Top 40 books I’ve read in 2014

“Remember, young man, experience is not the best teacher. Other people’s experience is the best teacher. By reading about the lives of great people, you can unlock the secrets to what made them great.”

Like Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, if I had one super natural talent, I might choose the ability to read faster. The impact books have made on my personal and professional development is a feeling I find difficult to put into words. Last year, I set out and completed an audacious goal of reading 100 books, and found that rather tiresome so this year I kept my numbers at a respectable but sane level of 80 books. Below is a list of the top 40 books I read out of the 80.

If you missed last year’s post, here is by former top 50: https://tianyijoezhu.com/2014/07/i-read-100-books-in-2013-and-it-changed-my-life-my-top-50-list/

Enjoy!

 

Starter Books – These are great books to get you on your path.

Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero to $100 Million in No Time Flat by Michael Masterson

Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies by Jim Collins

Make it Stick: The Science of Successful Learning by Peter C. Brown

Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck–Why Some Thrive Despite Them All by Jim Collins

Startup CEO : A Field Guide to Scaling Up Your Business, + Website by Matt Blumberg

 

Business story or biography books – Stories engage us, and through the stories of those that have come before us, we can learn a great deal.

The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers by Ben Horowitz

The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone

The Virgin Way: Everything I Know About Leadership by Richard Branson

American Icon: Alan Mulally and the Fight to Save Ford Motor Company by Bryce G. Hoffman

The Launch Pad: Inside Y Combinator, Silicon Valley’s Most Exclusive School for Startups by Randall Stross

In the Plex : How Google Thinks, Works, and Shapes Our Lives by Stephan Levy

The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success by William N. Thorndike

Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel

 

Books on product design – This is specifically focused in my field of software and hardware design, but all great books that I highly recommend!

The Design Of Everyday Things by Don Norman

Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal

Designing for Behavior Change: Applying Psychology and Behavioral Economics by Stephan Wendal

Mobile Persuasion: 20 Perspectives of the Future of Behavior Change by BJ Fogg and Dean Eckles

 

Specific business concept books – Learning about specific areas of business or new areas of business is always important, especially if it can be directly applied.

The Signal and the Noise: Why So Many Predictions Fail – but Some Don’t by Nate Silver

Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action – Simon Sinek

The Founder’s Dilemmas: Anticipating and Avoiding the Pitfalls That Can Sink a Startup by Noam Wasserman

The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Think Like a Freak: How to Think Smarter about Almost Everything by Steven D. Levitt

The Orange Revolution: How One Great Team Can Transform an Entire Organization by Adrian Gostick

Fascinate: Your 7 Triggers to Persuasion and Captivation by Sally Hogshead

Contagious: Why Things Catch On by Jonah Berger

Venture Deals: Be Smarter Than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist by Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson

Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook: How to Tell Your Story in a Noisy Social World by Gary Vaynerchuk

 

Psychology books – I have been obsessed with trying to understand the human mind, and what drives our emotions and actions. These are some of the books I really enjoyed in this field

Click: The Forces Behind How We Fully Engage with People, Work, and Everything We Do by Ori Brafman and Rom Brafman

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg

Change Anything: The New Science of Personal Success by Kerry Patterson

Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl

The Happiness Advantage: The Seven Principles of Positive Psychology That Fuel Success and Performance at Work by Shawn Achor

Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts by Carol Tavris

The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom by Jonathan Haidt

The Willpower Instinct: How Self-Control Works, Why It Matters, and What You Can Do to Get More of It by Kelly McGonigal

Good Business: Leadership, Flow, and the Making of Meaning byMihaly Csikszentmihalyi

 

Neuroscience books– My interest in human behavior and psychology has ultimately led me to the path of neuroscience. Curiousity of the why needs to start with our basic biology, and by understanding our brain’s tendencies, and chemical forces behind our actions allow us to have better control and understanding over ourselves and others.

Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School by John Medina

The Tell-Tale Brain: A Neuroscientist’s Quest for What Makes Us Human by V. S. Ramachandran

The Brain That Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science by Norman Doidge

Your Deceptive Mind: A Scientific Guide to Critical Thinking Skills by Steven Novella