I read this last year when it was released. I enjoyed it so much I re-read it again recently and bought 2 more copies for friends. This book is written as a memoir by Phil Knight, the founder of the Nike empire. Knight tells his story about traveling in his 20’s and his dream of designing a special kind of shoe for running. His adventure takes him into the heart of Japanese culture and an international licensing agreement.
Many of the business challenges he faced 40 years ago hold true today regarding company culture, competition and team building. One noticeable difference was the ease of accessing capital. Even though Nike was growing XXX% YoY, capital sources were limited to banks and they trusted only stable single-digit growth.
The book has countless nuggets of wisdom shared by Knight, and many by the legendary coach and co-founder Bill Bowerman. Shoedog will go down as one of the bestselling business books of our decade, perhaps of all-time.
My rating was 10/10.