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The Hard Thing About Hard Things

Ben Horowitz

25 readers recommend it across 17 discussions

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Original Hacker News comments, in the readers’ own words.

lanstein
Advice to Founders and CEOs - Dear Founder (Maynard Webb) - The Hard Things About Hard Things (Ben Horowitz) - Straight Talk for Startups (Randy Komisar and Jantoon Reigersman) - The Founders’ Dilemmas (Noam Wasserman) - The Entrepreneur’s Daily Nietzsche (Brad Feld and Dave Jilk) - Build (Tony Fadell) - Zero to IPO (Frederic Kerrest) - The Great CEO Within (Matt Mochary) Finance - Wharton's Introduction to Financial Accounting course: [https://www.coursera.org/learn/wharton-accounting](https://w... (https://www.coursera.org/learn/wharton-accounting]%28https://www.coursera.org/learn/wharton-accounting%29) - How Finance Works: The HBR Guide to Thinking Smart About the Numbers (Mihir Desai) - Financial Intelligence for Entrepreneurs: What You Really Need to Know About the Numbers (Karen Berman and Joe Knight) Open-Book Company (Employee Ownership, Financial Literacy, Goal-setting) - The Great Game of Business (Jack Stack and Bo Burlingham) Legal - Acceleration (Ryan Roberts) - The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Law and Strategy (Constance Bagley and Craig Dauchy) Company Strategy and Direction (post-product/market fit) - Crossing the Chasm (Geoff Moore) - Zone to Win (Geoff Moore)…

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ranabuzdar
Here are some of the most popular ones: The Lean Startup by Eric Ries Zero to One by Peter Thiel The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill The E-Myth Revisited by Michael Gerber Good to Great by Jim Collins The Art of Possibility by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton Christensen Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson These books cover various aspects of entrepreneurship, from idea generation and innovation to leadership and management. Each one offers a unique perspective and valuable insights that can help entrepreneurs navigate the challenges and opportunities of starting and growing a business.
wenc
* Fooled By Randomness (NN Taleb): Taleb is a complicated personality, but this book gave me a heuristic for thinking about long-tails and uncertain events that I could never have derived myself from a probability textbook. * Designing Data Intensive Applications (M Kleppmann): Provided a first-principles approach for thinking about the design of modern large-scale data infrastructure. It's not just about assembling different technologies -- there are principles behind how data moves and transforms that transcend current technology, and DDIA is an articulation of those principles. After reading this, I began to notice general patterns in data infrastructure, which helped me quickly grasp how new technologies worked. (most are variations on the same principles) * Introduction to Statistical Learning (James et al) and Applied Predictive Modeling (Kuhn et al). These two books gave me a grand sweep of predictive modeling methods pre-deep learning, methods which continue to be useful and applicable to a wider variety of problem contexts than AI/Deep Learning. (neural networks aren't appropriate for huge classes of problems)…
cik
At random Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand. Love her or hate her, she makes you think. The Hard Thing About Hard Things - This is a great book about building businesses, and business in general. Capital in the 21st Century - One of the greatest books about economics and capital written ever - let alone in the last decade. The Intelligent Investor - This is Buffet's favourite book, and regardless of how many times I read it, I still learn more. One can never digest it in full. Predictably Irrational - This excellent tome makes behavioural economics digestible outside of economics. It's enlightening, though provoking, and turns several accepted truths on its head, purely by being written at all. Nexus (Ramez Naam) - This science fiction book explores transhumanism and would it could mean in the near future. It's both light and pulpy, but at the same time makes you think about the outcomes of technological progression.
baristaGeek
Best business books: -Secrets of Sandhill Road -Hackers and Painters -The Great CEO within -Venture Deals -Predictable Revenue -Zero to One -The Hard Thing About Hard Things -Lean customer development -Lost and founder -Lean B2B -From Impossible to Inevitable -Traction Best computer science books: -Competitive programming 3 -Structure and interpretation of computer programs Best for fun (non-fiction): -Meditations -Sapiens -How to win friends and influence people -A brief history of time -Self-reliance -Frente a la estrella polar
jordz
Since setting up a business in 2016, I needed to better understand how to build a business: Principles by Ray Dalio - I found this really motivating to ensure our business sticks to and has a set of principles that evolve based on mistakes made (sounds obvious). Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz - I loved listening to this (audible) because being a CEO can be lonely and hearing other peoples thoughts and advice based on their experience (that you can relate to) is really uplifting. 2018 has been a great year for us and I do think these books have helped me get through the roller coaster that is building a technology startup.

