Jake Dixon's Top Books To Read In 2023
It is not about how many books you can read, it is about what you implement based on the books you read. Below are Jake's Top 12 book recommendations for Broker Owners to read in 2023. What would your year look like if you read and implemented 1 book per month? How can The Locker Room help you implement what you learn? Our partners are here to help you strategize, implement, and be held accountable!
1. FANS FIRST - JESSE COLE
The Savannah Bananas should not exist.
You can't name any of their players. They play in a 1920s-era ballpark with no ads or billboards. They play in kilts, stilts, and stilettos. They even have an all-grandma dance team: the Banana Nanas.
Everything the Bananas do is unconventional. It shouldn’t work.
And yet they sell out every game, have a waitlist in the thousands, ship merchandise around the globe, and entertain millions of followers on social media.
ESPN calls the Bananas “the greatest show in baseball.”
How is this even possible?
Two words: Fans First.
Packed with behind-the-peel stories, hard-earned lessons, and a few other surprises, Fans First teaches you how to stand out in your marketplace, drive explosive growth, and inspire fanatical loyalty.
If this all sounds bananas, that’s the point. Normal leaders read normal books and get normal results. But if you’re ready to change the game, break the rules, and create your own unforgettable team, then it’s time to go Fans First.
2. TRACTION - GINO WICKMAN
OVER 1 MILLION COPIES SOLD!
Do you have a grip on your business, or does your business have a grip on you.
All entrepreneurs and business leaders face similar frustrations—personnel conflict, profit woes, and inadequate growth. Decisions never seem to get made, or, once made, fail to be properly implemented. But there is a solution. It's not complicated or theoretical.The Entrepreneurial Operating System® is a practical method for achieving the business success you have always envisioned. More than 80,000 companies have discovered what EOS can do.
In Traction, you'll learn the secrets of strengthening the six key components of your business. You'll discover simple yet powerful ways to run your company that will give you and your leadership team more focus, more growth, and more enjoyment. Successful companies are applying Traction every day to run profitable, frustration-free businesses—and you can too.
3. BUILT TO LAST - JIM COLLINS
Drawing upon a six-year research project at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, James C. Collins and Jerry I. Porras took eighteen truly exceptional and long-lasting companies and studied each in direct comparison to one of its top competitors. They examined the companies from their very beginnings to the present day -- as start-ups, as midsize companies, and as large corporations. Throughout, the authors asked: "What makes the truly exceptional companies different from the comparison companies and what were the common practices these enduringly great companies followed throughout their history?"
Filled with hundreds of specific examples and organized into a coherent framework of practical concepts that can be applied by managers and entrepreneurs at all levels, Built to Last provides a master blueprint for building organizations that will prosper long into the 21st century and beyond.
4. A CEO ONLY DOES THREE THINGS - TREY TAYLOR
Whether you’re a new CEO trying to navigate chaotic workdays or a veteran of the C-Suite trying to reignite your passion, focus is your most important asset. Many owners and CEOs think they have to be involved in every aspect of their business. They spend valuable brainpower on low-priority decisions. Before long, they’re overworked and burned out.
Instead of doing everything, it’s time to focus on the right things.
A CEO Only Does Three Things zeroes in on the three pillars of business: culture, people, and numbers. Steeped in 20-plus years of practical knowledge, training, and consulting with some of the world’s largest companies, this indispensable guide shows how to articulate the right culture for your business, hire people with the right mindsets, and inspire your teams to produce optimal results.
Hundreds of CEOs have used Taylor’s methods to create fulfilled, efficient, professional lives, and you can join them. Learn how to focus on the work you love - and avoid CEO burnout.
5. THE 5 DYSFUNCTIONS OF A TEAM -PATRICK LENCIONI
After her first two weeks observing the problems at DecisionTech, Kathryn Petersen, its new CEO, had more than a few moments when she wondered if she should have taken the job. But Kathryn knew there was little chance she would have turned it down. After all, retirement had made her antsy, and nothing excited her more than a challenge. What she could not have known when she accepted the job, however, was just how dysfunctional her team was, and how team members would challenge her in ways that no one ever had before.
For twenty years, The Five Dysfunctions of a Team has been engaging audiences with a page-turning, realistic fable that follows the travails of Kathryn Petersen, DecisionTech’s CEO, as she faces the ultimate leadership crisis. She must unite a team in such disarray that it threatens to derail the entire company.
