What I recommend
The books, podcasts and videos I recommend most, by topic: startups, managing people, strategy, product, change, ADHD, coaching and solo business.
People often ask me what to read. Here’s where I’d start, by topic: mostly books, plus a few podcasts and videos. Pick the topic you’re facing now, and start with the first one.
Jump to: Running a startup · Managing people · Strategy · Product · Change and AI · Working with a coach · What’s next · ADHD · Emotions and the body · How I coach · Building a solo business
Running a startup
Where I’d start
Tony Fadell, Build. Start here: practical advice on building products, teams and yourself, from the person who led the iPod team and founded Nest.
Matt Mochary, The Great CEO Within. For running the company week to week: meetings, decisions, hiring and your own time.
Ben Horowitz, The Hard Thing About Hard Things. For the hard calls, and for keeping going when it looks lost.
More I recommend
Geoffrey Moore, Crossing the Chasm. When growth stalls after the early customers.
Reed Hastings and Erin Meyer, No Rules Rules. For building a company that doesn’t depend on you.
Eric Ries, The Lean Startup. For testing an idea before you bet the company on it.
Jim Collins, Good to Great. For what set lasting companies apart, from years of research.
Phil Knight, Shoe Dog. The honest story of building Nike, doubts and all.
Peter Thiel and Blake Masters, Zero to One. For finding what only you can build.
Managing people
Where I’d start
Julie Zhuo, The Making of a Manager. If you’re new to managing, start here.
Michael Bungay Stanier, The Coaching Habit. Then this: seven questions that help you ask more and tell less.
Patrick Lencioni, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. For your leadership team: why smart people still don’t work well together, told as a story.
More I recommend
Michael Bungay Stanier, The Advice Trap. Its follow-up, on why holding back your advice is so hard, and how to do it.
Kim Scott, Radical Candor. For feedback: how to be direct because you care.
Claire Hughes Johnson, Scaling People. For building the ways a growing company runs, from Stripe’s former COO.
Erin Meyer, The Culture Map. For leading people from other countries.
Ethan Evans (YouTube). A former Amazon VP on growing into bigger leadership jobs.
Russ Laraway, When They Win, You Win. Scripts for the conversations managers find hardest.
Michael Watkins, The First 90 Days. For your first three months in a new leadership job.
Strategy
Where I’d start
Richard Rumelt, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy. Start here: how to tell a real strategy from a list of goals.
A.G. Lafley and Roger Martin, Playing to Win. Then this: the five choices that make a strategy.
More I recommend
Richard Rumelt, The Crux. The follow-up: find the problem that matters most, and act on it.
Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, Business Model Generation. For mapping how your business makes money on one page.
Richard Russell, The OKR Operating System. My own free book, on running a company on OKRs.
Hamilton Helmer, 7 Powers. The few lasting advantages a company can have.
Christina Wodtke, Radical Focus. OKRs, told as a story.
Donella Meadows, Thinking in Systems. For seeing why the same problems keep coming back.
Product
Where I’d start
Melissa Perri, Escaping the Build Trap. Start here if your team ships plenty but little changes.
Marty Cagan, Transformed. For moving the whole company to the way the best product companies work.
More I recommend
Marty Cagan, Inspired. How strong product teams find products customers love.
Marty Cagan, Empowered. For leading product teams: give them problems to solve, not features to build.
Colin Bryar and Bill Carr, Working Backwards. How Amazon decides what to build, from two people who were there.
Teresa Torres, Continuous Discovery Habits. For talking to customers every week, not once a year.
Rob Fitzpatrick, The Mom Test. How to ask customers questions that get honest answers.
Lenny Rachitsky, Lenny’s Podcast (podcast). Interviews with product and growth leaders: there’s an episode for almost any product question.
Change and AI
Where I’d start
John Kotter, Leading Change. Start here: the eight steps, and why most change efforts fail.
Kai-Fu Lee, AI Native. For what rebuilding a company around AI asks of its leaders.
More I recommend
Eric Ries, The Startup Way. For bringing startup ways of working into a big company.
Satya Nadella, Hit Refresh. How Microsoft’s CEO changed its culture.
Stephen Bungay, The Art of Action. Why plans and what people actually do drift apart, and how to close the gap.
Working with a coach
Where I’d start
Scott Osman, Jacquelyn Lane and Marshall Goldsmith, Becoming Coachable. Read this before you start, to get the most out of working with a coach.
