Over the past year, I heard recommendations from multiple unrelated people to read The Great CEO Within: The Tactical Guide to Company Building by Matt Mochary, Alex MacCaw, and Misha Talavera. Wow, am I happy I listened to their advice. This book is easily the best business book I've read in the past 5 years at least and top 3 in the past 10 years. The title doesn't do it justice. The title made me think it's a book just for CEOs (it's not) and that it's a book just about CEO skills and inner game (it's not). It goes way beyond both of those. For me, this book is basically a distillation of best practices from the most effective entrepreneurs and companies and most useful books of all time. It's strategic, practical, tactical, and opinionated. I loved all the examples as well as the exact scripts to use in various situations. The subtitle of the book is probably the more apt description: "The Tactical Guide to Company Building." I am so appreciative of the author's hard work to distill all these lessons and best practices into one text and to even share it freely for other entrepreneurs to learn from. This is the kind of book I know I will want to re-read multiple times and reference over the years. I've now already recommended it personally to several other founders I know. As an indication of how much I liked it, my notes on the book (below) span 33 pages (I took all the notes before I realized the author shared an early version of the entire book for free, but it's not all time wasted since my own note taking and filtering probably helped me internalize the material better). If you're working on a company, you have to read this book.
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I really enjoyed Ben's previous book, The Hard Thing About Hard Things (especially the rap intros to each chapter). I recently heard on Tim Ferriss's podcast about Ben's newly released book, What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture. Based on how much I liked the first book, I decided to read the new one. I found the stories and historical anecdotes interesting, and I also enjoyed hearing more "war stories" from Ben about his previous startups. I did enjoy this second book a little less than the first; its core messages were less impactful/applicable. The beginning and end of the book were solid, but the middle didn't seem to connect and flow as well in one cohesive narrative. As a book focused on culture, it did teach some important lessons; I just was hoping it would've been weaved together as well as the first book. In any case, it was still enjoyable and instructive. Below are some of my notes and takeaways from the book. I heard about Reboot by Jerry Colonna via Tim Ferriss's and Jason Calacanis's podcasts. It's a book by a very well known startup "coach," but it goes much deeper than that. It exposes how startups bring out many psychological issues in founders that are rooted in childhood experiences. One of its core lessons is that "better humans make better leaders," so working on oneself improves one's company. It reminded me a bit of Getting The Love You Want, which taught how couples in marriage are dealing with issues from childhood via their relationship. It also reminded me of Esther Perel's new podcast How's Work? that delves into similar issues ("therapy" for the workplace). I enjoyed the book and learning about the author's "pathless path." The book did stay at a pretty high level, and I found myself craving for a bit more tactical "advice." Regardless, it was interesting to read about the stories of other founders' struggles and how they "processed" their issues. Below are my main notes/takeaways from the book. |
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