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guiambros
Last year I gave myself a Zuckerberg-style goal to read a book every two weeks. It started well, but some months were harder than others (usually when the book wasn't very good, so I would switch to podcasts for a few weeks, before getting back on track). Here's an unordered list of the best: [BUSINESS / SELF-IMPROVEMENT] - "Work Rules!" - about Google's culture and values - "Search Inside Yourself" - about mindfulness, meditation, and the impact on your life. - "What got you here won't get you there" - Liked a lot more than I expected. - "Re-read Innovator's Dilemma" - a great classic; never gets old. - "How will you measure your life" - from the same author. Also excellent. - "The Best Service is No Service" - good overview on why Amazon's customer service is so good - "Crucial Conversations" - half is common sense; half is good tips to practice everyday. [PROGRAMMING] - "Fluent Python" - was afraid it'd be too basic, but not really. Enjoyed it a lot. - "Think Complexity" - about algorithm complexity, data structures, etc. Great read. - "Python Data Science Handbook" - meh. - "Fundamentals of Deep Learning" - good intro. Helped me solidify some concepts from Andrew Ng's ML course…
guiambros
Here's the best books I've read in the last year or so: >> Computer History & biographies: The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story, Michael Lewis The Second Coming of Steve Jobs, by Alan Deutschman Machines of Loving Grace, by John Markoff The Innovators, by Walter Isaacson Ghost in the Wires, by Kevin Mitnick Idea Man: A Memoir by the Cofounder of Microsoft, by Paul Allen Creativity, Inc, by Ed Catmull (reading) >> Startups: The Hard Thing About Hard Things, by Ben Horowitz The Founder's Dilemmas, Noam Wasserman The Launch Pad, by Randall Stross >> Other books: Trilogy: Off to Be the Wizard (series), by Scott Meyer Search Inside Yourself, Chade-Meng Tan Joy on Demand, Chade-Meng Tan (reading)
jakegarelick
My recent favorites: Jobs, The Hard Thing About Hard Things, High Output Management, Innovator's Dilemma, Lean Startup, On The Shortness Of Life, How Google Works, Zero To One, Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up, Power of Habit, Things Fall Apart, Stoner
Yadi
I would buy and look into the following books: # HTTP: The Definitive Guide - O'Reilly Media # Algorithms by Sedgewick # Introduction to Algorithms by Cormen. Check out some Machine Learning books: # Pattern Recognition and Machine Learning # Computer Networks (5th Edition) I would look at the following book if you wanted more Q&A and interview questions: # Cracking the Coding Interview: 150 Programming Questions ... Tutorial memberships: # I would buy a Tuts+ account, they have been very slow in releasing new content (too bad), however they have lots of great Web Development stuff. I would read some other non-technical books: # Hackers & Painters: Big Ideas from the Computer Age by Paul Graham # The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz # The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book That Will Change The Way You Do Business by Clayton M. Christenen, # Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman # How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie If you wanted to understand some Cloud stuff, look into the Whitepapers from Amazon Web Services: # https://aws.amazon.com/whitepapers/
joshmlewis
Just got done reading Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz, most if it was pretty insightful, especially the stories in the beginning. The executive management parts I skimmed over in the middle and some parts were really irrelevant for early stage companies but overall it was a good read and informative. Peter Thiel's book Zero To One is on pre-order, but you can pre-order and then get a pre-print edition mailed to you. It's based around the class notes in his Stanford startup class. I don't agree with everything but it's a very good perspective. It really helped me get out of the perspective of shitty ideas and to think bigger. Edit: Ops, got Marc and Ben confused. ;)

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