Best Startup Books: 50 Picks Recommended by CEOs

Eric Ries treats a startup as any team building something new under extreme uncertainty, and swaps the long business plan for quick experiments, validated learning and honest measures of progress. Sheryl Sandberg liked its look at how the tech industry builds products and businesses.

Peter Thiel’s notes from his Stanford startup course argue that founders should create something new rather than copy what already works, and should aim for a defensible monopoly instead of open competition. Elon Musk said Thiel has built several breakthrough companies and the book shows how.

Ben Horowitz draws on his own years founding and running technology companies to cover problems business schools rarely teach, such as firing friends, recruiting from rivals and knowing when to sell. Michael Dell praised its candor about the thrills and dangers of starting a company.

Gabriel Weinberg and Justin Mares argue that customer growth decides a startup’s fate, then map nineteen acquisition channels and a three-step Bullseye method for choosing among them. Joel Gascoigne took from it the habit of giving traction as much time as product work.

Jessica Livingston asks the founders of 32 technology companies, Steve Wozniak among them, how their ideas began, how they persuaded investors and which mistakes they survived. Joel Gascoigne read it in Buffer’s first months and found it inspiring and practical.

Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson walk founders through a venture capital term sheet clause by clause, explaining valuations, how investors get paid and how terms shift from seed to later rounds. Tracy Osborn said she consulted it almost every day while raising money.

Steve Blank holds that a startup is searching for a business model rather than running one, and lays out a four-step Customer Development process for testing assumptions with customers while mistakes are still cheap. Marc Andreessen told readers to keep it under their pillow.

Brad Feld and David Cohen gather short essays from TechStars mentors and founders on lessons repeated inside the accelerator, grouped around vision, fundraising, legal structure and work/life balance. Jilliene Helman calls it her favorite read for a company’s very earliest days.

Reid Hoffman and Chris Yeh study the rare startups that become global giants and describe how to grow at extreme speed, arguing that every stage of growth needs new strategies, hiring practices and a changed founder role. Sam Altman read an early copy and wanted to recommend it to everyone.

Rob Fitzpatrick teaches founders to question customers in ways that surface the truth, since asking anyone whether an idea is good invites polite lies. Roxana Bitoleanu would start her own list with it, as the one resource on asking questions without sounding too eager.

Scott Belsky looks at the long stretch after a venture’s launch and first funding, drawing on research with founders and companies of every size to offer lessons on teams, products and leading through the ups and downs. Alexis Ohanian wants every founder to read it.

Scott Kupor of Andreessen Horowitz explains how venture capitalists choose companies and size their bets, and how founders can win good terms, pitch with a story, survive a down round and handle investors who get too involved. A sample term sheet is included.

Rand Fishkin uses the story of Moz, his marketing software company, to question popular startup advice on minimum viable products, growth hacking and venture money, describing fifteen years of debt, growth and hard lessons. Seth Godin praised its honesty about the lows of building a company.

Jerry Kaplan recounts founding GO Corporation in 1987 to create pen-based handheld computers, and the crises, quarrelsome team and risk-hungry investors that followed. Bill Gurley names it among the books he recommends that startups read.

Brad Feld and Mahendra Ramsinghani explain how a startup board works and how founders should choose members, run meetings and use outside directors to stay accountable and reach milestones. Steve Case, who has sat on many boards, praised its help in building one and using it wisely.

Dan Shapiro, who has founded and led four companies, splits the startup chief executive’s job into founding, funding, leadership, management and endgame, with stories of companies that thrived or died on each point. Kristen Hamilton called the advice solid and realistic.

Ash Maurya offers a step-by-step process for testing product ideas fast and reaching product/market fit, blending Lean Startup, Customer Development and bootstrapping, down to when to pivot and when to raise a large round. Garrett Moon recommends it for building products the lean way.

Randy Komisar’s narrative follows two would-be founders through meetings with investors, showing how startups begin and venture deals get struck, though its larger theme is finding fulfillment in work. Joel Gascoigne took from it the idea of the deferred life plan.

Jeffrey Bussgang writes for the employees who join young companies instead of founding them, breaking down roles in product, sales, growth and marketing and explaining how to find, judge and land a place at a young company. Eric Ries called it required reading for joiners.

Techstars Austin managing director Amos Schwartzfarb argues that slow early revenue sinks most startups, and explains how to build and scale a startup sales team, hire people who can sell and use traction to raise venture money. Brad Feld endorsed it for every founder.

Ash Maurya picks up after founders have talked to customers and built a first version, showing which metrics prove a business model works and why traction beats current revenue as a measure. Eric Ries presents it as the sequel to Running Lean, about moving from startup to lasting business.

Bill Aulet, who runs MIT’s center for entrepreneurship, disputes the idea that founding a company cannot be taught, and turns the work of building a startup around a new product into 24 learnable steps, with focus as the central discipline.

John Nesheim covers a high-tech company’s path from first idea to public offering, with case studies of successful startups and guidance on business plans, valuation, venture capital, lawyers and intellectual property. Lucas Morales found it dated but revealing about how startup investing has changed.

Alistair Croll and Ben Yoskovitz show how a startup can use data to choose its product and market before the money runs out, built around the One Metric That Matters at each stage and conversations with over 100 founders and investors.

Donatas Jonikas based the startup marketing manual on research into 1,447 startups, giving steps, real examples and templates for turning an innovative idea into a profitable business that can scale. Nicolae Andronic uses it as a reference while handling marketing for his own startup.

Noam Wasserman’s research on nearly 10,000 founders examines the early people decisions that sink or save startups: going solo or with cofounders, founding with friends, splitting equity and when a founder-CEO should step aside. Cody McLain recommends it for running a startup.

