Don’t Give Up on Your New Year’s Resolutions Yet!
January 19 is the day most people give up on their resolutions, in fact, Strava calls it “Quitter’s Day.” A few years ago I was at a New Years’ eve dinner with a friend and our spouses and we were talking about our reading habits. Both of us read a good number of books a year but commented that we didn’t really have a reading goal.
Somewhere later in the evening, we decided that having a goal of 100 books a year would be a good stretch goal and we kicked off 2017 with that target. I finished the first year at 104. 2018 finished at 94. I’ve now set a goal of 75 a year, continuing the 2019 goal into 2020. If you’re interested you can find a list here on Goodreads.
Yes, to preemptively answer the question, Audible and Libby (a free app that connects to your local library for audiobooks) represents the majority of my reading these days. But to get to 75 (or 100) you’ll need to do physical, e-books, and audio.
For me, I’ve found the curiosity is part of what makes good founders. I’m curious about things I don’t know especially where topics cross-industry segments – for example, what works in one vertical market, may not work at another.
Learning from books is cheaper than learning from experience.
I recently finished Leadership Strategies and Tactics: Field Manual by Jocko Willink, also the author of Extreme Ownership. He’s a Navy Seal that now runs a leadership company. One of the points he makes in the book is about Detaching. If you’re the leader, you’re not generally the point person in a firefight. If you are, you’re going to need perspective and to get that perspective you’ll need to detach.
By detaching from the current situation you’ll gain perspective on the battle and look for your next moves. If you’re in the midst of the battle it can be difficult to detach. That’s true for founders as well! If you’re in the weeds from day to day, it’s hard to look at the bigger picture.
What are you favorite books from last year? Send me your list dave.parker@startupdigestmail.com or tag me in Twitter @DaveParkerSEA
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