As a freelancer, solopreneur, or startup founder, one of your core responsibilities is continually learning new and exciting things about how to take your business to the next level. The moment you stop learning is the moment you stop growing and the moment your business starts to decline. And as cheesy as it may sound, picking up a book is a great way to learn the lessons you need to know in order to run a successful business.
Today, some of our coLab members are sharing the books that most changed their lives and improved their businesses.
The Personal MBA: A Business Reference Book for Go-Getters
coLabber Chris Danek says that when he was looking for an easy way to improve his business skills, The Personal MBA was a fast, simple guide that made it easy to memorize important lessons.
Says Chris: “Nobody wants to spend $100,000 on an MBA. I loved The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman because it gives a great one-page lesson on all of the essentials you need to know.”
Written by the founder of online business school PersonalMBA.com, The Personal MBA covers lessons such as the Iron Law of the Market, the 12 Forms of Value, the Pricing Uncertainty Principle, and the four main ways that businesses can increase their revenue.
Chris recommends The Personal MBA as an ideal short read for those who need to quickly gain business skills.
Influence: Persuasion Basics to Boost Your Sales Game
For coLab Content Czar Mike Straus, the best business book isn’t a business book at all – it’s the 1984 classic Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Arizona State University psychology and marketing professor Robert Cialdini.
“Without persuasion skills, your business is dead,” Mike says. “Cialdini’s Influence is a brilliant primer in persuasion that combines charming anecdotes, fascinating studies and experiments, and pop culture to convey some of the best theories on the science of persuasion in a layperson-friendly way.”
Mike says that Influence had a profound impact on him, in that it demystified the realm of sales & marketing.
“I loved it so much that the next book I’m planning to read is also a Cialdini work. It’s called Yes! 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to Be Persuasive. I’m interested to learn about what Cialdini calls Core Drives and how the various different persuasion methods I’ve learned while studying copywriting tie together into one cohesive theory.”
Microeconomics: Adjusting Business Practices for Changing Market Conditions
coLab member Jeff Carpenter says that his econ textbook gave him a great overview of the Canadian business environment:
“It’s taught me about the concept of sunk cost (among others). So the idea is to drop efforts where the expected value is less than the expected remaining cost regardless of how much I’ve invested in it.”
Written by Michael Parkin and Robin Bade, Microeconomics: Canada in the Global Environment relates world events and economic indicators to microeconomic theories in a way that is understandable, relatable, and fun. The book covers all the fundamentals of microeconomics in a way that is easily applicable in business settings. Beyond the typical explanation of supply-and-demand, the book also delves into topics like household preferences, government influence on markets, the impact of economic inequality on market conditions, and other related issues to demonstrate how changing economic conditions impact businesses of all kinds.
Parkin and Bade, both economics professors at the University of Western Ontario, are a husband-wife team whose work pioneered the establishment of the independent European Central Bank in 1998.
As an entrepreneur, staying well-informed is synonymous with staying competitive. There’s no shortage of great business books out there to solve whatever business challenge you may be facing. Try one of these reads to hone your business skills – you might be surprised at what you learn.
What’s your go-to entrepreneur read to quickly level up your business? Let us know in the comments!
