Reading List
Tell us your business model, industry and stage, or how you invest, and get the books worth your time, picked from 30,000 on building and backing companies. Chosen by ratings and what they are about.
Atomic HabitsJames Clear · 4.31★
FreakonomicsSteven D. Levitt · 4.01★
The Tipping PointMalcolm Gladwell · 4.01★
Rich Dad Poor DadRobert T. Kiyosaki · 4.08★
BlinkMalcolm Gladwell · 3.96★
Thinking, Fast and SlowDaniel Kahneman · 4.16★
The Art of WarSun Tzu · 3.94★The best matches for everything you told us, ranked.
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
Stephen R. Covey · 1989
4.16843,480 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
In The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, author Stephen R. Covey presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centered approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step…

The Ultimate Sales Machine
Turbocharge Your Business with Relentless Focus on 12 Key Strategies
Chet Holmes · 2007
3.979,181 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceFirst salesCompany building
Chet Holmes has been called “one of the top 20 change experts in the country.” He helps his clients blow away both the competition and their own expectations. And his advice starts with one simple concept: focus! Instead of trying to master four thousand…

80/20 Sales and Marketing
The Definitive Guide to Working Less and Making More
Perry Marshall · 2013
4.191,904 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceFirst salesMarketing and growth
Stop "Just Getting By" ... Master The 80/20 Principle And Make More Money Without More Work. When you know how to walk into any situation and see the 80/20's, you can solve almost ANY marketing problem. 80/20 can demolish any sales and advertising problem.…

The Power of Consistency
Prosperity Mindset Training for Sales and Business Professionals
Weldon Long · 2013
4.25644 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceFirst salesCompany building
How to achieve wealth, happiness, and peace of mind through personal responsibility The Power of Consistency is based on the fundamental premise that private declarations dictate future actions. In other words, we tend to take actions with the thoughts and…
The Wealth Money Can't Buy
The 8 Hidden Habits to Live Your Richest Life
Robin Sharma · 2024
4.206,440 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
A groundbreaking book redefining success to show readers how they can create truly abundant and fulfilling lives by following Sharma’s model of the eight forms of wealth, growth, wellness, family, craft, money, community, adventure, and service, from the #1…

Hyperfocus
How to Be More Productive in a World of Distraction
Chris Bailey · 2018
3.8711,667 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
Canada's productivity expert returns with a totally fresh angle on how to do more with less. Throughout his experiments and research, Chris Bailey came across many little-known insights into how we focus (a key element of productivity), including the…

Millionaire Success Habits
The Gateway To Wealth & Prosperity
Dean Graziosi · 2016
4.063,061 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
Millionaire Success Habits is a book designed with one purpose in mind: to take you from where you are in life to where you want to be in life by incorporating easy-to-implement "Success Habits" into your daily routine. Legendary business coach Dean Graziosi…

Business Made Simple
60 Days to Master Leadership, Sales, Marketing, Execution, Management, Personal Productivity and More
Donald Miller · 2021
4.192,054 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceFirst salesMarketing and growth
Is this blue book more valuable than a business degree? Most people enter their professional careers not understanding how to grow a business. At times, this makes them feel lost, or worse, like a fraud pretending to know what they're doing. It's hard to be…
The books most about focus and resilience.

The Power of Habit
Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business
Charles Duhigg · 2012
4.13576,931 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
In "The Power of Habit", award-winning "New York Times" business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. With penetrating intelligence and an ability to…

The PARA Method
Simplify, Organize, and Master Your Digital Life
Tiago Forte · 2023
4.073,216 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
This accessible guide expands upon the “well-written, cogent, and useful” (David Allen, author of Getting Things Done) bestselling Building a Second Brain with actionable advice on how to improve your digital life in just a few minutes.Living a modern life…

Rich AF
The Winning Money Mindset That Will Change Your Life
Vivian Tu · 2023
4.0610,220 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
When Vivian Tu started working on Wall Street fresh from undergrad, all she knew was that she was making more money than she had ever seen in her life. But it wasn’t until she found a mentor of her own on the trading floor that she began to understand what…

Drive
The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us
Daniel H. Pink · 2009
3.95127,465 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
The New York Times bestseller that gives readers a paradigm-shattering new way to think about motivation Most people believe that the best way to motivate is with rewards like money, the carrot-and-stick approach. That's a mistake, says Daniel H. Pink…

Million Dollar Habits
Proven Power Practices to Double and Triple Your Income
Brian Tracy · 1999
4.003,669 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilience
A guide to winning habits in business shows readers how to set and achieve goals quickly, organize their life, manage time, increase income, and tap inner power reserves--all in the service of improved productivity.
Published in the last three years, newest first, for what you told us.

