Recommended Booklist

Many of these authors have spent a lifetime learning the lessons in these books the hard way. Luckily for us, their wealth of knowledge is presented in the books below. There are no excuses–get reading…and please let us know what you think should have made the list in the comments!

1. The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur by Mike Micalowicz
2. ReWork by Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson
3. Entreleadership by Dave Ramsey
4. The Facebook Effect: The Inside Story of the Company That Is Connecting the World by David Kirkpatrick
5. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries
6. The Art of Non-Conformity: Set Your Own Rules, Live the Life You Want, and Change the World by Chris Guillebeau
7. The 22 Immutable Laws of Marketing by Al Ries & Jack Trout
8. Getting Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got by Jay Abraham
9. The Parable of the Pipeline: How Anyone Can Build a Pipeline of Ongoing Residual Income in the New Economy by Burke Hedges
10. The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of the Learning Organization by Peter M. Senge
11. Start Something That Matters by Blake Mycoskie
12. Making Ideas Happen: Overcoming the Obstacles Between Vision and Reality by Scott Belsky
13. The Simplicity Survival Handbook by Bill Jensen
14. The War of Art: Winning the Inner Creative Battle by Steven Pressfield
15. I Will Teach You To Be Rich by Ramit Sethi
16. The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas Stanley & William Danko
17. Purpose: The Starting Point of Great Companies by Nikos Mourkogiannis
18. Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne
19. 7 Strategies for Wealth & Happiness by Jim Rohn
20. Midas Touch: Why Some Entrepreneurs Get Rich-And Why Most Don’t by Donald J. Trump and Robert Kiyosaki
21. Upstarts: How GenY Entrepreneurs are Rocking the World of Business and 8 Ways You Can Profit from Their Success by Donna Fenn
22. Today We Are Rich by Tim Sanders
23. Alpha Dogs: How Your Small Business Can Become a Leader of the Pack by Donna Fenn
24. Never Get a “Real” Job: How to Dump Your Boss, Build a Business and Not Go Broke by Scott Gerber
25. Smarter, Faster, Cheaper: Non-Boring, Fluff-Free Strategies for Marketing and Promoting Your Business by David Siteman Garland
26. Crush It: Why NOW Is the Time to Cash In on Your Passion by Gary Vaynerchuk
27. Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup by Brad Feld & David Cohen
28. Thank You Economy by Gary Vaynerchuk
29. Bargaining For Advantage by G. Richard Shell
30. 3-D Negotiation by David A. Lax and James K. Sebenius
31. The Intelligent Entrepreneur by Bill Murphy
32. Illusions of Entrepreneurship by Scott A. Shane
33. Barbarians at the Gate: The Fall of RJR Nabisco by Bryan Burrough and John Helyar
34. 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene and Joost Elffers
35. Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh
36. Your Money or Your Life by Joel Dominguez & Vicki Robin
37. Fail-Safe Investing by Harry Browne
38. Work the System: The Simple Mechanics of Making More and Working Less by Sam Carpenter
39. Reengineering the Corporation: A Manifesto for Business Revolution by Michael Hammer and James Champy
40. The New Rules of Marketing & PR by David Meerman Scott
41. Practical Lessons in Leadership by Art Petty
42. Green to Gold by Daniel Esty & Andrew Winston
43. Seeing What’s Next by Clayton M. Christensen
44. Founders at Work: Stories of Startups’ Early Days by Jessica Livingston
45. SPIN Selling by Neil Rackham
46. The Sales Bible by Jeffrey Gitomer
47. Hackers and Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age by Paul Graham
48. It’s Not About The Money by Brent Kessel
49. Work Less, Live More by Bob Clyatt
50. iCon: Steve Jobs: The Greatest Second Act in the History of Business by Jeffery S. Young and William L. Simon
51. The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowieki
52. Freakanomics by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner
53. Ready, Fire, Aim by Michael Masterson
54. Escape from Cubicle Nation by Pamela Slim
55. Bankable Business Plans by Edward Rogoff
56. The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison by Mike Wilson
57. Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture by David Kushner
58. Indispensable by Joe Calloway
59. Lean Thinking by James Womack and Daniel Jones
60. Bringing Nothing To The Party: True Confessions of a New Media Whore by Paul Carr
61. Organizational Culture and Leadership by Edgar H. Stein
62. How to Make more Money than Your Parents by Nick Tart and Nick Scheidies
63. 12: The Elements of Great Managing by Rodd Wagner & James Harter
