5 books on every entrepreneur’s bookshelf

1. Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill

I call this the Bible. What can entrepreneurs learn from Napoleon Hill? The most famous of all teachers of success spent a fortune and the better part of a lifetime of effort to produce the Law of Success philosophy that forms the basis of his books and that is so powerfully summarized and explained for the general public in this book. In Think and Grow Rich, Hill draws on stories of Andrew Carnegie, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford, and other millionaires of his generation to illustrate his principles. This book will teach you the secrets that could bring you a fortune. It will show you not only what to do but how to do it. Once you learn and apply the simple, basic techniques revealed here, you will have mastered the secret of true and lasting success.

2. Africa is Open for Business: Victor Kgomoeswana

Victor Kgomoeswana, well known as an African business expert with a profile on radio and television, shares 50 stories of innovation and opportunity behind the business headlines of the last ten years on the African continent, with some revised content since the first edition of the book in May 2014. From the introduction of M-PESA in Kenya to changing the image of Nigeria as Africa’s fraud capital, and from Rwandan coffee farmers to other remarkable stories in between, Kgomoeswana criss-crosses the continent to highlight and revisit the most fascinating business stories and their impact on the future of Africa.
Africa is Open for Business contains a dynamic and different view of the opportunities available in Africa from those usually portrayed in the news and in other media. Kgomoeswana focuses on the stories behind the headlines as well as sharing his personal experiences of Africa while travelling and doing business in a way that is as entertaining as it is informative.

3. The Magna Carta of Exponentiality: Vusi Thembekwayo

In the book, Vusi looks at leaders and organisations that have managed to deliver phenomenal market-beating results in the face of extreme uncertainty, severe resource constraints and socio-political instability. We study the foresight of managers who turned entrepreneurs who seized opportunities and built businesses to rival their old employers, seasoned managers who looked through the fog of marketplace war to see opportunity. We answer the questions: how did they do it, what did they do and what can you learn from their ingenuity, luck and guts.

4. Africa’s Business Revolution: Acha Leke

Africa’s Business Revolution provides the inside story on business in Africa and its future growth prospects and helps entrepreneurs understand and seize the opportunities for building profitable, sustainable enterprises. From senior leaders in McKinsey’s African offices and a leading executive on the continent, this book draws on in-depth proprietary research by the McKinsey Global Institute as well as McKinsey’s extensive experience advising entrepreneurs, corporates and governments across Africa. Brimming with company case studies and exclusive interviews with some of Africa’s most prominent entrepreneurial executives, this book comes to life with the vibrant stories of those who have navigated the many twists and turns on the road to building successful businesses on the continent.

5. Africa’s Billionaires: Chris Bishop

Written by the founder of Forbes Africa, this is a masterclass on how the brightest and most successful entrepreneurs across Africa made their fortunes, as well as a timely look at how the work of entrepreneurs can influence lives in Africa and create the jobs that empty state coffers can no longer afford. Chris Bishop gets up close and personal with the biggest names in business on the continent: Aliko Dangote, Patrice Motsepe, Nicky Oppenheimer, Christo Wiese, Wendy Appelbaum and Stephen Saad, among others. These are the stories of how they not only survived, but thrived, in the fast and furious world of African business: Narendra Raval, the penniless priest who became a steel baron; Tim Tebeila, the barefoot apple-seller who turned into a mining millionaire; Herman Mashaba, the ‘knocksman’ who went from running dice games and dealing drugs to running a city; Pascal Dozie, the economics student who studied with Mick Jagger … This is a rich tapestry of stories about the super-wealthy and the qualities that make them so spectacrly successful, in arguably the most challenging economic arena in the world.