How to learn business being a software engineer?

I think getting basics of accounts/finance will go a long way. Being able to read a balance sheet/profit & loss statement/cashflow statements will help you understand the health of business.

Next I would say, reading up on basic marketing/consumer psychology will help develop/acquire product and sell it.

Since you mentioned being CTO, I am assume you have development/programming background. This series [1] is good read targetted to developers who want learn a bit of accounting and finance.

[1] https://www.moderntreasury.com/journal/accounting-for-develo...

MIT free course on finance from first principles. Answers questions like the difference between price and value. Why do interest rates exist

https://youtu.be/HdHlfiOAJyE

I was a part time CTO for awhile and have done a lot of consulting to C-suites. In my experience, you don’t need to know generic “business background”. You need to know the industry your company is in, and the unique characteristics of your company in that industry (both positives and negatives). The CTO needs to understand the industry environment, and the C-suites strategy within that environment, and how technology fits into that strategy.

A CTO can also bring opportunities to the C-suite - it is possible you know about exciting innovative tech possibilities that could materially impact the business that non-technical leaders don’t know much (or anything) about.

Sure, you can learn generic finance stuff. But the real gold is understanding your company and your vertical very deeply indeed.

I was also at the same juncture and found the 'The Personal MBA' Josh Kaufman book highly valuable. Because this book is an index book. Each couple of pages is the distilled top level wisdom/knowledge of a separate business domain. If that section takes your attention it provides a curated book list for digging in deeper.

So you just read the entire book for a wide-but-shallow understanding, and then drill in to topics that interest you most.

Getting into the business domain is firstly an issue of awareness. Once you have an awareness of the landscape you build your knowledge bit by bit.

For me it was obvious that sales was my weakest area, so I focussed on that with further reading and practice. (Turned out I was quite good at it in the end - a total shock to me as I am the nerdy techie type personality).

This site is teeming with book recommendations.

Here is the all-time top of the Business category: https://hacker-recommended-books.vercel.app/category/7/all-t...

Go take evening classes and get a business degree or graduate certificate specifically designed for students from a science/engineering background.

Finance and accounting is literally child's play for anyone with a strong math background. The harder part is understanding business models, human psychology, and developing a useful network.

Since completing a tech focused business program, I've done very well financially and found myself sitting on grant panels focused on commercializing academic research. It's astounding how naive hugely successful researchers are when they try to write business plans. Sometimes my scientific idols submit grants with kindergarten level understanding of business. It's shocking.

The opportunity that exists for a talented technical person with a holistic understanding of the art and practice of business is astounding. They literally throw money at you. More importantly you can leverage your knowledge to actually do what you want with your life.

I took the long road after graduating with a mechanical engineering degree in 2012 and working in industry. I quickly realized that engineering often meant executing and not strategizing, which frustrated me to no end. I learned that being right was secondary to making people above you look intelligent. So much of what drives action at larger orgs revolves around a small group of people with their own special social dynamics, opinions, and egos.

As others have indicated an MBA would give you the language and credibility most orgs require to get into "business" positions. I do not feel the actual coursework is needed to understand the concepts and theories that have meaning for any given org. Businesses largely want growth, diversity, innovation, cost cutting, and future profitability. But I swear you could shortcut all that for just making the primary business stakeholders happy. Whatever they care about, what they perceive, what their goals are, that is what makes or breaks your position.

Being able to present ideas is key. I got a lot out of some of the MIT open course material [1]. I am certain some exploration on that channel for the business topics will yield more excellent content. Soft skills often separate talented and business minded engineers from the business side of the org. I cannot stress how little being "right" actually matters once you get into business. I have to constantly make forecasts as a product manager and often have frighteningly little to work with in terms of data. Capture assumptions, build out strategy, believe your story. You will be wrong sometimes. Being able to check your own ego, guide an org towards what you believe is right, and dealing with a bunch of different people who all think their view is the right view all play into it. I love the challenge and enjoy seeing my contribution play out. Would highly suggest it for those who enjoy those sorts of challenges.

[1] https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Unzc731iCUY

You could (should?) ask others in your company at the C-Level to give you a high level briefing on what they work on, and how they think about their work. They may also have favored books, materials etc.

Coming from a technical background where you've likely had to understand and work on complex structures, I think you're well positioned to understand the structures in your organization.

The Personal MBA by Josh Kaufman.

https://www.amazon.com/Personal-MBA-10th-Anniversary-ebook/d...

Great resource to go from zero to some basic understanding of a lot of stuff.

This book is an easy-to-read and short reference for all of the financial jargon / skills you'll need to know: https://financialintelligencebook.com/. Worth it to read and to be able to reference quickly. (Covers cashflow, balance sheet, working capital, etc)

Agree with others here that working with someone else at the C-level to help you come up with your own small curriculum would be great, even if they don't need to teach you themselves.