64. Growing Great Employees by Erika Andersen
65. Hiring Smart by Pierre Mornell
66. Viral Loop From Facebook to Twitter, How Today’s Smartest Businesses Grow Themselves by Scott Penenberg
67. Learning from the Future by Liam Fahey & Robert Randall
68. Competitive Strategy: Techniques for Analyzing Industries and Competitors by Michael E. Porter
69. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
70. Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson
71. The Richest Man in Babylon by George Clason
72. Self-Directed Behavior by David L. Watson & Roland G. Tharp
73. Lead the Field by Earl Nightingale
74. The Art of Exceptional Living by Jim Rohn
75. Magic of Thinking BIG by David J Schwartz
76. Sources of Power: How People Make Decisions by Gary Klein
77. Smart Choices by John S. Hammond
78. The Path of Least Resistance by Robert Fritz
79. Ethics for the Real World by Ronald Howard & Clinton Korver
80. Start With Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action by Simon Sinek
81. UNmarketing by Scott Stratten
82. What Got You Here Won’t Get You There by Marshall Goldsmith
83. The New Leader’s 100-Day Action Plan by George Bradt
84. The Halo Effect by Phil Rosenzweig
85. The Perfect Pitch by Jon Steel
86. The Human Side of Enterprise by Douglas McGregor
87. Acres of Diamonds by R.H. Conwell
88. Myths of Innovation by Scott Berkun
89. The Referral Engine: Teaching Your Business to Market Itself by John Jantsch
90. The Little Big Things: 163 Ways to Pursue Excellence by Tom Peters
91. The Perfect Pitch by Jon Steel
92. The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes
93. The Art of Possibility by Benjamin Zander
94. Making Things Happen by Scott Berkun
95. Results Without Authority by Tom Kendrick
96. The Opposable Mind: How Successful Leaders Win Through Integrative Thinking by Roger Martin
97. The Principles of Scientific Management by Frederick Winslow Taylor
98. The Alchemist by Paul Coelho
99. Accounting Made Simple by Mike Piper
100. How to Read a Financial Report by John A. Tracy
101. Radical Leap by Steve Farber
102. Four Steps to the Epiphany by Steve Blank
103. The New Business Road Test by John Mullins
104. How to Make Millions with Your Ideas by Dan Kennedy
105. When You’re In A Traffic Jam I’m Playing Golf by Simon Thompson
106. Pursuit of Happiness by Chris Gardner
107. Blink: The Power of Thinking Without Thinking by Malcolm Gladwell
108. The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference by Malcolm Gladwell
109. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
110. The Human Side of Enterprise by Douglas McGregor
111. The Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgn
112. Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done By Ram Charan
113. The Knack: How Street-Smart Entrepreneurs Learn to Handle Whatever Comes Up by Norm Brodsky and Bo Burlingham
114. The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder
115. My Start-Up Life by Ben Casnocha
116. The Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith
117. The Functions of the Executive by Chester I. Barnard
118. StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath
119. The Power of Less by Leo Babauta
120. The 80/20 Principle by Richard Koch
121. Bit Literacy by Mark Hurst
122. The Power of Full Engagement by Jim Loehr & Tony Schwartz
123. Presentation Zen by Garr Reynolds
124. Show Me The Numbers by Stephen Few
125. From The Top 100 Business Books of All Time: What They Say, Why They Matter and How They Can Help You by Jack Covert and Steve Sattersten…
126. Flow by Mihaly Csikzentmihalyi
127. How to Be a Star at Work by Robert E. Kelley
128. How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie
129. The Power of Intuition by Gary Klein
130. What Should I Do with My Life? by Po Bronson
131. Chasing Daylight by Eugene O’Kelly
132. On Becoming a Leader by Warren Bennis
133. The Leadership Moment by Michael Useem
134. The Leadership Challenge by James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner
135. Leadership Is an Art by Max De Pree
136. The Radical Leap by Steve Farber
137. Control Your Destiny or Someone Else Will by Tichy and Sherman
138. Leading Change by John P. Kotter
139. Questions of Character by Joseph L. Badaracco, Jr.
140. The Story Factor by Annette Simmons
141. Never Give In! Speeches by Winston Churchill
142. In Search of Excellence by Thomas J. Peters and Robert H. Waterman, Jr.
143. The Innovator’s Dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen
144. Only the Paranoid Survive by Andrew S. Grove
145. Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance? by Louis V. Gerstner, Jr.
