We plan to bring eChai across 100 cities in India. It starts with eChai Startup Demo Day on 26 September, all in person. 13 cities confirmed, 628 founders registered. Any city that reaches 20 interested founders is on too. See your city

The Founder Bookshelf

Books founders recommend to each other. Browse by topic or by where you are as you grow, mark what you've read, and add what's next.

5 books on Strategy for fundraising

  1. Barbarians at the Gate cover

    Bryan Burrough and John Helyar

    The wildest corporate takeover battle of the 1980s, told in full.

    Barbarians at the Gate is a detailed account of the 1988 leveraged buyout of RJR Nabisco, the largest of its era. It follows the egos, bankers, and executives who...

    1 founder recommends Get the book ↗
  2. Pitch Anything cover

    Oren Klaff

    Win the deal by controlling the frame, not just the facts.

    Klaff presents his STRONG method for pitching, built on the idea that every interaction is a collision of psychological frames and the stronger frame wins. He draws on...

  3. Pour Your Heart Into It cover

    Howard Schultz with Dori Jones Yang

    How values and culture scaled Starbucks one cup at a time.

    Howard Schultz tells the story of how he transformed Starbucks from a small Seattle bean roaster into a worldwide brand built on the Italian espresso bar experience....

  4. slide:ology cover

    Nancy Duarte

    The craft of designing slides that actually communicate.

    Duarte presents a practical methodology for designing presentation slides, covering everything from data visualization and typography to building a coherent visual...

  5. You Can Negotiate Anything cover

    Herb Cohen

    Everything is negotiable if you know how power and time work.

    Cohen argues that negotiation is a pervasive part of daily life and that almost everything is negotiable. He frames every negotiation around three variables: power,...

Questions, answered

What books do founders recommend?

Founders on the eChai network recommend titles like Barbarians at the Gate, Pitch Anything, and Pour Your Heart Into It. The bookshelf ranks books by how many founders have read them.

Where can I find a startup reading list?

The eChai founder bookshelf is a curated, founder-recommended reading list you can browse by topic (fundraising, product, hiring) and by stage.

How is the bookshelf ordered?

By recommendation: the more founders mark a book read, the higher it ranks. You can also sort by newest or A to Z.

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