The Diary of CEO by Steven Bartlett

The Diary of CEO by Steven Bartlett: an easy listen/ read book by a 30-year old self-made entrepreneur, and top Podcast host who shares life lessons he learned about himself (e.g. make health priority), others (e.g. psychological concept of habituation) & business (e.g. absurdity concept in marketing). It is very useful if you’re early in your career in your 30s and 40s however, for those who read seriously around the topic of business lessons, leadership lessons and habits, then a lot of it is re-package information from other books. Easy, simple read, not too deep thinking but there are some nuggets in here which I recommend you pick out.

Here are his 33 “laws’, which are more really tips.

1. Fill your buckets in the right order
2. Teach it to master it
3. You must never disagree
4. You don’t get to choose what you believe
5. You must lean into bizarre behaviour.
6. Ask don’t tell-the question behaviour affect.
7. Never compromise your self-story.
8. Never fight a bad idea.
9. Always prioritise your first foundation.
10. Useless absurdity will define you more than useful practicalities.
11. Avoid wallpaper at all costs.
12. You must piss people off.
13. Shoot your psychological moon-shots first.
14. Friction can create value.
15. The frame matters more on the picture.
16. Use Goldilocks to your advantage.
17. Let them try and they will buy.
18. Fight for the first 5 seconds.
19. You must sweat the small stuff.
20. A small miss now creates a big miss later.
21. You must out-fail the competition.
22. You must become a Plan A thinker.
23. Don’t be an ostrich.
24. You must make pressure your privilege.
25. The power of negative manifestation. Why will this idea fail? Keep Focus! Pre-mortem.
26. Your skills are worthless, but your context is valuable.
27. The discipline equation: death, time, and discipline!
28. Ask Who? not How. You are a recruitment company.
29. Create a cult mentality. Passionate A Team players. The 1st 10 = 10%. Clear on your values, devoted to the cause obsessed with solving a problem.
30. The three bars for building great teams. 1 person can kill a culture & company Bar raiser maintainer or lowered?
31. Leverage the power of progress. Marginal Gains 1% progression not perfection.
32. You must be an inconsistent leader.
33. Learning never ends.