146. Discovering the Soul of Service by Leonard Berry
147. Execution by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan
148. Competing for the Future by Gary Hamel and C. K. Prahalad
149. Influence by Robert B. Cialdini, PhD
150. Positioning by Al Ries and Jack Trout
151. A New Brand World by Scott Bedbury with Stephen Fenichell
152. Selling the Invisible by Harry Beckwith
153. Zag by Marty Neumeier
154. Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey A. Moore
155. How to Become a Rainmaker by Jeffrey J. Fox
156. Why We Buy by Paco Underhill
157. The Experience Economy by B. Joseph Pine II and James H. Gilmore
158. Naked Economics by Charles Wheelan
159. Financial Intelligence by Karen Berman and Joe Knight
160. The Balanced Scorecard by Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton
161. Out of the Crisis by W. Edwards Deming
162. Toyota Production System by Taiichi Ohno
163. Reengineering the Corporation by Michael Hammer and James Champy
164. The Goal by Eliyahu M. Goldratt and Jeff Cox
165. The Great Game of Business by Jack Stack with Bo Burlingham
166. First, Break all the Rules by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman
167. Now, Discover Your Strengths by Buckingham and Clifton
168. The Knowing-Doing Gap by Jeffrey Pfeffer and Robert I. Sutton
169. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni
170. Six Thinking Hats by Edward De Bono
171. Titan by Ron Chernow
172. My Years with General Motors by Alfred P. Sloan, Jr.
173. The HP Way by David Packard
174. Personal History by Katharine Graham
175. Moments of Truth by Jan Carlzon
176. Sam Walton: Made in America by Sam Walton with John Huey
177. The Republic of Tea by Mel Ziegler, Patricia Ziegler, and Bill Rosenzweig
178. The Partnership Charter by David Gage
179. Growing a Business by Paul Hawken
180. Guerrilla Marketing by Jay Conrad Levinson
181. The Monk and the Riddle Randy Komisar with Kent Lineback
182. McDonald’s: Behind the Arches by John F. Love
183. American Steel by Richard Preston
184. The Force by David Dorsey
185. The Smartest Guys in the Room by Bethany McLean and Peter Elkind
186. When Genius Failed by Roger Lowenstein
187. Moneyball by Michael Lewis
188. Orbiting the Giant Hairball by Gordon MacKenzie
189. The Art of Innovation by Tom Kelley with Jonathan Littman
190. Jump Start Your Business Brain by Doug Hall
191. A Whack on the Side of the Head by Roger Von Oech
192. The Creative Habit by Twyla Tharp
193. The Age of Unreason by Charles Handy
194. Out of Control by Kevin Kelly
195. The Rise of the Creative Class by Richard Florida
196. Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman
197. Driven by Paul R. Lawrence and Nitin Nohria
198. To Engineer is Human by Henry Petroski
199. The Wisdom of Crowds by James Surowiecki
200. The First 90 Days by Michael Watkins
201. Up the Organization by Robert Townsend
202. Beyond the Core by Chris Zook
203. Little Red Book of Selling by Jeffrey Gitomer
204. What the CEO Wants You to Know by Ram Charan
205. The Team Handbook by Peter Scholtes, Brian Joiner, and Barbara Streibel
206. A Business and Its Belief by Thomas J. Watson, Jr.
207. Lucky or Smart? by Bo Peabody
208. The Lexus and the Olive Tree by Thomas L. Friedman
209. Thinkertoys by Michael Michalko
210. More Than You Know by Michael J. Mauboussin
211. Screw It, Let’s Do It by Richard Branson
212. Losing My Virginity: How I’ve Survived, Had Fun, and Made a Fortune Doing Business My Way by Richard Branson
213. Business Stripped Bare: Adventures of a Global Entrepreneur by Richard Branson
214. Tribes: We Need You to Lead Us by Seth Godin
215. We Are All Weird by Seth Godin
216. Linchpin: Are You Indispensable? by Seth Godin
217. The Dip: A Little Book That Tells Us When to Quit and When to Stick by Seth Godin
218. Unleashing the Ideavirus by Seth Godin
219. Survival is Not Enough: Zooming, Evolution and the Future of Your Company by Seth Godin
220. Small is the New Big: and 183 Other Riffs, Rants, and Remarkable Business Ideas by Seth Godin
221. Meatball Sundae: Is Your Marketing Out of Sync by Seth Godin
222. Purple Cow: Transform Your Business By Being Remarkable by Seth Godin
223. All Marketers are Liars: The Power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World by Seth Godin
224. Permission Marketing: Turning Strangers Into Friends And Friends Into Customers by Seth Godin
225. The Big Moo: Stop Trying to Be Perfect and Start Being Remarkable by Seth Godin
226. Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki
227. Rich Dad’s Guide to Investing: What the Rich Invest in that the Poor and Middle Class Do Not by Robert Kiyosaki
228. Rich Dad’s Who Took My Money?: Why Slow Investors Lose and Fast Money Wins by Robert Kiyosaki
229. Rich Woman: Take Charge of Your Money, Take Charge of Your Life by Kim Kiyosaki
230. The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It by Michael E. Geber
231. E-Myth Mastery: The Seven Essential Disciplines for Building a World Class Company by Michael E. Geber
232. Awakening the Entrepreneur Within: How Ordinary People Can Create Extraordinary Companies by Michael E. Geber
233. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Others Don’t by Jim Collins
234. Great By Choice: Uncertainty Chaos and Luck—Why Some Thrive Despite Them All by Jim Collins
235. How the Mighty Fail: and Why Some Companies Never Give In by Jim Collins
236. Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies by Jim Collins
237. Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds, and Actions by Guy Kawasaki
238. Reality Check by Guy Kawasaki
239. The Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki
240. Rules for Revolutionaries by Guy Kawasaki
241. How to Drive Your Competition Crazy by Guy Kawasaki
242. The Macintosh Way by Guy Kawasaki
243. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen
244. Ready for Anything: 52 Productivity Principles for Work and Life by David Allen
245. Making It All Work: Winning at the Game of Work and Business of Life by David Allen
246. The One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard
247. Raving Fans: A Revolutionary Approach To Customer Service by Ken Blanchard
248. Lead Like Jesus: Lessons from the Greatest Leadership Role Model of All Time by Ken Blanchard
249. The Secret: What Great Leaders Know — And Do by Ken Blanchard
250. Eat That Frog!: 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time by Brian Tracy
251. Goals!: How to Get Everything You Want — Faster Than You Ever Thought Possible by Brian Tracy
252. Maximum Achievement: Strategies and Skills That Will Unlock Your Hidden Powers to Succeed by Brian Tracy
253. The 100 Absolutely Unbreakable Laws of Business Success by Brian Tracy
254. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
255. The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness by Stephen Covey
256. Principle-Centered Leadership by Stephen Covey
257. How to Succeed With People by Stephen Covey
258. Bounce! The Path to True Confidence by Barry Moltz
259. You Need to Be a Little Crazy: The Truth About Starting and Growing Your Own Business by Barry Moltz
260. BAM! Delivering Customer Service in a Self Service World by Barry Moltz
261. Unlimited Power : The New Science Of Personal Achievement by Tony Robbins
262. Giant Steps : Author Of Awaken The Giant And Unlimited Power by Tony Robbins
263. Awaken the Giant Within : How to Take Immediate Control of Your Mental, Emotional, Physical and Financial Destiny! by Tony Robbins
264. The 5 Levels of Leadership: Proven Steps to Maximize Your Potential by John C. Maxwell
265. The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership: Follow Them and People Will Follow You by John C. Maxwell
266. How Successful People Think: Change Your Thinking, Change Your Life by John C. Maxwell
267. The 360 Degree Leader: Developing Your Influence from Anywhere in the Organization by John C. Maxwell
268. Failing Forward: Turning Mistakes into Stepping Stones for Success by John C. Maxwell
269. The Effective Executive: The Definitive Guide to Getting the Right Things Done by Peter Drucker
270. Innovation and Entrepreneurship by Peter Drucker
271. The Five Most Important Questions You Will Ever Ask About Your Organization by Peter Drucker
272. Swim with the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive by Harvey B. Mackay
273. Dig Your Well Before You’re Thirsty: The Only Networking Book You’ll Ever Need by Harvey B. Mackay
274. The Mackay MBA of Selling in the Real World by Harvey B. Mackay
275. Pushing the Envelope All the Way to the Top by Harvey B. Mackay
276. Fired Up!: How the Best of the Best Survived and Thrived After Getting the Boot by Harvey B. Mackay
277. Secrets of Closing the Sale by Zig Ziglar
278. Selling 101: What Every Successful Sales Professional Needs to Know by Zig Ziglar
279. Better Than Good: Creating a Life You Can’t Wait to Live by Zig Ziglar