Libraries of Leaders: On the Bookshelves of Venture Capitalists

As the Great Indian Startup story seems set up for a somewhat bumpy ride, the race to get your new idea or venture funded is becoming tougher than ever. The perennial question startup founders ask is what do venture capitalists look for before shelling out the big bucks? Here are a few books that have helped shape the thinking of Facebook investor Marc Andreessen, Silicon Valley’s billionaire investor Vinod Khosla, and Kalaari Capital’s managing director Vani Kola.

Marc Andreessen, co-founder at venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, and one of the early investors in Facebook and Twitter, has invested in Airbnb, Buzzfeed and many other ‘unicorn’ companies. An avid reader, he has recommended around 81 books on Twitter since 2014. I’ve picked the five which seemed most interesting:

1. Unconventional Success: A Fundamental Approach to Personal Investment by David F. Swensen

Andreessen says that this book is a great read for individual investors.

2. The Master Switch: The Rise and Fall of Information Empires by Tim Wu

3.The Halo Effect and the Eight Other Business Delusions That Deceive Managers by Phil Rosenzweig

According to Andreessen, the author shows how business managers often pick the wrong theories behind why a company fails or succeeds and seeks to break these misconceptions.

4. Who Really Matters: The Core Group Theory of Power, Privilege, and Success by Art Kleiner

Andreessen says “financial models often get constructed to validate the CEO’s preferences more than otherwise.This is the book that really crystallized it..”

5. Startup Rising: The Entrepreneurial Revolution Remaking the Middle East by Christopher M Schroeder

Andreessen calls this an excellent book and has even written a foreword for it. It is one of the first books, he says, on young entrepreneurs in the Middle East. In that sense, the book is a unique departure from the narrative of politics and violence that readers are often served on this region.

Vinod Khosla is the founder of Sun Microsystems and later Khosla Ventures, which focuses on venture investments in clean technology. He also has investments in Vox Media and Wattpad.

The billionaire is an avid reader who has recommended books to Bill Gates, who put them up on his blog. He also posts lots of his book reviews on Twitter. A recommended reading list that has he has vetted, is also on his company’s website. Here’s a curated list:

1. The Lean Startup by Eric Ries

Also recommended by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, the book is about how the technology industry looks at building products.

2. Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by Dan Heath and Chip Heath

The book is a guide on how to communicate ideas in ways that are both interesting and memorable.

3. The Purple Cow by Seth Godin

Seth Godin talks about how to create a business that stands out, much like the book’s title.

4. How to Change the World by David Bornstein

Khosla says the book is a must-read for those who want to apply entrepreneurial energies to social causes.

5. The Creative Destruction of Medicine by Eric Topol

Written by a practising cardiologist, the book is about how new technologies in genomics, information technology, and mobile medicine may change the way we treat and prevent illness.

Vani Kola, co-founded Kalaari Capital, and is also its managing director. She has invested in Snapdeal, Urban Ladder, Myntra and Zivame among others. She gave BloombergQuint four book recommendations:

1. High Output Management by Andrew Grove

Kola says that she has derived a lot of inspiration from the book’s author Andrew Grove – one of the most admired CEOs of his time. The book lays out his philosophy and no-nonsense approach to creating excellence, she says.

2. The Inevitable by Kevin Kelly

Kelly provides great food for thought on how life will continue to be disrupted and radically changed in ways that we cannot anticipate, Kola says. The book lays out a roadmap, and a list of the variety of innovations we must keep track of.

She recommends this book for futurists who “love thinking on the broad brushstrokes of impact.”

3. The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz

4. Conquering the Chaos: Win in India, Win Everywhere by Ravi Venkatesan

Veteran executive and coach Ravi tries to explain and simplify the complexity of winning in India, and how to overcome the unique challenges one faces in the country.

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