A list of the books which I found to be most useful for myself, as well as for others whom I have mentored during technology business start-up, development and scaling.

1. The Essential Technology Start-Up Book List
Dave Litwiller
Originally Published April 2011
Updated April 2014
Narratives
Walker, J., (1989). The Autodesk File: The No-Holds-Barred Story of the Making of a Software Company.
Thousand Oaks, USA: New Riders Publishing.
The Autodesk File captures the growth of the company and its products from their beginnings through IPO
from the documents that were used within the company at the time.
http://www.fourmilab.ch/autofile/afpdf.zip
Stone, B., (2013). The Everything Store. New York, USA: Little, Brown.
The story of building Amazon describes the relentless drive and energy required to build and sustain an
industry-defining company from start-up to scale, taking it from its beachhead vertical to many sectors.
http://www.amazon.ca/The-Everything-Store-Bezos-Amazon-ebook/dp/B00BWQW73E
Kidder, T. (1981). The Soul of a New Machine. New York, USA: Back Bay.
The Soul is a suspenseful description of the challenges for an organization and its people of bringing a
complex technology to life. Soul is a Pulitzer Prize winning book.
http://www.amazon.ca/The-Soul-A-New-Machine/dp/B00008RWB6
Kaplan, S. J., (1994). Startup: A Silicon Valley Adventure. New York, USA: Penguin.
Startup is one of the best written books about the creation and fostering of a high profile, highly funded
company and its travails getting market adoption for an early pen-based computer.
http://www.amazon.com/Startup-Silicon-Adventure-Jerry-Kaplan/dp/0140257314
Taylor, S. and Schroeder, K., (2003). Inside Intuit. Boston, USA: Harvard Business School Press.
Inside Intuit details the trials and path to success of an exemplary customer-driven, user feedback premised
business. http://www.insideintuit.com/
Venture Capital, Term Sheets and Business Formation
Nesheim, J.L. (2000). High Tech Start Up: The Complete Handbook for Creating Successful New High
Tech Companies. New York, USA: The Free Press.
High Tech Start Up is the definitive guide to understanding venture capital term sheets. It also provides a
very good overview of the emotional demands placed on the founder to successfully start a technology-
based business, grow it, and achieve liquidity.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/068487170X/qid=1096675033/sr=ka-1/thenesheimgroup
Metrick, A. (2007). Venture Capital and the Finance of Innovation. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Venture Capital profiles the empirical and statistical drivers of the venture capital industry, as well as
valuation models, to help the entrepreneur prepare and negotiate most productively when seeking venture
capital financing. http://ca.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-EHEP000064.html

2. General Management
Stalk, G. and Hout, T. (1990). Competing Against Time. New York, USA: Free Press.
This book powerfully describes the competitive advantage and adaptability conferred by fast cycles of
action. http://www.bcg.com/expertise_impact/publicationdetails.aspx?id=tcm:12-14119
Cohen, D. and Feld, B. (2011). Do More Faster. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Do More Faster is a full playbook for the start-up phase, most applicable to mobile app, social media, and
web services ventures. It captures a great deal of the intensive mentorship guidance from the TechStars
program to help young Web 2.0 companies start quickly and make the most of their potential.
http://www.domorefasterbook.com/
Kotter, J. (1990). A Force for Change. New York, USA: Free Press.
A Force for Change is a concise look at the differences between leadership and management, and how to do
both simultaneously and well.
http://www.amazon.ca/Force-For-Change-Leadership-Management/dp/0029184657
Horowitz, B., (2014). The Hard Thing About Hard Things. New York, USA: HarperCollins.
Horowitz describes the CEO’s role, especially when pushing for the highest growth and valuation. It is
most relevant for building enterprise software businesses. Functional emphasis is often placed on sales and
product management. http://hardthings.bhorowitz.com/
Grove, A. S., (1983). High Output Management. New York, USA: Random House.
This is the classic book on effective management of people and projects by the former CEO and chairman
of Intel. It is a must-read for people coming into supervisory and management positions for the first time.
http://www.amazon.com/High-Output-Management-Andrew-Grove/dp/0679762884
Bell, C.G., (1991). High-Tech Ventures: The Guide for Entrepreneurial Success. Reading, USA: Addison-
Wesley.
High Tech Ventures was one of the first and still most relevant guides describing an analytical approach to
moving an embryonic technology-based business toward much greater scale and success.
http://www.amazon.com/High-tech-Ventures-Guide-Entrepreneurial-Success/dp/0201563215#_
Sloan, A. P., (1990). My Years With General Motors. New York, USA: Doubleday.
My Years describes early scaling of General Motors at nearly unprecedented levels. It looks at the
emergent issues encountered and overcome in technology, operations, markets, financial controls and
human resources. It is most relevant for companies poised to take a large market.
http://blogs.hbr.org/2014/03/my-years-with-general-motors-fifty-years-on/
Rodgers, T.J., Taylor, W., and Foreman, R. (1992). No-Excuses Management: Proven Systems for Starting
Fast, Growing Quickly and Surviving Hard Times. New York, USA: Doubleday.
No Excuses Management details the systems for goal setting and performance management used by the
fiery founder-CEO of Cypress Semiconductor during its heyday of battling and succeeding in the hyper-
competitive memory chip business.
http://www.amazon.com/No-Excuses-Management-Systems-Starting-Surviving/dp/0385426046

