“If you don’t go, you don’t get.” — Ronnen Harary
A quantitative investor. A serial acquirer. A business strategist. A Hollywood power broker. A toy entrepreneur. At first glance, they have almost nothing in common. Look closer, and a pattern appears. Each spent years pursuing opportunities others overlooked. Each hit dead ends. None treated them as reasons to stop. Their stories point to the same conclusion: extraordinary results usually belong to people who stay in the game longer than everyone else. That’s the thread running through this July reading list.
For Jim Simons, that meant working with the smartest people he could find. Brad Jacobs saw problems as assets. Hamilton Helmer argues that real strategy requires doing something competitors can’t easily replicate. Michael Ovitz built influence from behind the scenes. And, like Helmer, Ronnen Harary created things that didn’t exist before. You can find more reading lists in my full catalog here.
The Man Who Solved the Market
“Work with the smartest people you can, hopefully smarter than you. Be persistent, don’t give up easily.” — Jim Simons
Since 1988, Jim Simons’ Medallion Fund has generated average annual returns of 66% before fees. Renaissance Technologies has earned more than $100 billion in profits.
The Man Who Solved the Market is the story of how Simons built Renaissance Technologies and its legendary Medallion Fund.
It’s the story of how a world-class mathematician and former code breaker revolutionized investing with a data-driven, algorithmic approach.
The ideas that stayed with me:
- Look for patterns, not reasons.
- Share information openly so the entire team can improve.
- Reward people for team performance rather than individual performance.
- Constantly update your thinking because competitors eventually will replicate your strategies.
For more on looking for patterns, collaborating, and rewarding performance, read:
📚The Man Who Solved the Market: How Jim Simons Launched the Quant Revolution
How to Make a Few More Billion Dollars
“Problems are an asset. Big gunky problems are where the best opportunities lie because most people run away from them.” — Brad Jacobs
In this sequel to How to Make a Few Billion Dollars, Jacobs explains how to partner with investors, build acquisition machines, and create organizations where culture, compensation, and talent reinforce one another.
The book also explores meditation, reframing irrational beliefs, and using mindfulness to pursue ambitious goals.
A few ideas I kept returning to:
- Think big from day one. Extraordinary outcomes often begin as unreasonable ideas.
- Hunt for opportunities with massive upside and manageable downside.
- Choosing the right playing field is mission-critical. Great operators rarely overcome terrible markets.
- Success comes from persistence, speed, and a willingness to take calculated risks.
- One of the most consequential decisions in business and life is who you surround yourself with.
If thinking big, finding opportunity in problems, and building great organizations resonates, read:
📚How to Make a Few More Billion Dollars
7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy
“Power requires a benefit and a barrier. You have to have something that you do that gives you a better outcome than your competitors, and then something that makes it impossible for somebody else to mimic that.”— Hamilton Helmer
Helmer argues that strategy is about more than short-term improvements. It’s about building a business capable of extraordinary returns.
7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy argues that companies need an advantage and a widening barrier that prevents competitors from catching up.
These powers include Scale Economies, Network Economies, Counter-Positioning, Switching Costs, Branding, Cornered Resource, and Process Power.
Helmer’s seven powers are memorable because they explain why some companies keep pulling away while others never catch up.
Principles worth remembering:
- Scale matters because higher production volumes often lead to lower costs per unit, allowing leaders to widen the gap over smaller competitors.
- Some businesses become more valuable as they grow. Every new user makes the network stronger for everyone already inside it.
- Disruption often comes from newcomers introducing business models incumbents can’t imitate without hurting their legacy operations.
- The harder it is for customers to leave, the more pricing power incumbents gain.
- Reputation matters. Customers routinely pay more for products that are objectively similar because they trust the brand behind them.
- Sometimes, enduring advantages come from controlling scarce resources that competitors simply can’t obtain.
- Some companies quietly build advantages over decades through unique processes that competitors struggle to replicate.
If you want the full story on the 7 powers and business strategy, read:
📚7 Powers: The Foundations of Business Strategy
Who Is Michael Ovitz?
“Mystique is ten times better than publicity; it’s much better to be thought of as the great and powerful Oz than to be revealed merely another schemer behind a curtain.” — Michael Ovitz
Michael Ovitz built one of Hollywood’s most powerful careers by mastering an asset that can’t be measured: mystique.
As co-founder of Creative Artists Agency, he reshaped what a Hollywood agent could be, helping guide the careers of Steven Spielberg, Meryl Streep, David Letterman, and countless others.
He started in the William Morris mailroom before becoming Hollywood’s most powerful dealmaker.
His success also came at an enormous personal cost.
What stayed with me:
- Deep curiosity helps you see where an industry is headed before everyone else.
- Relentless ambition can lead to extraordinary success, but it rarely comes without a personal cost.
- Legacy industries reward those willing to rewrite the rules.
- Mystique often builds more influence than self-promotion.
- Failure isn’t the end of the game; it’s preparation for the next one.
To dive deeper into Ovitz, his career, and his enduring principles, read:
No Experience Necessary
“I’m a creator. I birth and bring things into the world that never existed before.” — Ronnen Harary
Harary co-founded the company that would become Spin Master when he was 23.
He didn’t realize it at the time, but youth was his biggest asset.
More than 30 years later, Spin Master has helped create massive global toy lines, including Bakugan and PAW Patrol.
No Experience Necessary is structured around eleven core principles. The book recounts the building of Spin Master and doubles as a manifesto for anyone building something new.
Highlights:
- Inexperience is power: Not knowing the “rules” lets you see fresh solutions instead of roadblocks.
- Passion de-risks projects: Loving what you do unlocks massive energy to learn fast.
- Youth is a superpower: Higher risk tolerance and openness can create advantages early in life.
- Embrace the mess: Building from scratch beats waiting for the “perfect” plan.
For more on Spin Master, Harary, and the advantages of inexperience, read:
July Reading List: The Power of Persistence
These five books span quantitative finance, industrial logistics, business strategy, Hollywood, and the toy industry. Their stories are remarkably similar. The winners weren’t necessarily the smartest or most talented. They stayed curious, surrounded themselves with exceptional people, kept moving when others stopped, and compounded small advantages over decades. That’s what I’ll remember most from this July reading list. If you don’t go, you don’t get.
