CEO Reading

“Active Readers - Buffett and company prove that leaders are readers. Most (Berkshire subsidiary CEOs) list reading as the activity that consumes the largest percentage of their typical day. Each CEO was naturally inquisitive.” Robert Miles, ‘The Buffett CEOs’

“I was an avid reader of business articles. I read Fortune, Business Week and Forbes cover to cover every time they appeared.” Richard Farmer, Cintas

“I read a lot of biographies of people who had accomplished great things, people such as John D Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, Charles M Schwab, the steel magnate (no relation), and many others. I saw the importance of determination, or passion and fighting hard for what you believed in, and the importance of optimism and believing good things are possible. All the people I read about had a maniacal focus on growth.” Charles Schwab

“Become a student of your craft – whatever it is. Read, research and pay attention to the little details that make businesses like yours successful.” Kent Taylor, Texas Roadhouse

“I’ve always been a big fan of books and teaching seminars specializing in the area of self-improvement. Think And Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill is one book I’d recommend to everyone.” Jim Clayton, Clayton Homes

“I am a bona-fide book person. My home contains more books than I’ll ever have time to count.” Charles Koch, Koch Industries

“Forrest Mars read every book he could find on du Pont, on Rockefeller, on Ford. But it wasn’t the entrepreneurial ambitions of these men that impressed him; it was the nuts-and-bolts business principles each employed- their accounting practices, their manufacturing techniques, their internal organization. He absorbed himself in these nitty-gritty and seemingly mundane details, and by the time he graduated in 1928, he was ready to test all he had learned.” Joel Brenner, ‘Emporers of Chocolate’

“Fred Smith estimated that throughout the eighties he spent at least four hours a day reading – newspapers, magazines, books on management theory and flight theory, and journals on the latest technological developments. He sponsored a lot of market research, but when he began brainstorming on ‘large-scale innovation,’ he found he relied quite heavily on his own vision, backed by assimilating information from many different disciplines at once. ‘Particularly information about change,’ he explained, ‘because from change comes opportunity.’ So you might be reading something about the cultural history of the Unites States, and come to come realisation about where the country is headed demographically. The common trait of people who supposedly have vision is that they spend a lot of time reading and gathering information, and then synthesis it until they come up with an idea.”’ Vance Trimbull, ‘Fedex - Overnight Success’

“I learned how well read Bob Kierlin was, and one thing I observed over the years is, there was not a day that Bob Kierlin did not read the Wall Street Journal from cover to cover.” Daniel Florness, Fastenal

“Harrison McCain read widely from the management literature, economics, and politics. He told the Financial Post, ‘I don't know how anyone can get by without reading. I remember what Truman said about Eisenhower - when he said he's been too busy to read a book for seven years, I knew the country was in trouble.’” Donald Savoie, ‘McCain Foods’

“Harrison McCain's personal library had about seven hundred books dealing with three broad themes: management, economics, and politics. One can find books on Trudeau, Nixon, Richard Hatfield, the Bronfman family, E.P. Taylor, the Duponts, Lord Beaverbrook, and ‘The Valuation and Pricing of Privately Held Business.’ I also recall well Harrison telling me about the work of Tom Peters and Robert Waterman.” Donald Savoie, ‘McCain Foods’

“Students of business may wish to take note of Harrison's approach to management. He made a point of reading the business management literature, no matter how busy he may have been. And he learned at the feet of one of Canada's leading industrialists - K.C. Irving.” Donald Savoie, ‘McCain Foods’

“I’m a lifelong avid reader. I read The Wall Street Journal basically cover to cover every day, The New York Times, several monthly magazines that I’ve subscribed to for decades plus 1-2 books per week. I think reading, and reading on a wide range of subjects, is one of the most valuable things any of us can do to keep learning but also allows readers to put dots together, especially in new and unforeseen situations, in a way that very few people see until after the fact.” Scott Kirby, CEO United Airlines

“I read a lot, as much as time permits.” Reinhold Würth, Würth Industries

“The best executives are made, not born. They never stop learning. Study the people and organizations in your life that have had enormous success. They offer a free course from the real world to help you improve.” Steven Schwarzman, Blackstone

“On my bedside table, there’s always a biography. The interesting thing about biographies is that depending on where you’re at in your career and life, you take totally different meanings from them. And the biographies I love reading about are ones about people who’ve reimagined or transformed their business or their country in ways that have been profound. And I can’t help but relate it to my business.” David Tudehope, founder Macquarie Technology

“I am currently reading my third selection of 100 business/biography books to further hone my skills.” Chip Wilson, founder Lululemon

“I went to the library and checked out every book on retailing.” Sam Walton, founder Walmart

“Forrest Mars reads avidly, and has been known to supply his subordinates with reading lists.” Harold Meyers, Fortune 1967

“I’d probably read three, four books a week and not fiction. Almost all of them are basically the history of business books, leadership.” Robert Rosenberg, Dunkin Dougnhnuts

“I was at dinner a couple of years ago with a guy who is a very, very, very big deal investment banker, no it was not Warren Buffett, but very, very big leagues, and it was a private dinner, so I’m not gonna use his name, but we were chatting about God only knows what he said to me, he said, ‘Tom, what do you think the number one failing is of CEOs?’ And I was either born or whatever as a smart ass, and so I said, ‘Well, I can think of 50 things, but I’m not sure I can pin it down to one.’ And he looked at me, he didn’t look at me cruelly, he just looked at me and he said, ‘Number one failing in CEOs is they don’t read enough,’ and you could have heard that proverbial feather drop. I was just in shock at what he said. And so I think it, Charlie Munger, who is Buffett’s number two, once said, the number one thing that Warren does is read.” Tom Peters, ‘In Search of Excellence’