Book Summaries

Published in

Batko.blog

6 min readDec 22, 2017

💭 Any questions — reach out to me on Twitter.

As part of my new thing a week, I’ve also started reading a book a week — mostly on professional development and behavioural psychology for now, but this will expand with time.

My Recommendations 👇

My Book, Blog, Movie & Newsletter Recommendations

Book, Blog, Movie & Newsletter recommendation

medium.com

Overview + link to all the book summaries

One-Liner Twitter Summary of each book — here

Biographies & Company Journeys

Outsiders — the journey of 8 unconventional CEOs and how they allocated resources
Founders at Work — the founder journeys of many founders in the late 90s and early 00's
My Life and Work — Henry Ford’s recollection of his life and building the first cars
The Ride of a Lifetime — Bob Iger’s story of becoming Disney’s CEO
Let my people go surfing — all things Patagonia an environmental driven company
Ghenghis Khan Emperor of All Men — the history of the largest empire ever
Setting the Table — Danny Meyer’s story of starting high-end restaurants and Enlightened Hospitality
The New New Thing — Jim Clark’s story about the genesis of Silicon Valley
When I stop talking, you’ll know I’m dead — Jerry Weintraub — Elvis, Sinatra, Karate Kid, Oceans 11 etc
Red Notice — William Browder’s story about business in Russia
Made in America — Sam Walton — Walmart’s story
The Wit & Wisdom of Charles Munger — Berkshire Hathaway’s story
The Upstarts — Uber & Airbnb’s stories
The Undoing Project — Birth of Behavioural Psychology — Kahneman & Tversky
Shoe Dog — Nike story
Elon Musk — what a story
Behind the Cloud — the Salesforce Story
Surely, you’re joking Mr. Feynman — Nobel prize winner’s physics story
To Pixar and Beyond — Steve Jobs / Pixar story

Professional / Personal Development — Inspirational

Power of Moments — powerful moments in life
Grit — power of passion & perseverance
Radical Candor — about Feedback and Caring
Mindset — The New Psychology of Success — Growth vs Fixed
Principles — how to think, how to behave
Linchpin — How to be indispensable? — Be your best self
A Man’s search for Meaning — your belief is everything

Professional / Personal Development — Practical

High Growth Framework — how to run a high growth startup
Atomic Habits — practical habit development
Multipliers — how to be a better manager
Playing to Win — 5 step framework for strategy
Competing Against Luck — Jobs to be Done for customers
On Writing Well — well… it is on writing
5 Dysfunctions of a Team — about creating an executive team culture
Leaders Eat Last — leadership qualities
15 Commitments for Conscious Leadership — leadership is binary
On Managing People — tips and tricks for managers
For New Managers — tips and tricks for leaders and managers
Unconventional Success — Public markets investing
Measure What Matters — OKRs and goal setting
Trillion Dollar Coach — coaching executives
Angel — all things about angel investing
The LaunchPad — the inside story of what goes in at YC
Breaking into VC — if you’re thinking about starting in VC, read this first
Creativity — how to make or keep an organisation creative — ie: Pixar
Collaboration Patterns — how to work with an inspirational team
The Most Important Thing — Mark Howards’ guide to investing
The Little Book of Value Investing — how to invest long term
Data Smart — in-depth, step by step guide of machine learning
Algorithms to Live By — real life applied statistics
Checklist Manifesto — why you should have a to-do / checklist
Mastery — how to become good
Willpower instinct — willpower is a muscle, train it!
Who moved my cheese? — deal with change
Seductive Interaction Design — how to do UX
Daily routines — so many people, so many different routines
Getting to Yes — how to persuade
The Inevitable — 12 tech trends
Tao Te Ching — chinese wisdom about how to behave
7 Habits of Highly Effective People
How to win friends and influence people

Behavioural Psychology

Skin in the Game — Asymmetries of live and importance of Skin in the Game
Psychology of Executive Coaching — all things you need to know about Exec Coaches
The Art of Clear Thinking — 99 things to watch out for
Paradox of Choice — there is just so much of it, is it even good?
Pre-suasion — behavioural psychology principles
The Power of Habit — all things about habits
Hooked — how we get hooked on products

Business / Startup Building

Innovator’s Solution — about the theory of disruption
What you do is who you are — all things culture
Blood, Sweat and Pixels — the journey of video game producers
Fanatical Prospecting — how to sell
Mastering the VC game
Who — hiring
Tribal Leadership — all things culture
Good Strategy, Bad Strategy — how to set you a great strategy
The Four Steps to Epiphany — customers, sales, marketing and company building
Founder to CEO — practical steps about how to lead a company
Crossing the Chasm — customers, customers, customers
The Secrets of Closing a Sale — lots and lots of practical sales techniques
Hackers & Painters — Paul Graham’s internet predictions from back in the day
Lean Analytics — all things data for startups for all business models
The Mythical Man Month — tough read, but insights which still hold true about development
Do More Faster — a billion startup tips in one book
Venture Deals — all things VC / investment, into the smallest dryest details
Innovator’s Dilemma — becoming big comes with its risks
Purple Cow — how to be remarkable
Zero to One — startup basics
Founder’s Mentality — how to think about your business
Invention to Innovation — Australian tech history

Fantasy / Story

Stormlight Archive — fantasy book with a rollercoaster of mental health breakdowns
Unsouled / Cradle Series — immerse fantasy world from broken to Dreadgod
Project Hail Mary — science fantasy with spaceships, aliens and humour
The Lies of Locke Lamora — con-artist in a fantasy world
The Runelords — new magic system of giving/receiving attributes
The Legends of Condor Heroes — the Chinese Lord of the Rings
A Wizard of Earthsea — the tale of a silent wizard
Wool Trilogy — a tale of human preservation by restarting in siloes
Middlegame — the intersection of alchemy and science
Snowcrash — virus, drug or religion?
Mistborn — classic fantasy trilogy of superhuman powers through burning metals
Before the Coffee Gets Cold — time travel with strict rules
Piranesi — a book about being trapped in another world but yet happy
Ready Player One — the ultimate book for VR nerds and what a VR world could look like
Circe — the story of a greek goddess
Assassin’s Blade — the prequel of the Assassin’s series
Lost Hero — greek mythology + current affairs
Half-King — getting, losing and re-conquering the throne
Legend of Drizzt — The world of Drizzt — dark elves and the Underdark
Night Angel Trilogy — Magical assassins tangled up in politics
Daughter of Smoke and Bone — Beasts, Seraphim and Magic in our world
Colour of Magic — first book of Terry Pratchett’s “hundreds” of books
The Black Prism — enter a world of colour magic
The Name of the Wind — best storytelling you’ll read today
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy — easy, entertaining read
Sword of Truth Series — my favourite fantasy book
Dune — super famous, I wasn’t a fan
Tuff — Man Booker Prize winner

Science / Philosophy

Three Body Problem — what would humans do when they find out there is other life in the universe?
Poems that make Grown Men cry — poems + cry
Ego is the Enemy — Be real.
Courage to be Disliked — how to live an earnest life
Why We Sleep — make sleep your number 1 priority!
Deep Simplicity — principles the world is built on
Anthem — you be you; a philosophical book about a utopian world
The Lessons of History — all the things we can learn from history
The Republic — heavy read about logic, politics, the state
Medicus Magnus — the science behind a head transplantation
Grand Design — in case you were wondering about the universe
1788 The Brutal history of the First Fleet — Australia’s beginning

Summaries of the books I’ve read since May-2017

MBReads

Goal: Read and summarise one book a week