Simple Marketing For Smart People
The One Question You Need to Win Customers without Gimmicks, Hype, or Hard Selling
Billy Broas · 2024
4.35305 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceMarketing and growthFirst sales
Why do so many smart people struggle with marketing? The answer is smart people love complexity, and complexity brews problems. Does your marketing feel like it has way too many moving parts? If so, Simple Marketing for Smart People is the solution you’ve…

Intentional
How to Finish What You Start
Chris Bailey · 2026
3.86368 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
From author of Hyperfocus and productivity expert Chris Bailey, a new approach to finishing what you start.Most of us have no problem setting goals. We know what we want, and we have a pretty good sense of what it takes to get it. But consistently making…

Lean Marketing
More Leads. More Profit. Less Marketing.
Allan Dib · 2024
4.31452 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceMarketing and growthCompany building
Bigger Results with Less Marketing You keep being told to do more marketing―more complex, more aggressive, and more expensive marketing. Chasing the latest bright, shiny object is exhausting. Increased efforts keep leading to disappointment. The overwhelm…

The First-Time Manager
Sales
Mike Weinberg · 2023
4.43282 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceFirst salesCompany building
The First Time Manager Series has sold over 500,000 copies and is a go-to guide for new and aspiring sales managers on what to expect and how to succeed. The jump from sales superstar to sales manager has made or broken many a sales career. As a…

Reset
How to Change What's Not Working
Dan Heath · 2025
4.123,193 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Made to Stick, Switch, and The Power of Moments comes a revolutionary guide to fixing what’s not working, in systems and processes, organizations and companies, and even in our daily lives, by identifying…

Buy Back Your Time
Get Unstuck, Reclaim Your Freedom, and Build Your Empire
Dan Martell · 2023
4.365,076 ratings · Goodreads
Focus and resilienceCompany building
Wall Street Journal Bestseller Learn to conquer the one real hurdle to scaling your company and growing Time How you use your free time will make or break your success. The secret? It’s not about working harder or finding more time to do work. It’s about…
How companies like yours were actually built, from the people who built them.

The Ride of a Lifetime
Lessons Learned from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company
Robert Iger · 2019
4.4099,495 ratings · Goodreads
Founder storiesCompany building
A grand vision defined: The CEO of The Walt Disney Company shares the ideas and values he has used to reinvent one of the most beloved companies in the world, and inspire the people who bring the magic to life. In 2005, Robert Iger became CEO of The Walt…
Heartland
A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth
Sarah Smarsh · 2018
3.7616,921 ratings · Goodreads
Founder stories
During Sarah Smarsh’s turbulent childhood in Kansas in the 1980s and 1990s, the forces of cyclical poverty and the country’s changing economic policies solidified her family’s place among the working poor. By telling the story of her life and the lives of the…
Shoe Dog
A Memoir by the Creator of Nike
Phil Knight · 2016
4.45389,310 ratings · Goodreads
Founder storiesCompany building
In this candid and riveting memoir, for the first time ever, Nike founder and CEO Phil Knight shares the inside story of the company’s early days as an intrepid start-up and its evolution into one of the world’s most iconic, game-changing, and profitable…
Steve Jobs
Walter Isaacson · 2011
4.161,391,990 ratings · Goodreads
Founder storiesCompany building
Walter Isaacson's worldwide bestselling biography of Apple cofounder Steve Jobs. Based on more than forty interviews with Steve Jobs conducted over two years--as well as interviews with more than 100 family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and…

Bitter Brew
The Rise and Fall of Anheuser-Busch and America's Kings of Beer
William Knoedelseder · 2012
4.056,011 ratings · Goodreads
Founder storiesCompany building
“Bitter Brew deftly chronicles the contentious succession of kings in a uniquely American dynasty. You’ll never crack open a six again without thinking of this book.”, John Sayles, Director of Eight Men Out and author of A Moment in the Sun The creators of…

Never Finished
Unshackle Your Mind and Win the War Within
David Goggins · 2022
4.3850,509 ratings · Goodreads
Founder stories
This is not a self-help book. It's a wake-up call! Can't Hurt Me, David Goggins' smash hit memoir, demonstrated how much untapped ability we all have but was merely an introduction to the power of the mind. In Never Finished, Goggins takes you inside his…
What founders at seed keep coming back to, if you have not read them yet.

Crossing the Chasm
Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers
Geoffrey A. Moore · 2002
4.0332,109 ratings · Goodreads
Marketing and growthCompany buildingFirst sales
Here is the bestselling guide that created a new game plan for marketing in high-tech industries. Crossing the Chasm has become the bible for bringing cutting-edge products to progressively larger markets. This edition provides new insights into the realities…

Inspired
How to Create Tech Products Customers Love
Marty Cagan · 2008
4.2226,350 ratings · Goodreads
Company buildingFinding product-market fit
Learn to design, build, and scale products consumers can't get enough of How do today's most successful tech companies–Amazon, Google, Facebook, Netflix, Tesla–design, develop, and deploy the products that have earned the love of literally billions of…

The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing
Violate Them at Your Own Risk
Al Ries · 1993
4.0522,738 ratings · Goodreads
Marketing and growthCompany building
There are laws of nature, so why shouldn't there be laws of marketing? As Al Ries and Jack Trout, the world-renowned marketing consultants and bestselling authors of Positioning, note, you can build an impressive airplane, but it will never leave the ground if…
Lok Vyavhar
Diamond Books · 1936
4.221,157,905 ratings · Goodreads
Company building
This is the translation of famous - HOW TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE - a classic book that gave birth to the self-help industry. Through this book, Dale Carnegie offers practical and proven advice on how to deal with people and understand them in order…
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