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CEO Hacks: App, Books, Resources & Habits

Be a more effective & efficient CEO, entrepreneur & business owner

During our I AM CEO Podcast, we ask each guest for a CEO Hack that makes them more effective and efficient. We decided to share some of our best hacks.

What are CEO Hacks? They are books, apps, habits, tools, platforms or things that we believe you should incorporate into your business that will make you more efficient, effective, or successful (and maybe save money) as a CEO, entrepreneur or business owner.

Take a look at some of the CEO Hacks that have been recommended below, check out a different CEO Hack on our daily, laser focused I AM CEO Podcast with Gresh and feel free to look through the CEO Hacks by categories or just browse the list. For CBNation members, you will find more “how-to” and deeper tricks and strategy for many of these hacks.

If you need help implementing these CEO Hacks into your organization contact Blue 16 Tech.

Lastly, don't forget to grab your free download.

– Gresh

Please note in the sake of transparency our sites do contain affiliate links that pay us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Read our Affiliate Disclaimer.

P.S. If you want to contact us or have any CEO Hacks to recommend, please let us know HERE.

Smartphone screen showing a navigation menu for CEO Hacks. Menu options include Free, Apps, Supplies, Books, Podcast, Web, Video, Deals, Habits, and Marketing.
Teachable logo showing a lowercase "t" in a green circle followed by the word "teachable" in lowercase green letters.
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Teachable is a comprehensive technology solution to let you create and sell online courses from your own website.

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Cover of the book "The 12 Week Year" by Brian P. Moran and Michael Lennington, subtitled "Get More Done in 12 Weeks Than Others Do in 12 Months," published by Wiley.
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Most organizations and individuals work in the context of annual goals and plans; a 12-month execution cycle. Instead, The 12 Week Year avoids the pitfalls and low productivity of annualized thinking. This book redefines your "year" to be 12 weeks long. In 12 weeks, there just isn't enough time to get complacent, and urgency increases and intensifies. The 12 Week Year creates focus and clarity on what matters most and a sense of urgency to do it now. In the end more of the important stuff gets done and the impact on results is profound.

  • Explains how to leverage the power of a 12-week year to drive improved results in any area of your life
  • Offers a how-to book for both individuals and organizations seeking to improve their execution effectiveness
  • Authors are leading experts on execution and implementation

Turn your organization's idea of a year on its head, and speed your journey to success.

Cover of the book "The Lean Startup" by Eric Ries, featuring the title in large white text on a blue background and a circular brushstroke design. Subtext reads: "How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses.
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Most startups fail. But many of those failures are preventable. The Lean Startup is a new approach being adopted across the globe, changing the way companies are built and new products are launched.

Eric Ries defines a startup as an organization dedicated to creating something new under conditions of extreme uncertainty. This is just as true for one person in a garage or a group of seasoned professionals in a Fortune 500 boardroom. What they have in common is a mission to penetrate that fog of uncertainty to discover a successful path to a sustainable business.

The Lean Startup approach fosters companies that are both more capital efficient and that leverage human creativity more effectively. Inspired by lessons from lean manufacturing, it relies on “validated learning,” rapid scientific experimentation, as well as a number of counter-intuitive practices that shorten product development cycles, measure actual progress without resorting to vanity metrics, and learn what customers really want. It enables a company to shift directions with agility, altering plans inch by inch, minute by minute.

Rather than wasting time creating elaborate business plans, The Lean Startup offers entrepreneurs—in companies of all sizes—a way to test their vision continuously, to adapt and adjust before it’s too late. Ries provides a scientific approach to creating and managing successful startups in a age when companies need to innovate more than ever.

The book cover of "The Big Leap" by Gay Hendricks features a goldfish jumping from a small fishbowl to a larger fishbowl against a blue gradient background.
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In The Big Leap, Gay Hendricks, the New York Times bestselling author of Five Wishes, demonstrates how to eliminate the barriers to success by overcoming false fears and beliefs. Fans of Wayne Dyer, Eckhart Tolle, Marianne Williamson, and The Secret will find useful, effective tips for breaking down the walls to a better life in The Big Leap.

