Blog
Ideas for founding.
The 50 Bits for Founders — summaries of the books that have helped us most, organized by topic, with what we learned applying them — and notes on AI-native companies.
50 Bits for Founders · Masterclass
50 Bits for Founders · Mindset
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-1
Mindset
your ability is not a ceiling but a starting point; the word that changes everything is "yet".
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-2
The Now Habit
procrastination is not beaten with more discipline but with choosing: replace "I have to" with "I choose to," start small and protect guilt-free rest.
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-3
Positive Intelligence
your worst enemy lives inside your head and is called the Judge; learn to spot it, silence it with ten seconds of attention and ask what gift comes with the problem.
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-8
Awaken the Giant Within
make the decision that it will work non-negotiable, and make the how infinitely flexible.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-7
Give and Take
the people who give the most end up at the top and also at the bottom; the difference is giving strategically, protecting yourself from those who only take.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-2
Extreme Ownership
there are no bad teams, only bad leaders; everything that happens in your company is your responsibility, and accepting that is what gives you the power to fix it.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-5
Grit
effort counts twice: first it makes you good (talent × effort = skill) and then it makes you win (skill × effort = achievement).
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-3
Principles
pain plus reflection equals progress; turn every mistake into a written principle; let the best idea win, not the boss's.
50 Bits for Founders · Strategy
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-8
Steve Jobs, 1983: the simplicity of Apple's strategy
true innovation gets ahead of what is possible today, and moves toward it by being first in line for when technology, consumer trends or regulation allow it.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-6
The Innovator's Dilemma
leading companies don't fall because of bad decisions, but because they do exactly the right thing for their current customers, while a simpler, cheaper technology grows below the radar.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-7
Blue Ocean Strategy
instead of fighting the competition for the same customers, create a new market space where the competition stops being relevant.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-1
Blitzscaling
when the winner takes the whole market, speed is worth more than efficiency, but only if your business has the conditions to grow that way.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-2
Measure What Matters
focus the organization on a few ambitious, measurable goals, calibrated on the frontier between the possible and the fanciful.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-9
Exponential Organizations
an exponential organization grows ten times faster than its peers because it leverages resources it doesn't own, guided by a purpose so big that it makes the community work for it.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-3
Winning
candor is the cheapest competitive advantage there is, and differentiating people is the hardest decision a leader cannot delegate.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-4
Playing to Win
strategy is choosing, and it is five linked choices —what winning is, where to play, how to win, what capabilities you need and what systems sustain them—; what wins is not having them filled in, but having them fit together.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-5
McKinsey frameworks for founders
a handful of simple tools brings order to a company's thinking, communication and organization, and they are worth mastering before you need them.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-2
Rewired
digital and AI transformation is not a technology project, but the rebuilding of six capabilities of the company; without all six, the money stays in pilots.
50 Bits for Founders · Startup
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-4
How to find and evaluate startup ideas
good ideas aren't guessed, they're recognized by pattern: fall in love with a problem, run it through ten questions and remember that the only real test is launching.
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-5
inGenius
creativity works like an engine with six parts, three inside you and three around you, and the cheapest one to fire up is changing the question.
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-6
Zero to One
copying what works takes you from one to n; creating something new takes you from zero to one, and only the second builds extraordinary companies.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-1
The Lean Startup
a startup is not a small company but an experiment to discover what the customer wants; build the minimum, measure what matters and learn before the money runs out.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-2
Creative Confidence
creativity is not a gift of the few; it's a capacity that fear of judgment blocks and that is recovered by doing, in small steps.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-6
The Creator's Code
founders who build hundred-million-dollar companies don't share a profile, they share six skills, and all six can be learned.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-1
The Hard Thing About Hard Things
for the hardest moments there is no recipe; what saves you is radical honesty and the determination to keep searching.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-6
The Virgin Way
leadership is exercised by listening more than you talk, taking care of your people first and not taking yourself too seriously; the rest gets delegated.
50 Bits for Founders · Scale-up
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-3
High Growth Handbook
after product-market fit, the founder's job changes completely; the company reorganizes every few months, and what made you successful at the start is no longer what the company needs from you.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-6
Mastering the Rockefeller Habits
a growing company stays aligned with three simple disciplines: a few clear priorities, data that arrives fast and a fixed rhythm of meetings that is never canceled.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-7
Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
most strategies are lost in execution, and execution is a discipline the leader runs in person through three processes: people, strategy and operations.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-1
Managing
management must manage: your job is to get results, decide and follow through until what was decided gets done; no theory substitutes for that.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-2
Good to Great
companies that go from good to extraordinary do it with discipline sustained over years: the right people, the unvarnished truth and a focus that doesn't change every year.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-8
The Amazon Way
Amazon's culture lives in fourteen principles used every day to hire, evaluate and decide; your company can have its own if it makes them just as concrete.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-9
Founder Mode
there are two ways to run a growing company, as a manager or as a founder; delegating without getting involved works for a professional manager, but it pulls the founder away from what makes their company great.
50 Bits for Founders · Customer
- fundadores.net/en/1-1-7
Start with Why
people don't buy what you do, they buy why you do it; start with the purpose and let your product be the proof of that belief.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-3
Customer Centricity
not all customers are worth the same; identify the most valuable ones and align your products, your service and your organization around them.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-4
The Ultimate Sales Machine
selling better isn't about learning more techniques, but about repeating twelve disciplines stubbornly, concentrating on the best buyers and educating before selling.
- fundadores.net/en/1-2-5
Made to Stick
an idea sticks in people's heads when it is simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional and told as a story; the biggest obstacle is what you already know.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-8
Delivering Happiness
your culture is your brand; if culture is the number-one priority, great service and customer loyalty follow as a consequence.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-1
Creativity, Inc.
good ideas come from good teams; the leader's job is to protect candor and make it safe to be wrong.
50 Bits for Founders · People
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-3
The Four Agreements
four commitments to yourself (be impeccable with your word, don't take anything personally, don't make assumptions and always do your best) remove much of the drama and needless wear in work and in life.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-4
Crucial Confrontations
when someone breaks a commitment, silence is read as permission; the accountability conversation is prepared, held while protecting the other person's safety and ends with a plan of who does what by when.
- fundadores.net/en/1-3-8
Never Split the Difference
negotiating isn't winning an argument, it's discovering information; the tool is tactical empathy: listen, name what the other person feels and ask them questions that get them solving your problem.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-4
Topgrading
hiring well is a method and not a hunch: define the job by results, walk through the candidate's entire career and tell them from the start that you will talk to their bosses.
- fundadores.net/en/1-4-5
The Little Book of Talent
talent is built with deliberate practice at the edge of your ability, in short daily doses; that applies to you as much as to your team.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-6
Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team
a leadership team is built with five behaviors in order: trust, conflict, commitment, mutual accountability and results; if the one below fails, the ones above don't hold.
- fundadores.net/en/1-5-7
Good Boss, Bad Boss
a boss is measured by what their people achieve and by how they feel while achieving it; to deliver on both, the boss has to know, at all times, how what they say and do lands.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-4
Connect
exceptional relationships don't just happen, they are built: with measured vulnerability, with feedback that stays on your side of the net and with the willingness to repair after every clash.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-5
Be-Know-Do: Leadership the Army Way
leadership is formed in three layers, who you are, what you know and what you do, and a large organization works when there are leaders at every level and not just at the top.
- fundadores.net/en/1-6-7
Trillion Dollar Coach
a leader's job is to make their people win; first you build the right team and then you solve the problem.