This is a quick list of the nine best books you can read to grow your business and improve yourself in the New Year. Not up for reading nine books in 12 months? You’re not alone, so instead pick a few of these and give them a read. Your business will thank you for it.
1. Company of One: Why Staying Small is the Next Big Thing for Business by Paul Jarvis – How and why the future of business may lie in keeping things small, not just growing for the sake of it.
2. Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers by Tim Ferriss – A compendium of advice from a who’s who of business, well, titans.
3. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t by Jim Collins – The classic of classics. If this one has escaped you up to this point, make 2022 the year you read it.
4. Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World by Cal Newport – In a nutshell, we must get back to focusing without distraction. He explains the why and the how.
5. The Lean Startup: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses by Eric Ries – Another one that’s been around for a while, but you have to read it because so much of today’s business lexicon – like MVP (minimal viable product) – came from these pages.
6. The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz – The culmination of a series of excellent blog posts, this book provides the blunt, but awesomely helpful advice of someone who knows start-ups maybe better than anyone.
7. Never Split the Difference: Negotiating As If Your Life Depended On It by Chris Voss and Tahl Raz – You’re negotiating even sometimes when you think you’re not. This is the definitive guide on the topic.
8. Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel and Blake Masters – How you feel about Peter Thiel aside, this is an undeniably insightful look at the power of innovation and disruption.
9. Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less by Greg McKeown – It’s not about getting things done at work. Instead, it’s about getting the right things done. Turns out it’s a game-changer.