Journalist Randall Stross follows Y Combinator’s summer 2011 batch through three months of building companies under its partners, from founders dropping first ideas midway to Demo Day pitches before angel investors and venture capitalists. Scott Johnson recommends it.

Steve Blank and Bob Dorf turn Customer Development into a detailed manual with checklists, using the Business Model Canvas to lay out a young company’s hypotheses and sending founders out to customers before they build. Bill Earner calls it a fuller, how-to version of the Lean Startup.

Clayton Christensen’s study is mainly about why well-run incumbents lose their lead, but its account of disruptive innovation explains the opening newcomers exploit with crude technology that keeps improving. Bill Gurley called it the clearest analysis of how startups manage to disrupt.

Nir Eyal’s Hook Model is mainly about product design, explaining how products such as Twitter and Pinterest form habits that bring users back without heavy advertising. Eyal set out to write the hands-on guide he lacked as a startup founder.

Geoffrey Moore’s book is mainly about marketing technology products, and its account of the gap between early adopters and the pragmatic majority gives young tech companies a plan for winning one customer group at a time. Bill Gurley calls it required reading for enterprise plays.

John Carreyrou’s investigation is mainly a story of fraud, following the founder of a blood-testing startup as it reached a valuation above $9 billion with technology that did not work. Bill Gurley said every player in the startup world should read it.

Andrew Grove’s manual is mainly about management, drawn from his years running Intel and covering objectives and key results, performance reviews, training and productive teams. Tobi Lütke likes that it takes business apart into first principles.

Nick Bilton’s narrative is mainly a corporate drama about Twitter’s four founders, who built the service out of a failed podcasting startup and then fought over money and control as it grew. Casey Neistat said reading it gave him the confidence to start a tech company.

Eric Ries applies Lean Startup thinking mainly to established companies, nonprofits and governments, building a system of entrepreneurial management from his work with firms from GE and Toyota to Twilio and Airbnb. Aaron Levie praised how it keeps an entrepreneurial culture alive through growth.

John Doerr’s book is about the OKR goal-setting system, which he learned under Andy Grove at Intel and taught to Google’s founders soon after investing in their startup, with case studies from companies that use it. Reid Hoffman pointed it at first-time founders and seasoned CEOs alike.

Antonio Garcia Martinez’s memoir is mainly about his own career, from Goldman to a startup he sold to Twitter and then Facebook’s ads team, explaining venture capital and startups along the way. Mike Dudas found it a fun read on growing a business in Silicon Valley.

David Kirkpatrick’s history is mainly about Facebook’s growth from a dorm-room project to 500 million users, showing how its young founder put growth ahead of profit and sold equity to protect his vision. Angela Pham said it turned her into a fan of the company’s leaders years before she joined.

Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg and Alan Eagle write mainly about leadership, recording the methods of Bill Campbell, the coach behind Google, Apple and Intuit, for building trust and resolving tension inside fast-moving teams. Tim Cook praised it for keeping Campbell’s spirit alive for future generations.

Paul Graham’s essays range mainly across programming languages, software design and free speech, with pieces on internet startups and how wealth is created. Evan Williams singled out two of its essays, including How to Make Wealth, for explaining misunderstood economic principles.

Sean Ellis and Morgan Brown’s growth hacking method is mainly a marketing discipline, using cross-functional teams and fast test cycles to win and keep customers, modeled on how Airbnb, Pinterest and Uber grew. Nir Eyal praised it for breaking down silos between product, data and marketing.

Jerry Colonna, a former venture capitalist who coaches startup CEOs, writes mainly about leadership and self-inquiry, helping founders face the habits that built their success yet hurt their relationships and health. Angela Duckworth praised it for showing that a business cannot grow unless its leader does.

Aaron Ross and Jason Lemkin focus mainly on sales and revenue, drawing a seven-ingredient hypergrowth playbook from Salesforce, EchoSign and Zenefits, from nailing a niche to building a predictable pipeline. Jeremy Boudinet found it very tech-focused and full of ideas for people in startups.

Dan Senor and Saul Singer write mainly about Israel’s economy, asking why the small country produces more startups per person than larger nations and pointing to military service and immigrants willing to start from scratch.

Brad Stone’s account is mainly a history of Uber and Airbnb, tracing their founding, the rise of their founders and their fights with regulators. Ee Ling Lim suggests it as light reading for anyone weighing entrepreneurship.

Jason Calacanis writes mainly for investors, explaining how angels judge young technology companies, weigh risk against reward and get used well by the best startups. Brad Feld found it as outspoken as its author and full of gems.

Dan Lyons’s memoir of joining HubSpot at 50 after losing his Newsweek job is mainly a critique of one start-up’s culture and management, from Friday parties to vague job titles. Irina Marinescu said it helped her stay grounded amid the excitement of the startup era.

Brad Feld and Amy Batchelor write mainly about relationships, offering couples where one partner runs a young company practical ways to handle scarce time, long absences and the swings of startup life. AnneMarie Schindler found it once her husband started their first gym.

Eric Jackson, who ran marketing at PayPal, gives an insider history of the company from its 1999 launch to the eBay sale, as it survived the dot-com bust and fought regulators, banks and eBay itself. Mike Dudas said it reads almost like a novel rather than a business manual.

Mike Isaac’s reporting is mainly a corporate history of Uber, from its founding as UberCab to its public offering, covering Travis Kalanick’s rise and ouster and the company’s culture battles. John Carreyrou called it a parable about how far some founders go to gain and hold power.