Some thoughts as a strategy professional for a large tech co:

- Financial : DCFs, multiples, statements, esp what drives value of firms (Resource: Aswath Damodaran)

- Strategy: how firms create value (Resources: YC Startup School lectures esp Peter Theil’ lec on YouTube)

- Ops: YC lecture on metrics investors want (CAC, LTV, diff biz models like aaS, etc)

- most important would be to check out your co’s pitch decks, SEC filings (if public) to understand the core strategy, value prop, financial performance and most critical hypotheses

Great question. As a founder and CTO, I too have been through this. Couple recommendations:

Books: -The Personal MBA by Kaufman is a great start -Financial Statements: A Step-by-Step Guide to Understanding and Creating Financial Reports

Next advice is to learn investing. I’ve learned a ton by studying public companies, listening to earning calls, reading 10Ks, etc..

Audible books are great for consuming biz books on marketing, mgmt, teamwork, etc..

Founders podcast for just learning entrepreneurship and it being awesome.

This is what I learned from founding a business and running it successfully for 5+ years:

Business is easy. As long as you are cash-flow positive you are in business.

You improve your business by continually removing bottlenecks stopping you from improving your cash flow (see: Theory of Constraints).

Bottlenecks can be anything from marketing/sales to product development and tech. So you learn as you go directed by the bottlenecks.

That’s pretty much it. It’s easy but hard work.

I second the ideas around learning accounting, and also becoming comfortable working a spreadsheet.

Learning business strategy as a corporate executive is really the kind of skill best paralleled in certain forms of gaming - tabletop games with a lot of trade/barter mechanics, MMO guilds, and such: it's some combination of people knowledge, planning, negotiation, and internal controls and mechanism design.

What you're designing from the top of a large organization is a "machinery of people", and if you formulate all of the quantifiable stuff into a spreadsheet, it won't be a crystal ball, and it can bias you towards nonsensical "works in theory" decisions, but it will give you a sense of how to manage events proactively and leverage specific strengths instead of just reacting to crises. The spreadsheet's answers ultimately reflect the philosophy you bring to it, so a general study of philosophy(best done in a classroom dialogue) can pay off as well.

A last thing to check out would be Wardley mapping. This is a good brainstorming mechanism for getting a sense of the terrain and the dependencies in your industry.

Get some public P&L sheets and learn how to read them. Once you can argue about the financial effects of your own and your competitors' decisions, the other C levels will take your advice much more seriously.

Also, understanding where money comes from, where it goes to, and how budgets were allocated allows you to learn A LOT about how different industries work.

Also, which country?

Basically you need to be able to express your ideas simply, avoiding SE jargon as much as possible, and state how stuff either makes money or saves money.

For more detailed info, here you go: https://github.com/kuchin/awesome-cto

CFA offers a free foundations certification. That should cover basic finance.

On a side note, your company/HR should have an executive education plan. They should be able to recommend the materials or courses to help you learn what they want you to. If not, they probably should start something like that.

You may have heard people say that “business” is not a deep discipline and I think the theory of business is pretty accessible.

Go to any business school site and just look at the MBA curriculum:

https://www.hbs.edu/mba/academic-experience/curriculum/Pages...

I would then focus on the introductory courses (typically Accounting, Valuation, Marketing, Org theory etc).

Find the syllabus for those courses or the text book and just browse it.

That won’t teach it all but it will sort of give you a map of the territory so you can look it up when you need to. About the level of memory most MBA grads have 5 years after graduation.

'Financial Markets and Institutions' by Modigliani and Fabozzi. Really focus on the sections about benchmark rates and DCF/NPV valuation. This will help you work backward on an enormous number of business topics and really assess business models.

Twitter is a great start.

Create an anon account, follow investors & business people, ask questions, and over time start engaging in conversations.

A couple good follows to start: 1. @patrick_oshag (also listen to his pod) 2. @trengriffin 3. @secretCFO - read newsletter as well 4. @onlyCFO - read their newsletter as well 5. 10k diver (read his threads on his website)

From there, look at who they follow and engage with. Twitter is a one-stop shop for all your business learning.

P.S. we write a daily tech & markets newsletter @ themarketbyte.com. Having a daily email outlining top business information is useful to stay on top of news and develop a pulse for the market. Cheers to your jorney!

I would add "simple excellence" [1] to the already recommend "personal MBA".

Trying to map your companies products first on a "value proposition canvas" and then whole business on a "business model canvas" is a great way to better understand on a high level whats going on in your organization.

