My Crazy Project: Read 52 of the Best Business Books in 52 Weeks and Post a Weekly Review

“You wasted $150,000 on an education you could have gotten for a dollar fifty in late fees at the public library.”
– Will Hunting (played by Matt Damon), Good Will Hunting. First of all I want to introduce myself to those who do not know me: I am Olivier Roland, I am 27 years old, I am French and I run an information services company that I created when I was 19 (with 3 people).

Do you know the MBA Staff? It is a concept created by Josh Kaufman. Departing from the assumption that business schools do not have a monopoly on knowledge and wisdom, he suggests that each of us pass a personal MBA by reading a selection of the best business books out there, around 77 published in 2008 (93 with supplements). ) in 12 different categories.

1. Quick start

2. Productivity and Efficiency

3. Psychology and Communication

4. Design and Production

5. Marketing, Sales and Negotiation

6. entrepreneurship

7. management and leadership

8. Strategy and Innovation

9. Finance and Analysis

10. personal finance

11. Supplement: Business History

12. Supplement: Business Reference But what is an MBA, you might ask? It stands for Master of Business Administration, a degree that is the result of some very expensive classes (around 50,000 ¬ in Europe, $100,000 in the US!) and at a high level for doing business in the global economy, strategy, marketing, finance, human resources and management. It typically takes 12 to 24 months and is often pursued by students who want to finish their education with a prestigious degree, typically mid-career executives who want to increase their career potential through the acquisition of high-level knowledge. level, at outrageous cost, quite a bit In addition to the cost itself, an MBA requires you to sacrifice a full year or two, which sometimes requires you to quit your salaried job. That’s why Josh came up with the idea of ​​acquiring the essential knowledge distilled in the MBA, that 20% of people achieve 80% of the results, by reading a handpicked list of the best books covering the subject areas. that are taught in the MBA. – for less than $3,500, if you buy the books new, and even less if you buy the books used or borrow them. Started in 2005, the personal MBA has been issued twice, and now the idea is starting to take off: check out this article on Business Week or this one on Lifehacker. It seems that the idea of ​​getting a quality education for oneself is not new. To learn more about the Personal MBA, read The Personal MBA Manifesto. My project consists of 52 books from this list. I am approaching this project seriously, and I am preparing for it in the same way that I would train for a marathon: I know that the challenge will be long and difficult, especially once the initial motivation, as well as the enthusiasm to begin, they wear out off. Why am I doing this? Here are my reasons:

    • Because I am self-taught and I love to learn. I also love reading and I love learning by reading. Ever since I built my business as a young man – 19 years old, I’d be the happy owner of a degree if it wasn’t for 10 or 20 credits missing, and I’ve learned most of what I know on the job, learning a lot from my mistakes, and also taking a few classes here and there. I have also taken a few evening classes, but the practical application of these classes is not always apparent in my business.

    • Because I feel the need to acquire more knowledge to better run my business, to better understand the workings of the business world in which I find myself, to be more effective in all the projects that I have undertaken or will undertake and to gain a better appreciation of the world in general.

    • Because I have already read several of the books listed in the PMBA, and found them excellent, with a special mention for The 4 hour work week. They all changed my perception of certain things, sometimes radically. They have all changed my life on at least one level or given me a new tool to work with. In light of the major changes these 7 books wrought, I can hardly imagine what 52 will do!

    • Because reading 52 books in 52 weeks, writing a review and posting it here without ruining my professional and social life represents a challenge in itself, which will put all my organization and self-motivation skills into action. If I procrastinate too long, if I don’t organize myself well enough, if my motivation sinks like a rock, I won’t get there. And you’ll be the first to know. I will learn as much from the project itself as from the books.

    • Do a real life experiment to see if it is possible to change your life by reading the right books. That is the goal of this blog, I do not want to create a blog that only talks about this challenge, and I will try to show that it is possible by sharing with you what it brings to my business, my projects and my daily life. life.

    • Share the results of this project with others, in particular by writing clear, concise and relevant summaries.

    • To improve my English (about 80% of books are only available in English). How should I undertake this task? These are the rules of the challenge:

      1. Choose 52 books from The Personal MBA’s current list.

      2. Read one week for 52 weeks. Write a relevant summary, including a general and chapter-by-chapter summary, if the book lends itself to that.

      3. Sacrifice only what is useless. I don’t plan to stop my other activities: my business, improvisational theater, sports, my two clubs for entrepreneurs, my other blogs, my free time, my personal life. I am going to try to organize myself better and get rid of what is useless: casual web browsing, video games, YouTube, everything that wastes precious time in general. I can’t cut out the tv as I barely watch it anyway.

