100 Books Like Founders at Work

Range resonated deeply with me because it celebrates the power of diverse experiences—something I’ve always valued in my own life and work.

Epstein’s argument that generalists thrive in complex, unpredictable environments felt like a validation of my own neurodiverse strengths. I loved how he used real-world examples to show that breadth often beats depth when solving problems or innovating. This book encouraged me to lean into my varied interests instead of feeling pressured to specialize narrowly.

I loved this book because the author has such an incredible, authentic voice. Being a professional poker player turned consultant; she helps readers get comfortable with not knowing the outcome, being uncertain, and ultimately getting used to the idea of placing bets.

I loved the book because it helped me relax. Rather than stressing if the countless decisions I made every day were the right ones, it helped me see that I was making bets, running experiments, and constantly testing what worked. It helped me take myself less seriously, and it helped me see that even if an experiment failed, it would provide valuable learning and growth. As she references from her time on the world poker circuit, losing is not the end of it as long as you learn from your losses. 

I loved this book because it helped me see the power of questions. At work, there is often an expectation of always having answers. If you don’t have answers, you’re probably stupid or lazy—at least, that’s what I thought when I was younger. I love this book for many reasons, a big one being the gallery of countless examples of how breakthroughs and some of the world’s best inventions happened by first finding the right question to ask.

This book transformed my career. Instead of going into every meeting as a know-it-all, I came with a short list of questions to get people talking. When you show up with answers, people think they either need to agree or disagree. However, if you show up with only a question, everyone can participate. 

I loved this book for many reasons. First, like the plot of a work of fiction, it follows the trail of a successful entrepreneur and a successful artist as they fall in love. I have read an extensive number of self-help books in my day, and this one was by far one of the most enjoyable, easy, and fun to read. It also addresses some of the common pitfalls folks fall into when trying to practice self-help.

Although I only did the actual 5am protocol for a year myself, it changed how I viewed my day, my mental resources, and how I was investing (or wasting) those same resources. I loved this book because even though I don’t practice the 5am protocol anymore, the year I did changed my life forever.

This book is more scientific, but very interesting if you like to dig more into the depth of money illusion backed by its experimental investigation.

The old concept of money illusion is updated and transformed into its modern version, which is built on the principle of strategic complementarity. In this case, even a negligible individual money illusion suffered by only few agents might multiply effects of money illusion at the aggregate level due to a well-known mainstream concept called coordination failure. Modern money illusion might be responsible for substantial effects at the aggregate level.

For me, this book is very appealing, since the non-neutrality of money in the short run is explained in an alternative way, but it does not deny standard rational expectations theory.

This book presents the historical story of another great company that rose to dominate its industry from the perspective of the man who led the company and was the architect of the strategic battle to create it. Alfred P. Sloan was an MIT-trained engineer when he was selected to lead General Motors, which was at the time “an also ran” to the once mighty Ford Motor Company led by the legendary visionary of the industry, Henry Ford. Yet Sloan, who even today is less well known than Henry Ford, crafted a strategy and organization that ultimately surpassed Ford not only in market share, but also in all aspects of operations so that General Motors and not Ford became the dominant colossus of the Automotive industry for more than a half-century. 

The book gives readers an opportunity to see the nature and evolution of Sloan’s plans and actions that slowly and… show more.

The first “how to” business book, and what surprised me about it was how, for Cotrugli, being a good merchant was as much about being morally upright as about being profitable.

He spends as much time telling merchants how to pray as he does how to handle their ledgers (the book is historically famous for being the first European work to explain double-entry bookkeeping).

What I found fascinating about this book is how modern Cotrguli sounds; maybe it’s the work of the translators, but he comes across as somebody you could talk to today. And he is impassioned with his main preoccupation: how to both pursue material wealth and still be a good person. He’s trying to walk a line between greed and God, and that still matters today.

I love reading fiction, and so do many of my students. This book is a gift for us fiction lovers who are also interested in leadership. 

From ancient to modern, literature teaches about quite contemporary issues regarding leadership. In fact, I was astounded to realize how much real-life insight fiction is able to offer in this respect–much more than many management textbooks that often present a simplified and rationalized image of what management means. This book teaches how to approach difficult and very human aspects of leadership: everything that is linked to human experience. 

I found accounts of Herman Melville, Thomas Pynchon, Maurice Blanchot, and other writers captivating and enlightening.

In recent decades, as advertising has moved from one-way communication about product benefits to conversations with consumers about brands, someone needed to sum things up. Iezzi and the creatives she interviews do exactly that. As she presents it, “First of all, forget about making an ad… You’re making something to compete with every other piece of content, every other media experience that a person has during her waking hours.” The Idea Writers is an excellent primer on this new landscape. How do we create a brand’s story, one that consumers identify with and help propagate, if not create? How do we manage it, move it forward, spread it across various media, and make it viral? How can it become its own never-ending story?

This book is short and massively powerful. It gets you to think about all the possibilities you have to reach your full potential and do more than you might have thought possible. This 48-page, 2-word book just might change your life forever. You will learn 3 simple, powerful tools you can use immediately to access your unrealized potential. When you really start to think, What If?, around any issues, goals, or challenges, your possibilities can be endless. This book can inspire you to greatness, in my opinion. I bought hundreds of copies of this book because I thought it was so powerful and wanted to share it with my clients and prospective clients, so if you can’t find this book, I do have 5 more copies left.