3. Colley J.L., et al. (2007). Principles of General Management: The Art and Science of Getting Results
Across Organizational Boundaries. New Haven, USA: Yale University Press.
Principles of General Management lays out planning, analysis, monitoring, reporting and corrective action
methods suitable for organizations of all sizes.
http://yalepress.yale.edu/book.asp?isbn=9780300117097
Business Model Generation and Tuning
Mullins, J. and Komisar, R. (2009). Getting to Plan B: Breaking Through to a Better Business Model.
Boston, USA: Harvard Business School Press.
Getting to Plan B describes methods, tools and techniques for monitoring the performance of a
hypothesized or current business model, and developing data-driven, fact-based indicators from which to
evolve to a better business model.
http://www.amazon.com/Getting-Plan-Breaking-Through-Business/dp/1422126692
Blank, S. G. (2007). The Four Steps to the Epiphany: Successful Strategies for Products that Win. USA.
The Four Steps details an iterative strategic and tactical process based on rigorous feedback for aligning
company development with that of the product and the customer base in a rapidly growing enterprise.
http://www.amazon.com/Four-Steps-Epiphany-Steven-Blank/dp/0976470705
Finance and Accounting
The Harvard Business Essentials Series (2002). Finance for Managers. Boston, USA: Harvard Business
School Publishing.
Finance for Managers is a primer for non-financial entrepreneurs and executives on financial terms and
activities in order to credibly discuss financial projections, monitoring and reporting with prospective and
current investors, as well as other stakeholders.
http://hbr.org/product/harvard-business-essentials-guide-to-finance-for-m/an/8768-PBK-ENG
Product Management
Davidow, W. (1986). Marketing High Technology. New York, USA: The Free Press.
Marketing High Technology is a look at the successful strategy used by Intel in its early days of becoming
a microprocessor pioneer by creating a more complete product in the eyes of customers and faster cycles of
action than the competition.
http://www.amazon.com/Marketing-High-Technology-William-Davidow/dp/002907990X
Also, noted above, The Four Steps to the Epiphany is an important work for strategic product management,
and, The Hard Things About Hard Things discusses product manager training.

4. Research & Development
Reinertsen, D. G. (2009). The Principles of Product Development Flow – Second Generation Lean Product
Development. Redondo Beach, USA: Celeritas Publishing.
Flow is a comprehensive toolkit to help instrument and manage R&D activities for more rapid, adaptable
and predictable outcomes. The principles it describes can help with every type of R&D methodology, from
agile software development to phase-gate hardware and capital equipment creation.
http://www.amazon.com/Principles-Product-Development-Flow-Generation/dp/1935401009
McConnell, S. (1996). Rapid Development: Taming Wild Software Schedules. Redmond, USA: Microsoft
Press.
Rapid Development is an unrivalled look at scheduling, monitoring and providing course corrections for
complex engineering projects. It is written based on software development efforts, but the empirics and
techniques are extensible to nearly any type of engineering project. The sections devoted to project
recovery are especially useful.
http://www.amazon.com/Rapid-Development-Taming-Software-Schedules/dp/1556159005
Jones, C., (1997). Applied Software Measurement: Assuring Productivity and Quality. New York, USA:
McGraw-Hill.
Applied Software Measurement is a tour de force of quantitatively estimating and measuring productivity
and quality in software system design, delivery and maintenance.
http://www.amazon.com/Applied-Software-Measurement-Assuring-Productivity/dp/0070328269
Presentations
Weissman, J. (2009). Presenting to Win. Upper Saddle River, USA: FT Press.
Presenting to Win is the best book on making business and financial presentations, written by the most
successful coach of CEOs preparing for IPO roadshows.
http://www.amazon.ca/Presenting-Win-Telling-Updated-Expanded/dp/0137144172
Professional Services
Maister, D.H. (1997). Managing the Professional Services Firm. New York, USA: Free Press.
-and-
Baschab, J. and Piot, J. (2005) The Professional Services Firm Bible. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Managing the Professional Services Firm and The Professional Services Firm Bible provide firm-level
views of developing, promoting and delivering professional services. These books are widely extensible to
the professional services elements of consultative selling and service-augmented product delivery in high
technology.
http://www.amazon.com/Managing-Professional-Service-David-Maister/dp/0684834316
http://www.amazon.com/Professional-Services-Firm-Bible/dp/0471660485

