The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Difference between revisions

}}

 

== Introduction ==

 

His official bio lists the book as a {{Tooltip|New York Times}} bestseller, and it was longlisted for the 2014 {{Tooltip|Financial Times and McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award}}.<ref name="A16zBio">{{cite web |title=Ben Horowitz |url=https://a16z.com/author/ben-horowitz/ |website=Andreessen Horowitz |publisher=Andreessen Horowitz |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="Bookseller2014">{{cite news |title=FT and McKinsey Business Book longlist revealed |url=https://www.thebookseller.com/news/ft-and-mckinsey-business-book-longlist-revealed |work=The Bookseller |date=7 August 2014 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref>

 

== Chapter summary ==

 

''—Note: The above summary follows the Harper Business first-edition hardcover (2014; ISBN 978-0-06-227320-8).''<ref name="HCUS2014">{{cite web |title=The Hard Thing About Hard Things |url=https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-hard-thing-about-hard-things-ben-horowitz |website=HarperCollins |publisher=HarperCollins Publishers |date=4 March 2014 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="OCLC871263428">{{cite web |title=The hard thing about hard things : building a business when there are no easy answers |url=https://search.worldcat.org/fr/title/hard-thing-about-hard-things-building-a-business-when-there-are-no-easy-answers/oclc/871263428 |website=WorldCat |publisher=OCLC |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="CMCToC">{{cite web |title=The hard thing about hard things: building a business when there are no easy answers |url=https://cmc.marmot.org/Record/.b41807224 |website=CMC Library Catalog |publisher=Colorado Mountain College / Marmot Library Network |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref>

 

== Background & reception ==

 

🌍 '''Impact & adoption'''. The book appears on university reading lists and syllabi spanning entrepreneurship and technology management: {{Tooltip|Washington State University}}’s {{Tooltip|Entrepreneurial Management}} (2018), {{Tooltip|NYU Stern}}’s {{Tooltip|High-Tech Entrepreneurship}} (2021), {{Tooltip|Princeton}}’s {{Tooltip|COS 448}} reading list (2023), and {{Tooltip|UC Berkeley}}’s {{Tooltip|Sutardja Center}} summer innovation list (2019).<ref name="WSU2018Syllabus">{{cite web |title=ENTRP 489: Entrepreneurial Management — Syllabus |url=https://www.thallison.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/ENTRP-489-Entrepreneurial-Management-Syllabus-2-9.pdf |website=Thomas H. Allison (WSU) |publisher=Washington State University |date=21 March 2018 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="NYUStern2021">{{cite web |title=High-Tech Entrepreneurship — Syllabus |url=https://www.stern.nyu.edu/sites/default/files/assets/documents/Papadimitriou_TECHGB2131_Fall21.pdf |website=NYU Stern School of Business |publisher=New York University |date=7 July 2021 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="PrincetonF23">{{cite web |title=Computer Science 448 (Fall 2023) — Recommended/Required Reading |url=https://www.cs.princeton.edu/courses/archive/fall23/cos448/index.html |website=Princeton University |publisher=Princeton University |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref><ref name="BerkeleySCET2019">{{cite web |title=SCET Summer Innovation Reading List |url=https://scet.berkeley.edu/scet-summer-innovation-reading-list/ |website=University of California, Berkeley |publisher=Sutardja Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology |date=3 July 2019 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref> Its phrases and maxims also surface in business commentary; for example, {{Tooltip|Axios}} quoted Horowitz’s advice to tackle unpleasant decisions decisively (“if you are going to eat it, don’t nibble”).<ref name="Axios2022">{{cite news |last=McCaskill |first=Nicholas |title=Stop ducking the tough decisions |url=https://www.axios.com/2022/06/17/tough-decisions-work-home-firing-quitting-apologizing |work=Axios |date=17 June 2022 |access-date=10 November 2025}}</ref>

 

 

{{Youtube thumbnail | F2e3RqL4VWs | Ben Horowitz at Stanford eCorner on building when there are no easy answers}}

{{Youtube thumbnail | F-VxY_xVUHs | Animated summary by Productivity Game}}

 

{{The Almanack of Naval Ravikant/thumbnail}}

{{Zero to One/thumbnail}}

{{Shoe Dog/thumbnail}}

{{The E-myth Revisited/thumbnail}}

{{Insert before References}}

 

== References ==

{{reflist}}

 

{{Insert bottom}}