
Why Startup Founders Should Stop Reading Business Books - davidw
http://www.softwarebyrob.com/2010/08/05/why-startup-founders-should-stop-reading-business-books/
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mildweed
No, they shouldn't choose more specific books, they should just friggin get to
work. Startups are all about hard work, not about sipping coffee and reading.

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danielharan
Hard work which apparently leaves times for reading posts linked on HN.

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eru
Maybe he already sold his company?

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keeptrying
I think the key lesson (and this is independent of the above article) is to
start emphasizing doing over reading.

Ie your day you should be a constant stream of action after which you force
yourself to read for a bit.

My dad was like this when he was working. He hardly ever read during the day.
He'd work like crazy through the day and then would catchup on reading in the
evening for about 1 hour. He was an officer in the navy and went from plowing
the fields as a kid to pay for college to a very high ranking officer.

The only "meta" principle that I observed, about him, is that he is fearless
in a very strange way. It always seems to me that he doesnt even think about
starting to do something. He just does it ...

Someday I hope I'll figure out what drives him.

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rewind
I read a lot of books. The biggest benefit I get from them is that my thoughts
on current projects will get tweaked a bit, and a few gems come to me that I
wouldn't have thought of otherwise if I was too focused on my specific
project(s) and books that relate directly to them.

I read for enjoyment, relaxation, and learning, in that order. A lot of times,
the benefit I get is similar to when you have an idea in your head then
actually talk to someone about it. It's amazing the sort of ideas that pop
into your head when you just start TALKING about what you're doing instead of
just thinking about it. Books, however high-level or fluff-filled, often have
the same effect for me.

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caustic
"For entrepreneurs, reading business books is the new television"

Could not agree more with the author. Most of these books are just waste of
time. There are few good business books, though, the ones that look at things
though skeptic's eye, the ones that disillusion you. But even those books are
probably not worth reading.

Moreover, most of these books were written by authors who have never done any
significant business in their life.

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hernan7
Except for "How to Get Rich". That one is great.

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lelele
Author? Thanks.

~~~
eposts
Felix Dennis

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benatkin
Good article. I think it would be better if he used a counter-example or two,
to make sure readers knew what he meant by "Business Books". For example,
according to Amazon, "Getting Things Done" is a business book (two of the
three categories it's in are subcategories of "Business"), but has specific
actions that could help many startup founders.

[http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Things-Done-Stress-Free-
Produc...](http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Things-Done-Stress-Free-
Productivity/dp/0142000280)

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edw519
Summary:

I read the same trendy business books "everyone" is reading.

They didn't help me.

Therefore, don't read _any_ business books.

(except mine)

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icey
Yeah... it seemed like kind of an odd article from someone who is trying to
sell a business book.

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durbin
Just because there are a lot of over-simplified, tabloid-headline creating
blogs that are trying to get to the front page of Reddit or Hacker News, it
doesn't mean I am going to tell people to stop reading all blogs. In the same
vein, there are a ton of amazing business books that entrepreneurs should be
reading in spite of the others. The Map of Inovation for example. The key to
to pick the right ones and read faster.

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pramit
A better bet is to read the distilled wisdom of all the best business books of
all time - The Success Manual - something I helped edit - is one of them.
Check it out at <http://thesuccessmanual.bighow.com>

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pramit
Another option is to read The Success Manual - which contains summaries from
100+ best business and self help books. <http://thesuccessmanual.bighow.com>

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davidw
Along those lines, I had a site called Squeezed Books that does free
summaries: <http://www.squeezedbooks.com> \- I sold it though, and it remains
to be seen how it'll end up.

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Aaronontheweb
Leadership is an Art and The Abilene Paradox are great business books - if
you've ever made mistakes managing people like I have both of these books are
very instructive on the people aspect of running a startup.

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lucasoman
... and business blogs.

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Ardit20
Very ironic that she emphasises that the business books are general and not
applicable and what you need is tailored advise, yet goes on to give very
general, and absolute advice, and also make very general comments such as "we"
are "addicted" to... blogs?

I don't even read any blogs! And I am not addicted to anything on the
internet! And my ability to process information is hardly "plummeting" and
basically you should stop just giving out opinions as a wise old man in the
age of 80 telling the great youth of what life is really like.

