The Icarus Deception is a call to make great art. Seth Godin makes the case that in our new information economy, your best hope is to find a niche audience and form a connection. The End of the Industrial Age There was a point in time – almost a century ago – where the smartest … Read more
The New New thing is a brilliantly written story by Michael Lewis that describes the life of James Clark, founder of Silicon Graphics, Netscape, my CFO, and Healtheon. Clark was the antithesis to the corporation man. He despised suits, formalities, and investment bankers. He was a master salesman, and a Silicon Valley cowboy. He sued … Read more
The Undiscovered Self is a book that is written in a time of apocalyptic, dystopic visions, the iron curtain and the great division of the East and the West. Jung opens with a question. “What does the future bring?” What stops the world from disintegrating into chaos is a stable minority of individuals. The masses … Read more
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi accomplishes two tasks through this brilliant book. The first is that he redefines the concept of happiness, and the second is to show you how to achieve this state of happiness – Flow. No matter who you are whether you’re an introvert or an extrovert, the CEO of a company or a manual … Read more
It’s not strange that misbehaving children exist, or that some misbehaving adults exist. It’s strange that anyone at all is civilized, calm, and well-adjusted rather than being barbaric, drug addicted, and chronically anxious. It’s easy to lose focus and it’s easy to not discipline your children. We are more sensitive to losses than to gains. … Read more
Survey Results Noam T. Wasserman asks the questions that many entrepreneurs avoid when starting a business. The Founder’s Dilemmas is an academic style business book that starts off by providing you illuminating survey results that touch on several important topics about entrepreneurship. One survey investigates the differences in motivation between entrepreneurs and employees. Entrepreneurs are … Read more
The Right Pond It’s better to be big fish in a small pond rather than a small fish in a big pond. No matter who you are, and what you are doing, there is always someone who is more brilliant than you are. Don’t be too self-critical, this is a reality that each person must … Read more
Be a Producer, Not a Consumer The Millionaire Fastlane is about thinking about business from a pragmatic, not academic perspective. De Marco advises you to find things that can make you money while you sleep, to be need driven, not money driven (selfish consumer-like producer jumping from one thing to another). The market doesn’t care … Read more
Malcolm Gladwell popularized the 10,000-hour rule that states that by practicing for roughly that amount of time on any skill, you will become an expert. The original researcher Gladwell drew his conclusions from the author of Peak: Secrets From The New Science of Expertise, Anders Ericsson. Ericsson describes what it really takes to become an … Read more
Nihilism Peterson grew up in Fairview, Alberta – a city with cold, harsh weather in Canada where he spent most of his time drinking while going out on long drives with his friends. He befriended nihilists for most of his adolescent years, and while he cleaned up his act, some of his friends didn’t. And … Read more