What’s next
Where I’d start
Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, Designing Your Life. Start here: try out possible next steps before you commit to one.
Oliver Burkeman, Four Thousand Weeks. For deciding what to do with the time you have.
Steven Pressfield, Turning Pro. When you know what you want to do, and keep not doing it.
More I recommend
Brené Brown, The Gifts of Imperfection. For letting go of who you think you should be.
Todd Herman, The Alter Ego Effect. For showing up as the version of you the moment needs.
Paul Millerd, The Pathless Path. For stepping off the standard career path.
ADHD
Where I’d start
Ned Hallowell, ADHD Explained. Start here: what ADHD is, and what helps.
Ned Hallowell and John Ratey, ADHD 2.0. Then this: the newer science, and practical ways to use it.
Peter Shankman, Faster Than Normal. From an entrepreneur with ADHD, on making it work for you.
More I recommend
Russell Barkley, Taking Charge of Adult ADHD. A practical guide from one of the field’s leading researchers.
Ned Hallowell and John Ratey, Driven to Distraction. The book that brought adult ADHD to wide attention, first published in 1994.
Cal Newport, Time-Block Planner. A paper planner for giving every hour a job.
Alex Partridge, Now It All Makes Sense. A survival guide for adults who found out about their ADHD later in life.
Emotions and the body
Where I’d start
Gary Chapman, The 5 Love Languages. Start here: how you show care, to the people around you and to yourself.
Eugene Gendlin, Focusing. How to listen to what your body already knows about a problem.
Joe Hudson, Art of Accomplishment (podcast and YouTube). On feeling what you feel, and how that makes decisions clearer.
More I recommend
Eckhart Tolle, The Power of Now. For getting out of your head and into the present.
Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score. How stress and trauma stay in the body, and what helps.
Bruce Tift, Already Free. Two ways to work with hard feelings, changing them and being with them, from a therapist who is also a Buddhist teacher.
Lisa Feldman Barrett, How Emotions Are Made. The science of how the brain makes emotions.
Richard Schwartz, No Bad Parts. On the parts of you that pull different ways, and why none of them is the enemy.
Peter Gill, The Way of Curiosity. Listening to your body with open curiosity, in the tradition of Focusing.
How I coach
For coaches, and for anyone curious about what’s behind my coaching.
Where I’d start
Claire Pedrick, Simplifying Coaching. Start here: how to do less in a session, so your client does more.
Michael Neill, The Inside-Out Revolution. Why our feelings come from our thinking, not our circumstances, and what that frees up.
More I recommend
Tony Robbins, Awaken the Giant Within. Much better than his first book.
Marcia Reynolds, Coach the Person, Not the Problem. For coaching the person in front of you, not only their problem.
Amy Hardison and Alan Thompson, The Ultimate Coach. About the coach Steve Hardison and his clients.
Claire Pedrick and Lucia Baldelli, The Human Behind the Coach. On the coach as a person, not only a set of skills.
Nancy Kline, Time to Think. How giving someone your full attention helps them think.
Henry Kimsey-House and others, Co-Active Coaching. One of the core coaching models, and a good place to learn the basics.
Building a solo business
For coaches, consultants and anyone selling their own expertise.
Where I’d start
Rich Litvin and Steve Chandler, The Prosperous Coach. Start here: how coaches create clients by serving people first.
Rich Litvin, $100K Clients. Finding, coaching and keeping high-value clients.
Alex Hormozi, $100M Offers, $100M Leads and $100M Money Models. Making an offer, finding the people for it, and pricing it so the business works.
More I recommend
Taki Moore, Million Dollar Coach. Strategies for growing a coaching business: offers, marketing and sales.
Ankush Jain, Awakening the Coach Within. Lessons on building a thriving coaching practice.
Donald Miller, Coach Builder. For turning what you know into a coaching business.
Alan Weiss, Million Dollar Consulting. The classic on building a high-fee consulting practice.
Sarah Short, The Intersection. The best book I’ve seen on choosing a niche.
Michael Port, Book Yourself Solid. A step-by-step way to fill your practice with clients.
Justin Welsh, The Saturday Essay (newsletter). Weekly lessons on running a one-person business.
Written by
Richard Russell
Coach for founders and leadership teams
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Richard Russell’s recommended books, podcasts and videos for founders and leaders, by topic: where to start, and what next.