would you get ride of ATMs so that more bank tellers could keep their jobs?
- Tuned In Your opinion, although interesting, is irrelevant. Get out and talk to people. Figure out what product or service, you are uniquely capable of delivering, that people want to pay for.
- Business Model Generation A pragmatic guide for quickly iterating business models. Applies a concept we call Go Deep Quick at ShapeStart to building a business plan. This replaces the traditional business plan which often concluded with a static (dusty) document stored somewhere on a server or in a file cabinet.
- Death by Meeting
- Overcoming the Five Temptations of a CEO
- Silos, Politics, and Turf Wars
- Who
- The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
- The E-Myth Revisited
- 7 Habits of Highly Effective People