About reading I figured I’d put my one answer in a single reply.
I’ve always been a book worm since I was a kid. There were many arguments with my parents around books & reading (which books I’m allowed to have, book I wanted was too expensive, reading in the back room instead of socializing when my parents were hosting a party, reading late into the night and not sleeping enough etc). To me, reading is how I live multiple lives instead of just one.
I read for fun and without prejudice against any particular genres. But the book must be interesting enough for me to finish. I probably start 80 books a year but only finish 50. There are books I can’t get through and I just leave them unfinished because life is too short to be a completist about something I am not enjoying.
Here is a tip for those who want to read more books but feel stuck when they picked a book that they don’t enjoy because people tell them they should or must read this book or that. Give yourself permission to not finish a book you are not enjoying and excited to pick back up.
The other trick is to always have the next few books you want to read lined up. I am always getting recommendations from people or podcasts and saving them in my Kindle by using the send free sample feature from Amazon. It’s not unusual for me to be reading 3 books in parallel because each day you have a different mood and different books suit different moods. I also re-read books I’ve read previously when I need something comforting.
I think the reason I can read hundreds of books over the years is because I don’t treat it as a chore or a checklist to get through. I read what I enjoy and find interesting and want to learn about. Make reading fun and the habit will stick with you for life. This is how I am introducing reading to my kids too.
As for when I find the time, I read in bed every night before going to sleep. It can range from 15 mins to an hour to sometimes a couple hours. I am also an occasional insomniac and there are nights I read almost all night. Don’t recommend that approach but if you read 20 mins a night every single night, you can finish probably 2 books a month on average. But make it a fun habit instead of something you ought to do.
Book Recommendations for entrepreneurs:
Influence by Cialdini (everything we do is selling or convincing or persuading)
Checklist Manifesto by Gawande (this is required reading for operations side of our team)
Nudge (so many things that you can apply to ranging from marketing copy, product design, customer communication to team processes)
Farsighted : how we make decisions that matter
Getting Past No and Getting to Yes (the classics for negotiations)
These are the ones I would recommend. There are many okay books for particular topics I want to learn or grow. But these are the ones I would recommend for any founder.
You might notice a trend in that I tend to favor research based non-fiction over biographical business books. I can count biographical business books that I have read in two hands despite having read tons of non-fiction. I’m not sure why that is.
If anyone wants fun books to read, I have tons of recommendation for fantasy, sci fi and literary fiction. The genre I particularly enjoy is historical multigenerational epic sagas.
As is evident in how often ‘inspiring’ shows up in the founder questions above, there’s so much to learn from your unique and spirited journey. 