Upgrade your PM skills with top-selling authors
Founding a startup demands a diversified skill set and lots of experience. If you do not have hands-on experience, it is okay. Successful entrepreneurs, top managers, and business coaches share their stories in the best project management books — and you can learn a lot from them.
12. The $100 Startup by Chris Guillebeau
Ideas worth a million bucks are everywhere, you just need to discover them. Chris Guillebeau debunks the myth that one needs special education or huge investments to make their own startup.
Even if you have already found your startup idea, it won’t hurt to read this book. Guillebeau breaks down the 50 most interesting business cases and describes how the creators of these businesses got off the ground step by step. This book will be especially useful when you need inspiration or wise advice from someone who has seen it all.
11. Hooked by Nir Eyal
Every startup founder needs to be good at evaluating ideas: what is going to stick around and what is not. Hooked offers an unusual method – the Hook Model. This is a four-step process aimed at developing an engaging product that keeps customers happy. These are the products that everyone wants to buy.
Eyal has a lot of experience working with customers since he has founded and sold a couple of his own companies. By studying consumer psychology and consumer product design, he has created a solid system that you are welcome to exploit to become more successful. As they say, the expert in anything was once a beginner.
10. Zero to One by Peter Thiel
Zero to One is a manual on how to build a successful company from Peter Thiel, one of PayPal’s co-founders and one of the first Facebook investors. PayPal was a pioneering digital payment system, and it is especially interesting to read its story: how the project evolved from an idea to a functional web platform.
Peter Thiel believes any business can be successful as long as it is innovative — only fresh ideas can rule the world. In his opinion, every new project goes from 0 to 1. Instead of copying what already exists, startups need to present something innovative that will get them to 1.
9. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey
Stephen R. Covey has experience running a business while giving lectures, and paying attention to family life at the same time. He wrote one of the best project management books that describes how certain skills and qualities can help you manage multiple things at once.
The book is based on a philosophy of 7 vital skills. If you want to achieve complete harmony in life, while achieving outstanding success in the professional field, this book comes in handy.
8. Good to Great by James C. Collins
Good to Great is a collection of amazing success stories. This book dives deeper into the details and uncovers the mechanics that made these companies so successful. You will learn the techniques that you can use to improve your performance and build a competitive company.
7. Making Things Happen: Mastering Project Management by Scott Berkun
Back in 2003, Scott Berkun was a Microsoft engineer and UI evangelist. He used to be a program manager for Internet Explorer and some other projects for Windows, so he has lots of on-hand experience managing large technological projects. Now, he is a world-renowned speaker and author who shares his project management experience.
If you don’t know anything about project management and want to learn a couple of new tricks, this book is for you. The book focuses more on general strategies rather than particular techniques. It will teach you how to make good decisions, develop leadership, and build trust. The author’s sincere tone makes this book very engaging.
6. Decide by Steve McClatchy
The ability to make the right decision today can be considered a superpower. Especially so, when it’s about starting your own business. If you want to learn from a recognized coach who helps companies from Fortune 1000 to act smart every day, read this book.
Steve McClatchy created an eye-opening read that will teach you how to deal with the stresses of a startupper’s life and create a new routine that will move your business a step closer to success every day.
5. The Startup Owner’s Manual by Steve Blank, Bob Village
This book is one of the best project management books on how to build a profitable startup. If you are a fan of crystal-clear explanations and visualizations, you will definitely enjoy this book.
The author shares some of the methods that are now adopted by top startup accelerators all around the world. You can apply the game-winning techniques from the book to avoid common mistakes and learn how to “get, grow, and keep customers.”
4. “Radical Candor: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity” by Kim Scott
Successful startups are led by successful leaders. As the author of the book suggests, bad bosses are one of the main sources of unhappiness in our world and problems in the workplace.
Kim Scott knows what it means to be a good boss. In Radical Candor, he pays a lot of attention to how to encourage and motivate the employee to pursue success. Moreover, you will be able to assess your own management style, assess your emotional intelligence, and find outstanding project management tips.
3. Superbosses: How Exceptional Leaders Master the Flow of Talent by Sydney Finkelstein
Superbosses are people who know how to form a team and manage it successfully. They also know how to organize the processes in a company, so that they are transparent and logical. Superbosses shares inspiring accounts of the best managers in various industries such as IT, sports, and fashion.
Сreating master-apprentice relationships, relying on the cohort effect, and saying goodbye on good terms even when people do not fit your standards — these skills are not easy to master. But the book will provide you with exercises and techniques that you can apply to become better at these things.
2. The Ideal Executive by Ichak Kalderon Adizes
Itzhak Adizes’s book is basically a real-life conversation with an experienced CEO. If you are looking for an inspiring and insightful book, The Ideal Executive is your choice.
This book shares one important idea: no one is perfect at everything. What you can do is polish your skills and invest in your personal development. It is quite possible to be a leader in one or two areas, and you can strive for this perfection.
1. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries
The main idea of The Lean Startup is to express a new approach to entrepreneurship. This includes lean manufacturing, customer development, and flexible software development processes. The core values of a lean startup are a science-oriented approach and the welcoming of customer feedback.
The book provides everything you need to build an effective and scalable business. Lean methodology can be adopted by any company, not necessarily a software developer. This methodology offers clear standards and enables anyone to build a prospering business. Having a logical plan in mind and sticking to it, you are more likely to arrive where you want to be than by relying on intuition and emotions.
Conclusion
If you are still polishing your business ideas, elaborating financial strategies, and learning about HR management — benefit from the expert’s experience!
Following the best practices delivered by business leaders with experience, you avoid common bottlenecks and save yourself from many disappointments. Hopefully, by keeping an eye on proven startup development strategies, you will be able to organize work in your team to achieve success.
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