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[1] https://www.amazon.com/Simple-Excellence-Organizing-Manageme...

A few books I read or am reading now, though I'm not in business or management currently:

The Personal MBA: master the art of business, by Josh Kaufman (and personalmba.com has more info, maybe). Seems to want to be the practical guide.

MBA in a Nutshell, by Milo Sobel. Seems slightly more academic than the one just above.

Start Your Own Business: the only startup book you'll ever need, from Entrepreneur

At least the first two come with lists of recommended further reading, by topic, including on finance, marketing, etc etc.

I would start by reading High Output Management by Andrew Grove – It really gives a great lens to view a business through and helps you focus on the right problems

Hi welcome to the front role. Spent a good amount of time in the CTO role.

Happy to chat offline.

Things I wish I knew:

The first law of learning business is tech folks can learn business far easier than business folks can learn tech. You have this.

Second law is no one should represent your voice. They should help present it.

The leadership team should be facilitating introductions to learn more about the business how they see fit. If it’s not proactively happening.. keep reading.

Learning business is as much about understanding what the business needs and how it can get there as accounting and finance.

Understand the type of cto you are there to be, there are many kind. I have a book somewhere that broke it down well but effectively it can vary.

Read into CIO roles and responsibilities as well as traditionally they made the decisions about tech

If your position is net new you are extra capacity. Be mindful of absorbing work from other areas that upholds the past vs change for the future.

Find a framework you like for your first 30-60-90 days.

First, tech should never ever roll into Finance, only CEO. You are now the leader of possibility and capability in the organization. It may ruffle feathers. Find all the reports from McKinsey, etc making this clear why. This will mean you’ll need to be a better communicator and self manager out of the gate.

Get an executive coach or mentor immediately. Once a week at minimum if not twice a week for the first few weeks. You will know when to ease off.

Setup your own way to communicate regularly with the entire company. Find all the meeting you May want a slot on.

Learn the phrase innovation accounting- how to measure what can’t be counted by dollars and cents. Your world can be undermined by folks who want to measure what suits them.

Digital transformation - take a few classes or certain immediately. Quicker than books. Be clear in whether the business is building the future, or catching up to the present.

Change management - take a cert immediately for it, it’s fine to read but only a 2-3 day thing. It will keep mbas with no track record at bay.

Togaf/Cobit - having something like this doesn’t hurt. At least read about it.

Agile/scrum - make sure you can talk the talk and walk the walk. Those words belong to you now. I’d probably lean towards agile.

Six sigma - this overlaps with others a over however a bit better known in the business world. Consider it.

If you want to become a better speaker look into a course like Roger Love’s speaking courses, you will discover how simply your voice is just an instrument like keyword and you can use it as well as the best.

Learn how to read and summarize simply when needed. It helps tremendously to present complex ideas simply to folks who just need to know to put the car in drive.

Highly recommend to check out this, regarding reading the P&L statements. https://lethain.com/profit-and-loss-statement/

Also check out the rest of his posts. I find them clearly written and useful.

Lots of finance-based suggestions already. But, if you're willing to use history as a guide, then first up should be marketing & sales. In many cases, those who bubble to the top have an M&S background.

Financials are important, but not as important as having a bias for customers and revenue.

Crossing the Chasm is a must read. The Challenger Sale too. Among the other references in sibling comments

Others have said CFA. CFA is the obvious paved path to what you are looking for. A few grand to add some letters to your name, and it will forever alter the way you think about business. But probably just ask someone who you think knows a lot to teach you.

Look for an Executive MBA course nearby that you can enroll and complete. The most important things that I learned from such a course was Financial Management and Marketing Strategy.

A lot of knowledge falls under the business umbrella. Have you asked the other C levels where they learned, or what you should focus on? I think that would be more helpful then turning to general learning material first.

Speak with colleagues to understand how the business works - what is it’s core competency - service or product, and how does your company build and sell that.

Then get a basis in accounting.

Has anybody here had experience with having a technical background, and then getting an MBA?

I’m curious just how much this fast tracks someone into leadership

Hi! Could you give an example or be a bit more specific? What kind of things are you struggling with?

Is it certain topics or business lingo?

You learn business by becoming a businessman.

Take cfa courses. Will answer ALL of your questions. And get the cfa took if your serious.

Paul Graham has some great essays on business / startups:

http://paulgraham.com/startupideas.html

http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html

Startup CXO will give you an overview of all your fellow CXOs responsibilities.

Ray Dalio — How the economic machine works, Principles, etc.

Jim Collins — Good to great

Alex Hormozi

Start a Shopify dropshipping website, or learn SEO/PPC/Organic TikTook/Facebook ads, hire a VA, and pitch local businesses on marketing services.