5. Marketing
Jeffery, .M. (2010) Data-Driven Marketing. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
This book provides a comprehensive overview of ROI-based, data-driven marketing techniques which
apply to efforts both on- and off-line.
http://www.amazon.ca/Data-Driven-Marketing-Metrics-Everyone-Should/dp/0470504544
Halligan, B. and Shah, D. (2010). Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media and Blogs.
Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Inbound Marketing is a thorough tactical guide to web and social media marketing for businesses.
http://inboundmarketing.com/book
Sales
Coonradt, C. (2007). The Game of Work. Layton, USA: Gibbs Smith.
The Game is a detailed guide to setting goals, gaining personal commitment from staff, and stoking
competitive instincts in a sales organization. It applies also to other easily measured environments.
http://www.amazon.com/Game-Work-The-Charles-Coonradt/dp/1423630858
Bosworth, M. T. (1995). Solution Selling: Creating Buyers in Difficult Selling Markets. New York, USA:
McGraw-Hill.
Solution Selling provides a tactical master class for conducting and influencing the sales process in large
transaction price business-to-business technology sales, especially IT.
http://www.amazon.com/Solution-Selling-Creating-Difficult-Markets/dp/0786303158
Miller, G. (2009). Spent: Sex, Evolution and Consumer Behaviour. New York, USA: Penguin.
Spent describes the basis in evolutionary psychology for what drives consumer behaviour. It draws
connections to what works, what doesn’t, and why in consumer products, video and social media games, as
well as web services.
http://www.amazon.com/Spent-Sex-Evolution-Consumer-
Behavior/dp/B002ZNJWHW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1302875176&sr=1-1
Goldstein, N.J., Martin, S.J., and Cialdini, R.B. (2008) Yes!: 50 Scientifically Proven Ways to be
Persuasive. New York, USA: Free Press.
Yes! delivers behavioural psychology research on influencing people, updating Cialdini’s classic book on
the subject, Influence. The ideas Yes! presents are important to make the most of any type of person-to-
person selling or persuasion effort, as well as enhancing products, games, incentives, and service offerings
to be most compelling.
http://www.amazon.com/Yes-Scientifically-Proven-Ways-
Persuasive/dp/1416576142/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1302875213&sr=1-3

6. Governance
Conger, J. A. et al (2009). Boardroom Realities: Building Leaders Across Your Board. San Francisco,
USA: Jossey-Bass.
Boardroom Realities is current look at how to build and deliver leadership from the boardroom, optimizing
performance and impact of the board of directors for the organization.
http://www.josseybass.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470391782.html
Nadler, D., Behan, B., and Nadler, M. (2006). Building Better Boards: A Blueprint for Effective
Governance. San Francisco, USA: Jossey-Bass.
Building Better Boards taps the collective experience of a large number of seasoned corporate directors to
convey a range of methods and techniques to achieve efficient and effective board operation.
http://www.amazon.ca/Building-Better-Boards-Blueprint-Governance/dp/078798180X
Feld, B., and Ramsinghani, M. (2014). Startup Boards. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Startup Boards is a unique and comprehensive guide to the practical issues of making the board of directors
work well in a start-up. http://www.amazon.ca/Startup-Boards-Getting-Board-Directors/dp/1118443667
Also, The Four Steps to the Epiphany, noted above, describes in detail a recommended set of interaction
points for the board of directors overseeing start-up and growth stage technology businesses to help shape
the development of the business and its main product platform.
Intellectual Property Licensing
Megantz, R. (2002) Technology Management. Hoboken, USA: Wiley.
Technology Management is a thorough tour through the world of licensing technology both out and in.
Note that this book largely pre-dates the widespread use of open source technologies and the particular
issues for IP licensing and recommitment which come in open source.
http://ca.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0471200182.html
Compiled By:
David J. Litwiller is a senior executive in high technology, based in Waterloo, Ontario. His background is
in wireless devices, precision electro-mechanics, semiconductors, electro-optics, MEMS, biotech
instrumentation, and enterprise software. He serves as an advisor for various private corporations in
matters of strategy, technology, operations, and business development. Mr. Litwiller is the author of
“Rapid Advance - Mergers & Acquisitions, Partnerships, Restructurings, Turnarounds and Divestitures in
High Technology”.
http://www.amazon.com/Rapid-Advance-Acquisitions-Partnerships-
Restructurings/dp/1439200874/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1287516364&sr=1-1.