The bookshelf

Habits & productivity

• Atomic Habits by James Clear. Focus on your trajectory, not your current results. Tiny changes, repeated day after day, compound into big ones.
• Slow Productivity by Cal Newport. Do fewer things, work at a natural pace, and obsess over quality.
• Ultralearning by Scott H. Young. Learn by doing, then drill the weak spots. Testing yourself beats rereading every time.
• Protocols by Andrew Huberman. Sleep, light, movement and food are the foundation every other habit stands on.
• Hidden Potential by Adam Grant. Character skills, not natural talent, decide how far you go.
• Creativity by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. Flow, deep engagement in hard work, is where enjoyment and creativity meet.
• Principles by Ray Dalio. Principles connect your values to your actions. For every one, ask: is it actually true?

Marketing & persuasion

• Influence by Robert B. Cialdini. We say yes on mental shortcuts like reciprocity, scarcity, consistency, social proof, liking and authority. Know them, and keep the customer’s best interest at heart.
• Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss. Don’t split the difference. Listen closely, mirror what you hear, and stay calm enough that the other side keeps talking.
• Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg. Every conversation is practical, emotional or social. Figure out which one you’re in.
• $100M Offers by Alex Hormozi. Make an offer so good people feel foolish saying no.
• Marketing Made Simple by Donald Miller. The customer is the hero of the story. The brand is the guide.
• Marketing 6.0 by Philip Kotler et al.. Marketing is moving toward immersive experiences that blend physical and digital.
• This I Know by Terry O’Reilly. The best marketing is a clear strategy told as a good story.
• The Way of the Wolf by Jordan Belfort. Selling is a learnable system built on certainty in the product, the person and the company.

Money & investing

• The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel. Getting rich is simpler than staying rich. Stay humble, respect the role of luck, and know when enough is enough.
• The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham. Treat stocks as businesses, and always leave a margin of safety.
• The Snowball by Alice Schroeder. Patience and compounding, applied for decades, outperform brilliance applied in bursts.
• Poor Charlie’s Almanack by Charles T. Munger. Patience and focus are an investor’s greatest strengths. Stay inside what you understand, and own your mistakes fast.
• Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. Define the goal precisely, write it down, read it twice a day, and surround yourself with smart people.
• The Wealth Creation Formula by Grant Cardone. Treat earning more and investing well as one plan, not two.

Lives & leadership

• Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson. Make fewer products and make them simple. A seamless experience is the product.
• Elon Musk by Walter Isaacson. Question every requirement, then delete whatever part or step you can.
• The Ride of a Lifetime by Robert Iger. Bold, well-timed bets, like Pixar and Marvel, can transform a company.
• A Promised Land by Barack Obama. You don’t choose the time; the time chooses you. Be ready when it does.
• Spare by Prince Harry. Telling your own story honestly takes its own kind of courage.
• Business Adventures by John Brooks. The same human mistakes show up in business again and again.

Mind & meaning

• The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson. Everything worth doing comes with struggle, so choose the struggle that’s right for you, and say no to the rest.
• Wisdom Takes Work by Ryan Holiday. Wisdom isn’t knowing more. It’s practising what you already know.
• Values by Mark Carney. Markets are powerful tools, but they need values to point them somewhere good.
• The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. Seduction beats coercion, and people move for their own self-interest far more than for goodwill.