Reading List: Top 5 Business Lifestyle Books

Reading for mental wellbeing can be a great opportunity to take your mind away or inspire it to think about different things, giving it a break from normal, everyday working noise.

Here we have assembled out top 5 business lifestyle books that have really made a difference to us. Happy reading.This book changed everything for us!

I first read Rich Dad, Poor Dad in 2012, after being recommended it by our good friends Kevin and Caroline and I only wished I had found it sooner. In spite of a fairly well learned and comprehensive business background in life, I could not believe that I was only learning some of the things I read in this book when I did. Why had it taken me to get to nearly 43 years of age to know this stuff?

I’m pretty sure this book is somewhere on everyone’s reading list but for me it changed my outlook on my working and personal life for the better.

If you are still trading time (your life) for money, in a job working for someone else, this book might just change your view on that. It certainly did for us.

We both read Property Magic by Simon Zutshi shortly after attending a property investors meeting (PIN meeting) in 2013. I remember reading this book for the first time sitting poolside in Florida and I kept just saying ‘Wow’ out loud. In the end Lisa had to read it too so she understood my amazement.

Some of the learning is simple, even obvious yet somehow in our busy lives we miss practical steps and decisions we can make to improve our actions and our thinking.

We subsequently sought out and met a number of people featured in the case studies in Simon’s book and know the learning to be true. If you are a property investor, or want to be, this is a great read.

We read Serviced Accommodation Success by Kevin Poneskis during the second C-19 lockdown of late 2020 and this book changed our modus operandi for our businesses.

If you are running a guesthouse, bed and breakfast or any kind of furnished holiday let business some of the practical tips alone in this book will either save you money or provide you with ways of making your more money. And if you are embarking on a serviced accommodation property journey you will find it invaluable.

After reading this book by Kevin Poneskis we changed a number of things in our business which led to us being more efficient and ultimately more profitable.

Anyone who knew me in the mid 90’s and early 2000’s knows that I raved about this book Fish! and the subsequent follow ons, More Fish, Fish for Life and Fish Sticks.

Can you imagine any place worse to work than a Fish market (ask my friends Terry and Ian and they’ll tell you first hand)? This book explains how adopting the right mindset, for you, your colleagues and team around you, can really produce sparkling results, even if you find yourself working in a cold, wet and smelly fish market. Just as important today as it was then.

I love the simplicity of this series of books and how they encourage good mindset, strong performance and a smile, even if your conditions don’t necessarily allow them.

One of the first business linked improvement books I ever read and regularly referenced, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey is as pertinent today as ever.

In particular habits 1 – Be Proactive, 4 – Think Win-Win and 7 – Sharpen the Saw are always in my mind and Sharpen the Saw makes me smile the most often when I say it out loud or say it to someone as they look at me with total bewilderment.  I am regularly amazed how many businesses or business owners forget this in their own business or life often to their own sufferance.

Win-Win has always resonated the most with me. Every deal, negotiation or interaction at any level must work for both sides equally, otherwise you risk it falling apart.

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