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One of the things that have helped me build my property businesses and shape the way that they look today is reading books about other people’s businesses and entrepreneurial journeys. This has allowed me to learn from their successes and failures and trials and tribulations.
Read below or listen to the full episode on The HMO Podcast to find out the 12 most valuable books that I’ve read about business and entrepreneurship! These will help you make tough decisions, recalibrate your expectations, and inspire you to take your business to the next level.
1. Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of NIKE by Phil Knight
This is the incredible story of Phil Knight and NIKE. We all know the brand and what it stands for. And this book is really about the trials and tribulations of business. I’ve read this book several times, and it always reminds me that it isn’t meant to be easy and that sometimes the best things come through adversity…
Overall, it’s a really enjoyable and easy read. But you’ll not believe what obstacles and challenges Phil had to overcome to get where he is today. NIKE is so big that it’s easy to forget that starting out it was just one man with an idea! And this book is really all about that journey.
2. Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson
Steve Jobs is the man behind Apple, Pixar, and many other successful ventures. He’s been well-documented and well-criticised, and this book is an eye-opening insight into who he was, how he functioned, why he made the decisions that he did, what drove him, what he was passionate about, and who he really was as a person.
This book was so interesting because it’s a really unique insight into one person’s vision, and how that one, unquestionable, and uncompromising vision ultimately got him to where he was. And there was a lot of adversity he had to overcome. Within this book, there are so many really useful things you can put into your own business as well.
3. Alibaba: The House That Jack Ma Built by Duncan Clark
Jack Ma is the founder of Alibaba, a Chinese company that’s sort of like Amazon in the South East. It’s a huge company, which is impressive in a country like China where it’s a lot less capitalistic than here. The story of Jack himself is really unique, and this book is another journey through adversity.
You’ll find a huge amount that you can take away from the way he thought, how he made decisions, where he was willing to compromise and where he wasn’t, how he managed to build his business through things like partnerships, and the risks he was prepared to, and ultimately had to, take.
4. The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone
Amazon is a company we all know about. It famously started in Jeff Bezos’s garage as an online bookseller, and it’s grown and grown and become something quite different from its origins.
This book is specifically about the trials and tribulations of building a business at this scale, raising finance, and overcoming the lack of belief from anyone else that this could possibly work.
It’s also a fascinating story of evolution. This book is for anyone starting and building a business that finds themselves thinking: Am I doing the right thing? Do I need to change tact or pivot?
5. Elon Musk: How the Billionaire CEO of SpaceX and Tesla is Shaping our Future by Ashlee Vance
Elon Musk is obviously a unique character. He’s like nobody else and what I get from him more than anything else is thinking big otherwise it’s not worth it! I’ve not managed to get myself there, nor do I think I have what it takes to deliver at that sort of level, but he’s incredibly inspiring whether you love or hate him.
Elon built PayPal, an incredibly successful company that he sold. He’s the founder of Tesla and SpaceX and has been a part of other ventures as well. Within the book, there’s a huge amount about a variety of businesses that you can learn from, and you’ll be able to take a lot of ideas and put them into your own business.
6. The Lean Startup: How Constant Innovation Creates Radically Successful Businesses by Eric Ries
Eric Ries has founded a number of startups and advises a number of large companies and ventures on business. This book really helps you to start thinking differently about innovation and entrepreneurship and have a new approach to business.
It’s packed with practical principles and interesting stories to help you start and build your business. It’s probably the most useful book that I’ve actually been able to directly input into my businesses!
This is possibly my all-time favourite autobiography about business and entrepreneurship! Richard Branson is another unique character. He likes to live in the moment, is a daredevil with a passion for extreme sports, and even lives on an island.
His values for the Virgin Group and his staff are what really come through in this book. He highlights the importance of building teams and how integral his teams have been in ultimately getting him where he’s got to, building several extremely successful companies.
8. Scaling Up: How a Few Companies Make It…and Why the Rest Don’t by Vern Harnish
This book provides ideas and best practices for scaling up your business. It’s really useful if you’re struggling with things like cash flow, prioritising your time, creating systems and processes, and having to do it all on a strict budget.
I’ve read this book multiple times, and there’s still so much that I get from it every time. It doesn’t matter what kind of business you’re starting, everything in this book will be pertinent. And it covers so many things you can implement into your business straight away!
9. The Warren Buffett Way by Robert G. Hagstrom
Warren Buffet is probably the most successful investor ever, and this book is a fascinating insight into how he approached investment. There’s so much to take in from the way that he talks about the compounding effect, reinvesting, and taking calculated risks.
This book has helped shape my approach to business. Before reading it, I was a short-term thinker, doing everything right now. After reading it, I started making decisions for the long term and focusing on the long-term benefits of building value and great brands. And through that, I’ve achieved much better results!
10. What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excellence by Stephen A. Schwarzman
Stephen A. Schwarzman is the CEO and Founder of Blackstone, one of the biggest hedge funds in the world. Starting out, he was a young student, making his way up the ranks in the financial industry. But he eventually found himself out on a limb and started Blackstone.
He overcame huge obstacles, faced adversity on so many occasions, and somehow managed to pull it all off. I haven’t seen a lot of people talk about this book, but it’s brilliant! And it really focuses on the principles of investment.
Robert Iger was the CEO of the Walt Disney Company from 2005 to 2020, but the company paid him an eye-watering sum to come back in 2022 because he was just that good. Disney is one of the most recognisable companies in the world, and under Robert’s leadership, they’ve done incredible things. And this book is a really interesting look into his life.
You can learn from some of the decisions he had to make as CEO of one of the biggest companies in the world and how he managed and coped with the pressure he was under. And he has a very honest and candid approach to sharing what was going on behind the scenes.
12. Unshakeable: Your Financial Freedom Playbook by Tony Robbins
Tony Robbins is a billionaire and incredibly successful investor. He also owns a lucrative company that specialises in self-help books, coaching, and other resources, which isn’t really my thing, but his book Unshakeable is about good principles of investment.
In it, Tony shares the importance of compounding and investing for the long term. It’s a great book with some transparent investment examples, and it’s really useful for getting perspective on building businesses.
So, those are the 12 most valuable books I’ve read over the years about business and entrepreneurship! If I had to pick three books from this list to start with, it’d be:
- What It Takes: Lessons in the Pursuit of Excellence
- The Ride of a Lifetime: Lessons in Creative Leadership from 15 Years as CEO of the Walt Disney Company
- Scaling Up: How a Few Companies Make It…and Why the Rest Don’t
Join us over in The HMO Community Facebook Group and let us know what you think about these books and if you have any recommendations. If you want to scale things up in your HMO business, check out The HMO Roadmap and become a member!
About the Author:
Andy Graham is the founder and the lead trainer at The HMO Roadmap! He is also the co-founder of The HMO Mastermind and Smart Property, a specialist HMO property investment and management company. He writes as a regular columnist in different magazines about a variety of HMO topics and is the host of The HMO Podcast! Follow Andy on Instagram!