“Leaders are readers.”
Yep, if you want to do that leading thing well, you need to read. One challenge is sorting through all the “leadership” and other business books to find good ones. This post should help. Here are some pointers to reviews of and excepts from recent leadership (in the broadest sense) books.
In this post I point you to reviews of Leaders Ready Now, Lead and Disrupt: How to Solve the Innovator’s Dilemma, and Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days.
From Desda Moss: Preparing Leaders to Be Ready Now
“Most businesses falter when it comes to growing leaders who can keep pace with the speed of business today, according to the authors of Leaders Ready Now (DDI Press, 2016). Citing research that highlights this failing, scientists at Development Dimensions International (DDI) challenge CEOs and talent management experts to rethink their approaches to leadership development and to change the tools and processes they apply to the task. The book is organized into six sections that showcase what the authors call ‘acceleration imperatives’ that, when consistently applied, can propel business results from good to great.”
From Theodore Kinni How to Become an Ambidextrous Leader
“A few pages into Lead and Disrupt: How to Solve the Innovator’s Dilemma (Stanford University Press, 2016), business professors Charles A. O’Reilly III and Michael L. Tushman present two lists of companies. At first glance, there doesn’t seem to be too much difference between them. Each features 27 companies, most with familiar names and long histories, such as GM, Siemens, and Lego.”
From Wharton: ‘Sprint’: A 5-Day Plan for Solving Tough Problems
“Many companies face difficult problems that require focused attention to solve, but many do not know where to begin. Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days, a new book by Jake Knapp with John Zeratsky and Braden Kowitz, partners at Google Ventures, offers a plan for identifying the best solution to a problem, developing a prototype and testing it with customers.”
Reading recommendations are a regular feature of this blog. Want more recommendations about what to read? Check out my Three Star Leadership blog, Michael McKinney’s LeadingBlog, and Bob Morris’ Blogging on Business.