Since working for myself the past two and a half years, experience and mentors have been my primary teachers but books have always played a strong role as well. I’m extremely visual, and tend to learn best that way. Reading pulls me into the author’s world. I internalize the stories as I read and for a while after, letting the words sit in my head and decide how I’ll apply them to my own life. I often juggle multiple books at a time depending on the time of day and whether I’m looking to learn, be inspired, or simply quiet my mind. It’s usually a combo of stoic philosophy, nonfiction, and fiction.
After reading hundreds of nonfiction books, I’ve noticed they’ve played a specific role. They’ve helped me see people. I was reading through my Kindle notes and highlights to write book summaries to post here, and decided that that alone was an interesting realization to share here.
My favorite nonfiction is biographies of entrepreneurs. Stories of building from scratch something that impacts millions. I look for ones that get into the gritty details of those early stages, before everyone knew them, before their name became tied with success. All the ups, downs, failures, lessons, milestones. Ones that shine a blinding light on the tangled reality that being an entrepreneur is. A reality that often hides under the surface of Techcrunch success stories and IPO press releases.
Mostly, I love learning about the people. What was their upbringing like, how’d they behave in school, what sort of friendships do they have, are they close to their family, what’s their temperament, how do they think, what do they care about, etc.
This applies outside of reading too, I’m fascinated in studying the nuances in humans. The unique personalities, values, thoughts, behaviors, the stories of where they began to where they are now, and drawing lines to how their beginning might’ve directed and shaped their now. Biographies just give me access into the minds of humans I’ll never meet. Like Andy Grove or Leonardo Da Vinci.
I look for the common threads. The characteristics or behaviors that seem to be repeatedly tied to the successful ending that led to warranting a biography about them.
This does two things. It helps me discover proven tactics that I can apply in my own life and it sharpens my radar towards peak performers. It’s crafted an understanding of what it takes to be successful and an intuition into the kind of people more likely to do so.
It’s why I started angel investing and why I want to work in venture capital. I’m good at seeing people. I love putting this intuition into practice, finding the gems before others do. Seeing past the business conversations and powerpoint decks and into the humans behind them. It’s a skill I use to pick clients, mentors, hires, and ultimately will use to pick founders and teams to fund.
My Kindle is probably 60% these books. Some of my favs:
Everything by Walter Isaacson especially his Da Vinci, Steve Jobs, and Ben Franklin bios
Shoe Dog (Nike)
What it Takes by Steven Schwartzman (Blackstone)
Principles by Ray Dalio (Bridgewater)
Bold by Peter Diamandis
Building on Bedrock by Derek Lidow
The Everything Store (Amazon)
Elon Musk by Ashlee Vance
Delivering Happiness (Zappos)
Made in America by Sam Walton (Walmart)
Creativity Inc. (Pixar)
Who is Michael Ovitz (CAA)
Blitzscaling by Reid Hoffman (Paypal, LinkedIn)
Good to Great by Jim Collison
The Hard thing about Hard things by Ben Horowitz
Titan (Rockefeller)
The Wizard of Menlo Park (Walt disney)
How to Get Rich by Felix Dennis
Little Black Stretchy Pants (LuluLemon)
I’m working on compiling these common threads I’ve found and tested, which I’ll later post here.