This book is about how we can break from this low-energy paradigm, that the authors term Power Over, to a new more invigorating one of Leading Through. This is a refrain frequently preached – but that requires ever more repetition – that, to quote the Clarks “when we loosen our grip on consolidated power and […]
Book Review Subject: Organizational Culture
Infectious Generosity
In this book, Chris Anderson starts by reflecting on these events as an early example of infectious generosity; giving that inspires others to give too. Having first given his content and then his brand away, Anderson is well-placed to write about this. He has worked with billionaires and academics, wealthy business leaders and street-smart activists. […]
Power to the Middle
Right from the start the authors’ recognize these attributes stating ‘that the smartest executives will do everything in their power to keep their best middle managers where they and reward them’ and then explaining that in many instances this is infact the correct approach, but it needs to be carefully managed. Too often people are […]
Capitalism and Crises
Few people have a better understanding of the role corporations play in society than Prof Mayer who has been honing his thinking on the issue for over two decades. While this book sees that there is an urgent need for reform, and highlights plenty of areas where the current model of capitalism is failing humanity […]
Bend the Knee or Seize the Throne
The book explores the various characters and their leadership styles from the TV series Game of Thrones itself adapted from the fantasy novel series of George R R Martin’s book series ‘A Song of Ice and Fire’. The reader will benefit from a knowledge of the characters and plot-lines of the eight series of GoT, […]
Anthro-Vision
Tett applies a three-part set of principles of the anthropologist’s mindset to structure the book: Make the ‘strange’ familiar – cultivate a mindset of emapthy for strangers and value diversity Make the ‘familiar’ strange – question and explore our own environment and context with fresh eyes to identify what is strange about our own worlds – […]
The Imagination Machine
This book explores this cognitive dimension of humanity as it relates to the organisation and its ability to imagine and reimagine itself. Like so much of the content we champion here at Ideas for Leaders, it starts from the recognition that 19th and 20th century industrial performance was founded on treating humans as units of […]
The Healing Organization
The authors reserve judgement on whether the likes of JP Lemann, boss of investment firm 3G, or Al Dunlap the notorious CEO featured in The Psychopath Test and others are 'bad people' preferring to quote Mohammad Yunus, the Nobel laureate, "it is not because bad people are running the machine; just that the machine is […]
Everybody Matters
As Simon Sinek writes in the Foreword to this book “we are social animals and we respond to the environment we’re in”. Good people can do wrong in bad environments, and those who have done bad things can be transformed in good ones. The key is the culture – and culture is set by leaders. […]
Fair Talk
Founded on the view that we humans are not good at improvement, the relationship of actionable feedback to performance is a central theme of this new book. It comes in three sections being firstly an exploration of the nature and practice of feedback; secondly, all that it takes to be the Fairtalk leader; and in part […]