Book recommendations for software entrepreneurs and product managers

These books have proven to be helpful for software entrepreneurs and I highly recommend them. I made this list initially back in year 2012 and kept it updated since.

Thinking & Strategy

• “80/20 Principle” by Richard Koch
• “The Black Swan” by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
• “Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity” by David Allen
• “Improv Wisdom: Don’t Prepare, Just Show Up” by Patricia Ryan Madson
• “The 4-hour workweek” by Tim Ferris
• “Good To Great” by James C. Collins, Jerry I. Porras
• “The Art of War” by Sun Tzu
• “Tao Te Ching” by Lao Tzu
• “The Book of Five Rings” by Miyamoto Musashi

Customer & Product Development

• “The Startup Owner’s Manual” by Steven Gary Blank
• “Running Lean: Iterate from Plan A to a Plan That Works” by Ash Maurya
• “Business Model Generation” by Alex Osterwalder
• “The Lean Startup” by Eric Ries

User Experience Design

• “Don’t Make Me Think” by Steve Krug
• “The Design of Everyday Things“ by Don Norman

Software Development

• “The Mythical Man Month” by Fred Brooks
• “The Pragmatic Programmer: From Journeyman to Master” by Andrew Hunt

Entrepreneurship

• “Rework” by Jason Fried, David Heinemeier Hansson
• “The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don’t Work and What to Do About It” by Michael E. Gerber
• “The Art of the Start: The Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything” by Guy Kawasaki

Bootstrapping A Company

• “Start Small, Stay Small: A Developer’s Guide to Launching a Startup” by Rob Walling
• “The Bootstrapper’s Bible: How to Start and Build a Business with a Great Idea and (Almost) No Money” by Seth Godin
• “The 7 Day Startup: You Don’t Learn Until You Launch” by Dan Norris

Innovation

• “The Innovator’s Dilemma” by Clayton M. Christensen
• “The Innovator’s Solution” by Clayton M. Christensen
• “Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant” by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne
• “Crossing the Chasm” by Geoffrey A. Moore

Project Management

• “Agile Project Management” by Ken Schwaber
• “Agile Estimating & Planning” by Mike Cohn

Marketing, Sales & Business

• “Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die” by Chip and Dan Heath
• “Inbound Marketing” by Brian Halligan and Dharmesh Shah
• “Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion” by Robert B. Cialdini
• “Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery” by Garr Reynolds
• “How to Win Friends & Influence People” by Dale Carnegie
• “Word of Mouth Marketing” by Andy Sernovitz
• “Guerilla Marketing” by Jay Conrad Levinson
• “Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In” by Roger Fisher
• “Traction: A Startup Guide to Getting Customers” by Gabriel Weinberg