Essential Christmas Reads - Part 2

My last post introduced a range of business books that all business owners should read at some stage, if not already. Once you have knocked them off, here are 5 more that should also add to your knowledge, vision and enthusiasm for business ownership.

I welcome your comments and feedback on whether you have enjoyed these books or not and what other titles you think should be on the list.

Getting Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got
Jay Abraham

This book provides some powerful strategies for boosting your business. The author believes that anyone can advance in life by tapping into hidden assets and developing the right mindset. He writes, "You are surrounded by simple, obvious solutions that can dramatically increase your income, power, influence and success. The problem is, you just don't see them."

Abraham's central theme is that everyone is in sales. In almost any profession, people must be skilled at selling themselves and their ideas, not just their company's product or service.

Business owners with the itch to grow must read this book. The ideas are varied enough to work with kitchen-table businesses, as well as large firms, because they are outstanding and because they are communicated so well.


The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
John C Maxwell

What would happen if a top expert with more than thirty years of leadership experience were willing to distil everything he had learned about leadership into a handful of life-changing principles just for you?

The result is a revealing study of leadership delivered in an easy-to-understand and easier-to-implement style.


The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People
Steven Covey

True success encompasses a balance of personal and professional effectiveness, so this book is a manual for performing better in both arenas

This awesome book presents a holistic, integrated, principle-centred approach for solving personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and pointed anecdotes, Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, service, and human dignity - principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.
This isn't a quick-tips-start-tomorrow kind of book. The concepts are sometimes intricate, and you'll want to study this book, not skim it. When you finish, you'll probably have Post-it notes or hand-written annotations in every chapter, and you'll feel like you've taken a powerful seminar by Covey.

Raving Fans
Ken Blanchard

Your customers are only satisfied because their expectations are so low and because no one else is doing better. Just having satisfied customers isn't good enough anymore. If you really want a booming business, you have to create Raving Fans

Raving Fans uses a brilliantly simple and charming story to teach how to define a vision, learn what a customer really wants, institute effective systems, and make Raving Fan Service a constant feature in your business.


Loosing My Virginity
Richard Branson

In this autobiography, Virgin Group founder Richard Branson says one of his prime business criteria is "fun." Fun made Branson a billionaire, and few business memoirs are one-billionth as fun as Branson's, nor as niftily written.