#Shelfie
A picture is worth a thousand words. In this case, possibly bordering on a few million. This is my business and game development library. It's my first point of reference for research, for answering questions from clients, employers, employees and mentorees alike. Once a year, for Start-Up Weekend, I lug almost all of these books up a massive hill in the centre of my city to one University, and then the next day I lug them all down another hill in the opposite direction to take them to a different university, so the students and attendees can read up on the topics we might only be able to glance off when the worskhops are in full flow.
Some of these are more helpful than others. There is at least one that I think is downright useless, but I keep it on hand in case it connects more with one of the students than it does with me! There is a mixture of business theory and practical advice, some game design and production best practice stuff, as well as my trusty legal reference collection, that has got us out of a jam more than once. A few art related books round out the shelf, and hint to my much larger collection of art history books, which cover everything from bookbinding to sculpture, prints to pottery, and even a small, brick-like tome on the meanings of symbols.
Left to Right:
1) Tech Nation 2017 (TechNation)
2) Fabulosity (Lee-Simmons)
3) Intellectual Property Law (Press)
4) Commercial Law (Rutland)
5) Business Law (Marson)
6) The Beermat Entrepreneur (Southon & West)
7) The Startup Kit 2013 (Jones)
8) The Lean Startup (Ries) 9) The Really Practical Guide To Setting Up Your Own Business (Spedding)
10) Business Start Up 2014 (Williams)
11) How To Set Up & Run A Fashion Business (Meadows)
12) Digital Copyright (Stokes)
13) [old] Daybook
14) [old] Business Notebook 15) The GameDev Business Handbook (Futter)
16) Start Your Business In 7 Days (Caan)
17) See SEO More Clearly (Go Up)
18) Boxed Copy of Mirror's Edge Catalyst
19) Deus Ex Human Revolution Design Work (Jacques-Belletete)
20) Designers Are Wankers (McCormack)
21) Agile Game Development With SCRUM (Keith)
22) Games As a Service (Clark)
23) The Game Production Handbook (Chandler)
24) Games, Design & Play (Macklin & Sharp)
25) A Theory of Fun (Koster)
26) The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses (Schell)
27) Mass Effect 2 Official Art Book (Prima)
28) Drawing And Painting Fantasy Figures (Cowan)
29) The Art of Deus Ex Universe (Jacques-Belletete & Dubeau)
Of all the books though, the ones that arrived as gifts, were given away by embarrassed authors, or purchased by me voluntarily, the most valuable reference books are always 13, and 14. 13 is my Daybook, the daily diary I keep for recording client tasks, meeting minutes, research notes - everything I do for work, goes in a notebook. I've had one for every company I've worked at. The second book, 14, is my business theory notebook. In it, there are notes from every enterprise related talk I've ever been to, public lectures, courses, and hundreds and hundreds of podcasts and radio shows. This is the one book I recommend everyone have on their bookshelf. It doesn't have to be expensive - a 99p spiral bound job is just as good as something Italian and wrapped in calf-skin - what matters is what you do with it.
Carry it around with you. Use it to write down your own ideas, but far more importantly, use it to record the ideas of other people. Listen to podcasts and make notes. Watch YouTube videos and make notes. Go to talks...and make notes(!) Those notes will help you to remember what was being said, but they will also serve as your own personal bank of quick-reference information when you encounter a problem and need to structure your thoughts. Porter's Five Forces should get a page, the principles of email marketing should get a page. It doesn't need to be pretty. It just needs to be there. If there is one piece of advice I'd give to every young entrepreneur starting out, it would be to get a book like this, and use it. Having a book like this readily to hand, and referring to it often, will allow you to make business decisions based on theory as well as instinct, and that will pay off in the long run.
