The books that shaped the way I think

The bible of Jobs To Be Done. Christensen explains why customers don't buy products — they "hire" them to get a job done. Essential for understanding the theory behind the entire methodology. If you only read one book from this list, make it this one.

Ulwick turns JTBD into a rigorous, quantitative system: Outcome-Driven Innovation. If Christensen gives the why, Ulwick gives the how. The framework I use in all my consulting projects: outcome interviews, quantification and prioritisation.

Moesta, one of the fathers of JTBD, applies the theory to sales. The purchase seen from the buyer's side: what makes them switch, what holds them back, how to design the sales process from real demand rather than from the product.

The manifesto for building real software without excess. Fewer features, more focus, fast decisions. A direct influence on how I think about product development: build less, but better. More relevant today than ever.

Basecamp's method for managing product projects: fixed 6-week cycles, appetite instead of estimates, working in hills. A radically different way of planning that puts risk and scope at the centre from day one.

Moesta's most recent book closes the loop: if JTBD explains why people buy, Learning to Build explains how to build what people actually need to hire. A bridge between Jobs theory and the practice of product teams.

Ulwick's first book, where he describes the Outcome-Driven Innovation approach before fully systematising it. It explains how to capture the outcomes customers want to satisfy and use them to guide innovation. The starting point of the methodology I use in consulting.

Klement applies JTBD to B2C product design with a different perspective to Christensen. His concept of "job story" instead of "user story" is a concrete way to integrate JTBD into the daily workflow of product teams. Useful as a practical complement to Competing Against Luck.

The book that precedes Competing Against Luck and explains why great companies fail against disruptive innovators. Christensen shows that doing the right things for current customers can be exactly the reason you don't see the person who will destroy you coming. The intellectual foundation of everything that followed.

The book that popularised lean thinking beyond Toyota. It defines five sources of waste (muda) and proposes a system to eliminate them systematically. A direct influence on how I assess operational efficiency in startups and product processes.

Deming doesn't talk about quality as a final inspection — he talks about designing systems that produce quality from the source. His 14 points and his critique of management by objectives are more relevant than ever in modern product teams.

Goldratt explains the Theory of Constraints through a novel. The core idea: every system has a bottleneck that limits its total throughput, and optimising anything else is sub-optimising. It radically changes how you think about prioritisation and capacity.

Mironov compiles his essays on product management from Silicon Valley: how to navigate the tension between business and engineering, how to prioritise with limited resources, how to build a product culture. A practical and honest book about the reality of the PM role.

A book that translates the concept of flow into the context of leadership and human performance. Cubeiro connects the state of optimal concentration with team management and workplace motivation, offering a practical and direct perspective. It helped me understand why some people and teams perform well above average when the right conditions are in place.

163 observations by Tom Peters on what separates excellence from mediocrity. Not a book of theories — it is a compendium of attitudes, habits and concrete decisions Peters has accumulated over decades advising the best organisations in the world. Read it a little at a time, but re-read it constantly.