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ThemeForest logo featuring a minimalist design with a brown semi-circle and a black square, resembling an open book, followed by the word "themeforest" in lowercase black letters.
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Discover 1000s of premium WordPress themes & website templates, including multipurpose and responsive Bootstrap templates, email templates & HTML.

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Trusted by over 20 million people, Todoist is the best online task management app and to-do list. For Web, iPhone, iPad, Android, Chrome, Outlook and many more!

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Cover of "The E-Myth Revisited" by Michael E. Gerber, featuring the subtitle "Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About It" and a note about more than one million copies sold.
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An instant classic, this revised and updated edition of the phenomenal bestseller dispels the myths about starting your own business. Small business consultant and author Michael E. Gerber, with sharp insight gained from years of experience, points out how common assumptions, expectations, and even technical expertise can get in the way of running a successful business.

Gerber walks you through the steps in the life of a business—from entrepreneurial infancy through adolescent growing pains to the mature entrepreneurial perspective: the guiding light of all businesses that succeed—and shows how to apply the lessons of franchising to any business, whether or not it is a franchise. Most importantly, Gerber draws the vital, often overlooked distinction between working on your business and working in your business.

The E-Myth Revisited will help you grow your business in a productive, assured way.

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Cover of the book "The Personal MBA: Master the Art of Business" by Josh Kaufman, featuring an origami crane made of dollar bills, endorsements, and a note of it being a revised and expanded edition.
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The 10th anniversary edition of the bestselling foundational business training manual for ambitious readers, featuring new concepts and mental models: updated, expanded, and revised.


Many people assume they need to attend business school to learn how to build a successful business or advance in their career. That's not true. The vast majority of modern business practice requires little more than common sense, simple arithmetic, and knowledge of a few very important ideas and principles.

The Personal MBA 10th Anniversary Edition provides a clear overview of the essentials of every major business topic: entrepreneurship, product development, marketing, sales, negotiation, accounting, finance, productivity, communication, psychology, leadership, systems design, analysis, and operations management...all in one comprehensive volume.

Inside you'll learn concepts such as:

The 5 Parts of Every Business
: You can understand and improve any business, large or small, by focusing on five fundamental topics.

The 12 Forms of Value
: Products and services are only two of the twelve ways you can create value for your customers.

4 Methods to Increase Revenue
: There are only four ways for a business to bring in more money. Do you know what they are?

Business degrees are often a poor investment, but business skills are always useful, no matter how you acquire them.

The Personal MBA will help you do great work, make good decisions, and take full advantage of your skills, abilities, and available opportunities--no matter what you do (or would like to do) for a living.

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Say more with Threads — Instagram’s text-based conversation app

Threads is where communities come together to discuss everything from the topics you care about today to what’ll be trending tomorrow. Whatever it is you’re interested in, you can follow and connect directly with your favorite creators and others who love the same things — or build a loyal following of your own to share your ideas, opinions and creativity with the world.

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TaskBullet logo featuring blue and black text with an icon of a simplified human figure inside a blue circle.
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Many small business owners spend a majority of their time working on tedious & repetitive tasks. TaskBullet is a U.S.A-based virtual assistant company that leases online employees to small business. Our customers can scale their workforce up or down on demand for 50% less than a minimum wage employee.

OUR MISSION

We innovate and streamline business processes for maximum efficiency. We do this for all forward thinking business owners who understand that the system is the solution. We accomplish this by educating, teaching and inspiring the TaskBullet team to better assist our clients, and by providing our clients with the resources needed to move their company forward.

 

WE STICK AROUND

​When you purchase a bucket from TaskBullet we stick around and manage your account and the VA. We don’t leave you to the vast abyss of the internet, to deal with vanishing VA’s who take your money and your work. We have Project Managers who are in constant contact with the VA’s and we the Management are in constant contact with the Project Managers. If there is ever a problem you can contact us directly here in the U.S. and we will do everything we can to fix the issue. The VA’s who work for us are like family, some of them have been with us since the beginning of TaskBullet. We love our VA’s and we know you will love them as well.

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