      4. To take action. Thinking without doing something is just as stupid as doing something without thinking. Thinking is based both on our experience, in the field, and on our knowledge, acquired from books, school, in conversation with others. The first problem is to choose the 52 books among the 77 or the 93 of the PMBA. This was not an easy task. First, there are several books that I have already read (7 in total). For the most part, I decided to add them to the list because (1) they are worth reading again and (2) I want to write a review about them because I think they are all important. In the end, I got rid of the two sections of the Supplement (Business History and Business Reference), it’s 16 books, the books are only available in an audio version (being French, it’s much harder for me to understand spoken English than English written) , much of the category Design and Production (being services and software, this seemed less important to me), all in the Personal Finance category (I have already read The millionaire next door, which already opened my eyes to this topic – as well as the Get Rich Slowly and The Simple Dollar blogs and I’ll wait until I’m richer before delving into this topic 😉 and the ones that seemed too specialized or too US-specific Here, then, is the list of the 52 books I will read. The original PMBA obviously suggests a list of titles exclusively in English, but some of them have been translated into French. I’ll read them in French when possible, to save time, and read the rest in English.

         Quick start
         1. 10 days for faster reading by Abby Marks Beale
         2. >Fortress Finder 2.0 by Tom Rath
         3. lead the field by Earl Nightingale

            Productivity and Efficiency

         4. The Cash Executive by Peter Drucker
         5. Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by david allen
         6. bit literacy by Mark Hurst
         7. The creative habit by Twyla Tharp
         8. The path of least resistance by Roberto Fritz
         9. The Simplicity Survival Manual by Bill Jensen
         10. Come to the point by Stuart Levine
         11. The unwritten laws of business by W. J. King
         12. Make things happen by Scott Berkun
         13. Results without authority by Tom Kendrick

             Psychology and Communication

         14. How to win friends and influence peopleby Dale Carnegie
         15. crucial conversations by Kerry Patterson, Joseph Grenny, Ron McMillan and Al Switzler
         16. Presentation Zen: simple ideas on designing and delivering presentationsby Garr Reynolds
         17. Made to Stick: why some ideas survive and others die by Chip and Dan Heath
         18. Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert B Cialdini
         19. Sources of power: how people make decisions by Gary Klein
         20. deep survival by Laurence Gonzalez
             Design and Production

         21. getting real by 37signals (free PDF eBook)
             Marketing, Sales and Negotiation

         22. All sellers are liars by Seth Godin
         23. Indispensable by Joe Calloway
         24. Get all you can out of all you got by Jay Abraham
         25. The sales bible by Jeffrey Gitomer
         26. The ultimate sales machine by Chet Holmes
         27. sale of drafts by Neil Rackham
         28. trade for advantage by G. Richard Shell
         29. three-dimensional negotiation by David A. Lax and James K. Sebenius

             entrepreneurship

         30. The new business driving test by John Mullins
         31. Ready, Shoot, Aim by Michael Masterson
         32. The 4 hour work week by Timothy Ferriss
         33. How to make millions with your ideas by dan kennedy

             management and leadership

         34. First, break all the rules by Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman
         35. 12: The Elements of Great Management by Rodd Wagner and James Harter
         36. What got you here won’t get you there by Marshall Goldsmith
         37. cultivating great employees by Erika Anderson
         38. >45 effective ways to hire smart by Pierre Morell
         39. Judgment by Noel Tichy and Warren Bennis
         40. the halo effect by Phil Rosenzweig
         41. The Essential Drucker by Peter F. Drucker
             Strategy and Innovation

         42. Purpose: the starting point of large companies by Nikos Mourkogiannis
         43. Blue Ocean Strategy by W. Chan Kim and Renée Mauborgne
         44. see what’s next by Clayton M. Christensen, Erik A. Roth, Scott D. Anthony
         45. learning from the future by Liam Fahey and Robert Randall
         46. Innovation and entrepreneurship by Peter F. Drucker
         47. innovation myths by Scott Berkun
         48. green to gold by Daniel Esty and Andrew Winston

             Finance and Analysis

         49. Turn numbers into knowledge by Jonathan Koomey
         50. show me the numbers by Stephen Few
         51. marketing metrics by Paul W. Farris, Neil T. Bendle, Phillip E. Pfeifer, and David J. Reibstein
         52. Web analytics: one hour a day by Avinash Kaushik

         I don’t necessarily plan to read the books in this order, but I will try to read everything one category at a time to make it easier to compare and connect my new knowledge.

         My project officially starts on October 1st. Let’s stay on the 4th or 5th for the first review of the first book, 10 days for faster reading.