Equal parts leadership fable and business handbook, this definitive source on teamwork by Patrick Lencioni reveals the five behavioral tendencies that go to the heart of why even the best teams struggle. He offers a powerful model and step-by-step guide for overcoming those dysfunctions and getting every one rowing in the same direction.
Today, the lessons in The Five Dysfunctions of a Team are more relevant than ever. This special anniversary edition celebrates one of the best-selling business books of all time with a new foreword from the author that reflects on its legacy and lessons.
6. THE E-MYTH REVISITED
E-Myth \ 'e-,'mith\ n 1: the entrepreneurial myth: the myth that most people who start small businesses are entrepreneurs 2: the fatal assumption that an individual who understands the technical work of a business can successfully run a business that does that technical work
Voted #1 business book by Inc. 500 CEOs.
An instant classic, this revised and updated edition of the phenomenal bestseller dispels the myths about starting your own business. Small business consultant and author Michael E. Gerber, with sharp insight gained from years of experience, points out how common assumptions, expectations, and even technical expertise can get in the way of running a successful business.
Gerber walks you through the steps in the life of a business—from entrepreneurial infancy through adolescent growing pains to the mature entrepreneurial perspective: the guiding light of all businesses that succeed—and shows how to apply the lessons of franchising to any business, whether or not it is a franchise. Most importantly, Gerber draws the vital, often overlooked distinction between working on your business and working in your business.
The E-Myth Revisited will help you grow your business in a productive, assured way.
7. WHO NOT HOW - DAN SULLIVAN
Have you ever had a new idea or a goal that excites you... but not enough time to execute it? What about a goal you really want to accomplish...but can't because instead of taking action, you procrastinate? Do you feel like the only way things are going to get done is if you do them? But what if it wasn't that way? What if you had a team of people around you that helped you accomplish your goals (while you helped them accomplish theirs)?
When we want something done, we've been trained to ask ourselves: "How can I do this?" Well, there is a better question to ask. One that unlocks a whole new world of ease and accomplishment. Expert coach Dan Sullivan knows the question we should ask instead: "Who can do this for me?"
This may seem simple. And it is. But don't let the lack of complexity fool you. By mastering this question, you will quickly learn how billionaires and successful entrepreneurs like Dan build incredible businesses and personal freedom.
This book will teach you how to make this essential paradigm-shift so you can:
* Build a successful business effectively while not killing yourself
* Immediately free-up 1,000+ hours of work that you shouldn't be doing anyway
* Bypass the typical scarcity and decline of aging and other societal norms
* Increase your vision in all areas of life and build teams of WHOs to support you in that vision
* Never be limited in your goals and ambitions again
* Expand your abundance of wealth, innovation, relationships, and joy
* Build a life where everything you do is your choice--how you spend your time, how much money you make, the quality of your relationships, and the type of work you do
Making this shift involves retraining your brain to stop limiting your potential based on what you solely can do and instead focus on the nearly infinite and endless connections between yourself and other people as well as the limitless transformation possible through those connections.
8. THE POWER OF ONE MORE - ED MYLETT
You're one more intentional thought and action away from discovering your best life
In The Power of One More, renowned keynote speaker and performance expert Ed Mylett draws on 30 years of experience as an entrepreneur and coach to top athletes, entertainers, and business executives to reveal powerful strategies to help you live an extraordinary "one more" life.
In The Power of One More, you'll:
- Learn why you're closer to your dreams and goals than you think and why using The Power of One More strategies will help you cross the finish line in whatever race you're running
- Understand the psychology and science of how to use The Power of One More in every part of your life to help you solve problems and achieve levels of success you never thought possible
- Discover time-tested and unique solutions to challenges that will remove the mental roadblocks you've been battling for years
Perfect for anyone who wants more bliss, wealth, or better relationships, The Power of One More is an indispensable roadmap to realizing and exceeding your personal and professional goals by tapping into the superpowers and gifts you already have inside you.
9. THE INFINITE GAME - SIMON SINEK
From the New York Times bestselling author of Start With Why and Leaders Eat Last, a bold framework for leadership in today’s ever-changing world.
