Reality check
author of The Art of the Start.In Silicon Valley slang, a "bozo explosion" is what causes a lean, mean, fighting machine of a company to slide into mediocrity. As Guy Kawasaki puts it, "If the two most popular words in your company are partner and strategic, and partner has become a verb, and strategic is used to describe decisions and activities that don’t make sense"... it’s time for a reality check.For nearly three decades, Kawasaki has earned a stellar reputation as an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and irreverent pundit. His 2004 bestseller, The Art of the Start, has become the most acclaimed bible for small business. And his blog is consistently one of the fifty most popular in the world.Now, Kawasaki has compiled his best wit, wisdom, and contrarian opinions in handy book form. From competition to customer service, innovation to marketing, he shows readers how to ignore fads and foolishness while sticking to commonsense practices. He explains, for instance:• How to get a standing ovation• The art of schmoozing• How to create a community• The top ten lies of entrepreneurs• Everything you wanted to know about getting a job in Silicon Valley but didn’t know who to askProvocative, useful, and very funny, this "no bull shiitake" book will show you why readers around the world love Guy Kawasaki.
Stats for nerds
5recommend
9mentions
9people
2008–2016years
56% recommend44% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- These are loosely related to your topic. But, depending on where your interests lie, these might be interesting for you:
"Nine Algorithms That Changed the Future: The Ingenious Ideas That Drive Today's Computers" - John MacCormick
"Domain Driven Design" - Eric Evans
"Artificial Intelligence: The Basics" - Kevin Warwick
...and on the Project management / Executive side:
"Agile Project Management with Scrum" - Ken Schwaber
"Reality Check" - Guy Kawasaki
"Founders at Work: Stories of Startups' Early Days" - Jessica Livingston
- From a start up perspective, Reality Check by Guy Kawasaki is probably one of the most all around no bs start up book out there....
- I bought a few of the well known startup books and this helped me gain a lot of insight. I am now looking for other books. Do you have any recommendations? I'd like to start by listing a few names with a short description why I liked it.
Reality Check, Guy Kawasaki: This book is great in that it covers many different aspects in the nature of a startup, and tells you the reality about issues that you either don't know or have false hopes with wishful thinking. It also has depth, as the author has interviewed the experts on every different subject and has summarized his findings.
The Art of the Start, Guy kawasaki: Haven't read it yet.
Rework, 37Signals: Read half of it so far, it is a striking book with a call for how simple and plain a business should be. Its small, and messages are delivered in clear concise manner. I definitely recommend it.
Just ordered: Founders at Work by Jessica Livingston, and 4 Steps to Ephiphany by Steve Blank.
- Reality Check by Guy Kawasaki is excellent, and covers everything from PR to marketing to legal. Some parts are advice on how to approach various aspects of starting up while other parts are more "nuts and bolts." (on average, the book stays somewhere between those two slants)
http://www.amazon.com/Reality-Check-Outsmarting-Outmanaging-... is e
- "Presentationzen" by Garr Reynolds and "Slide:ology" by Nancy Duarte will be exceedingly helpful to you. Here are links to their blogs and Amazon descriptions. Good luck!
http://www.presentationzen.com/presentationzen/
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0321525655/103-6148611-3957...
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0596522347?ie=UTF8&tag=...
You should also find a copy of Guy Kawasaki's "Reality Check" or "The art of the start". Even if you don't have enough time to push through the whole book, just read the chapter on pitching. Should be very helpful.
- Books I finished in 2016. There are others that are still "in progress", but I'll skip those for now.
- Towers of Midnight (Wheel of Time, #13) - Robert Jordan
- Artificial Intelligence: What Everyone Needs to Know - Jerry Kaplan
- The Gathering Storm (Wheel of Time, #12) - Robert Jordan
- Ashley Bell - Dean Koontz
- Spooky Action at a Distance: The Phenomenon That Reimagines Space and Time—and What It Means for Black Holes, the Big Bang, and Theories of Everything - George Musser
- What Is Relativity?: An Intuitive Introduction to Einstein's Ideas, and Why They Matter - Jeffrey O. Bennett
- Code: The Hidden Language of Computer Hardware and Software - Charles Petzold
- The Seven Pillars of Statistical Wisdom - Stephen M. Stigler
- Deliver Us from Evil (A. Shaw, #2) - David Baldacci
- Total Control - David Baldacci
- Second Foundation (Foundation #3) - Isaac Asimov
- Foundation and Empire (Foundation #2) - Isaac Asimov
- End of Watch (Bill Hodges Trilogy, #3) - Stephen King
- Foundation (Foundation #1) - Isaac Asimov
- Everything and More: A Compact History of Infinity - David Foster Wallace
- The Meaning of Science - Tim Lewens
- Reality Check: The Irreverent Guide to Outsmarting, Outmanaging, and Outmarketing Your Competition - Guy Kawasaki
- The Last Mile (Amos Decker, #2) - David Baldacci
- Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Start-Up Bubble - Dan Lyons
- Management Strategies for the Cloud Revolution: How Cloud Computing Is Transforming Business and Why You Can't Afford to Be Left Behind - Charles Babcock
- It's Not the Big That Eat the Small...It's the Fast That Eat the Slow: How to Use Speed as a Competitive Tool in Business - Jason Jennings
- Predictive Analytics: The Power to Predict Who Will Click, Buy, Lie, or Die - Eric Siegel
- Mastering the Complex Sale: How to Compete and Win When the Stakes Are High! - Jeff Thull
- The Bazaar of Bad Dreams - Stephen King
What would I recommend out of this batch? Pretty much all of the fiction titles, and out of the non-fiction, I'd call out these as particularly recommended:
Mastering The Complex Sale, by Jeff Thull
Code, by Charles Petzold
and
It's Not the Big That Eat the Small...It's the Fast That Eat the Slow by Jason Jennings.
The one I'd call out as "not recommended" is
The Seven Pillars of Statistical Wisdom by Stephen M. Stigler. I guess it has it's place, but it didn't turn out to be as enlightening as I'd hoped it would be.