How do we win a game that has no end? Finite games, like football or chess, have known players, fixed rules and a clear endpoint. The winners and losers are easily identified. Infinite games, games with no finish line, like business or politics, or life itself, have players who come and go. The rules of an infinite game are changeable while infinite games have no defined endpoint. There are no winners or losers—only ahead and behind.
The question is, how do we play to succeed in the game we’re in?
In this revelatory new book, Simon Sinek offers a framework for leading with an infinite mindset. On one hand, none of us can resist the fleeting thrills of a promotion earned or a tournament won, yet these rewards fade quickly. In pursuit of a Just Cause, we will commit to a vision of a future world so appealing that we will build it week after week, month after month, year after year. Although we do not know the exact form this world will take, working toward it gives our work and our life meaning.
Leaders who embrace an infinite mindset build stronger, more innovative, more inspiring organizations. Ultimately, they are the ones who lead us into the future.
10. PROFIT FIRST - MIKE MICHALOWICZ
Author of cult classics The Pumpkin Plan and The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur offers a simple, counterintuitive cash management solution that will help small businesses break out of the doom spiral and achieve instant profitability.
Conventional accounting uses the logical (albeit, flawed) formula: Sales - Expenses = Profit. The problem is, businesses are run by humans, and humans aren't always logical. Serial entrepreneur Mike Michalowicz has developed a behavioral approach to accounting to flip the formula: Sales - Profit = Expenses. Just as the most effective weight loss strategy is to limit portions by using smaller plates, Michalowicz shows that by taking profit first and apportioning only what remains for expenses, entrepreneurs will transform their businesses from cash-eating monsters to profitable cash cows. Using Michalowicz's Profit First system, readers will learn that:
· Following 4 simple principles can simplify accounting and make it easier to manage a profitable business by looking at bank account balances.
· A small, profitable business can be worth much more than a large business surviving on its top line.
· Businesses that attain early and sustained profitability have a better shot at achieving long-term growth.
With dozens of case studies, practical, step-by-step advice, and his signature sense of humor, Michalowicz has the game-changing roadmap for any entrepreneur to make money they always dreamed of.
11. THE SEVEN LEVELS OF COMMUNICATION - MICHAEL J. MAHER
Can you imagine receiving a referral each and every day? Neither could real estate agent Rick Masters.
(7L) The Seven Levels of Communication tells the entertaining and educational story of Rick Masters, who is suffering from a down economy when he meets a mortgage professional who has built a successful business without advertising or personal promotion. Skeptical, he agrees to accompany her to a conference to learn more about her mysterious methods. Rick soon learns that the rewards for implementing these strategies are far greater than he had ever imagined. In seeking success, he finds significance. This heartwarming tale of Rick's trials and triumphs describes the exact strategies that helped him evolve from the Ego Era to the Generosity Generation. This book is about so much more than referrals. This is about building a business that not only feeds your family, but also feeds your soul.
12. GREAT TEAMS: 16 THINGS HIGH PERFOMING ORGANIZATIONS DO DIFFERENTLY - DON YAEGER
What makes a team great? Not just good and not just functional—but great?
Over six years, long-time Sports Illustrated editor Don Yaeger was invited by some of the greatest companies in the world to speak about the habits of high-performing individuals. From Microsoft and Starbucks to the New England Patriots and San Antonio Spurs, what do some organizations do seemingly better than most of their opponents?
Don took the challenge. He began building into his travel schedule opportunities to interview our generation’s greatest team builders from the sports and business worlds. During this process, he conducted more than 100 interviews with some of the most successful teams and organizations in the country. From those interviews, Don identified 16 habits that drive these high-performing teams.
Building on the stories, examples, and first-hand accounts, each chapter in Great Teams comes with applicable examples on how to apply these characteristics in any organization. Great Teams includes:
- Life lessons from some of the most notable names in sports and business applied to team-making in any situation
- Interviews from well-known players from Peyton and Eli Manning to Kevin Durant
- Skills to allow culture to shape who you recruit, manage dysfunction, friction, and strong personalities
- Advice on how to win in critical situations, embrace change, build a mentoring culture, and see value others miss
Great Teams is the ultimate intersection of the sports and business worlds and a powerful companion for thought leaders, teams, managers, and organizations that seek to perform similarly. The insight shared in this book is sure to enhance any team in its pursuit of excellence.
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