Book picks similar to
Liberating the Corporate Soul by Richard Barrett


management
conscious-capitalism
ethics
business-design-support-creating

Less Is More: How Great Companies Use Productivity As a Competitive Tool in Business


Jason Jennings - 2002
    Now Jason Jennings, a bestselling author and international business consultant, offers a groundbreaking look at how to boost productivity and your bottom line.In Less Is More, Jennings shares tested and successful programs from the leading giants in industry and presents new trends that businesses of all sizes will be able to implement. Inside, you'll learn how to:increase sales 300 percent without increasing head countbecome 10 times more efficientkeep track of every pennyuse technology and automation in your favorWritten in the same breezy, informative style of Jennings's previous book, Less Is More is sure to join its predecessor on bestseller lists nationwide.

Influencer: The Power to Change Anything


Kerry Patterson - 2007
    You'll be taught each and every step of the influence process-including robust strategies for making change inevitable in your personal life, your business, and your world. You'll learn how to:- Identify a handful of high-leverage behaviors that lead to rapid and profound change.- Apply strategies for changing both thoughts and actions.- Marshall six sources of influence to make change inevitable.Influencer takes you on a fascinating journey from San Francisco to Thailand where you'll see how seemingly “insignificant” people are making incredibly significant improvements in solving problems others would think impossible. You'll learn how savvy folks make change not only achievable and sustainable, but inevitable. You'll discover why some managers have increased productivity repeatedly and significantly-while others have failed miserably.

The Credibility Code: How to Project Confidence and Competence When It Matters Most


Cara Hale Alter - 2012
    You have to look credible. Still, for many professionals, credibility feels like a mystery.Now, by pinpointing 25 specific visual and auditory cues, The Credibility Code unlocks this mystery and shows you exactly how to come across as confident, capable, and qualified in all types of person-to-person interactions.Acclaimed credibility expert Cara Hale Alter outlines clear, concise "codes of conduct" for posture, gestures, vocal skills, eye contact, and more. And unlike countless other cues, such as gender, age, or physical features, these signals are within your active control. Individually, these behaviors are easily implemented; together, they form a skill set that can transform your career.As a bonus, each chapter includes a link to an online video of the author demonstrating the "codes of conduct" featured in the previous pages.

Peak Performance: Elevate Your Game, Avoid Burnout, and Thrive with the New Science of Success


Brad Stulberg - 2017
    Whether someone is trying to qualify for the Olympics, break ground in mathematical theory or craft an artistic masterpiece, many of the practices that lead to great success are the same. In Peak Performance, Brad Stulberg, a former McKinsey and Company consultant and journalist who covers health and the science of human performance, and Steve Magness, a performance scientist and coach of Olympic athletes, team up to demystify these practices and demonstrate how everyone can achieve their best.The first book of its kind, Peak Performance combines the inspiring stories of top performers across a range of capabilities - from athletic, to intellectual, to artistic - with the latest scientific insights into the cognitive and neurochemical factors that drive performance in all domains. In doing so, Peak Performance uncovers new linkages that hold promise as performance enhancers but have been overlooked in our traditionally-siloed ways of thinking. The result is a life-changing book in which readers will learn how to enhance their performance by a myriad of ways including: optimally alternating between periods of intense work and rest; developing and harnessing the power of a self-transcending purpose; and priming the body and mind for enhanced productivity.In revealing the science of great performance and the stories of great performers across a wide range of capabilities, Peak Performance uncovers the secrets of success, and coaches readers on how to use them. If you want to take your game to the next level, whatever "your game" may be, Peak Performance will teach you how.

The Positive Leader: How Energy and Happiness Fuel Top-Performing Teams


Jan Mühlfeit - 2016
    Discover how to banish stress and negativity, rediscover your best self and become an inspirational leader - starting now.Inspirational leaders:- Target strengths, not weaknesses- Have a dream- Manage energy, not time- Put happiness before successBased on cutting edge research, and with truly actionable advice, The Positive Leader shows you how.Former Chairman of Microsoft Europe, Jan Muhlfeit, turns the lessons he's learnt from his years at the coalface of leadership into a 'how to' guide for busy managers.Academic studies have shown that a positive mind-set results in 31% higher levels of productivity.*The Positive Leader gives you a four-point approach to becoming a happier and more inspirational leader.Discover and work to your strengths Identify your mission and vision Become a 'Chief Energy Officer' Lead yourself to happiness* 'Positive Intelligence', Shawn Anchor, Harvard Business Review, Jan/Feb 2012

Tribal Leadership: Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization


Dave Logan - 2008
    I learned about myself and learned lessons I will carry with me and reflect on for the rest of my life.”—John W. Fanning, Founding Chairman and CEO napster Inc.“An unusually nuanced view of high-performance cultures.” —Inc.Within each corporation are anywhere from a few to hundreds of separate tribes. In Tribal Leadership, Dave Logan, John King, and Halee Fischer-Wright demonstrate how these tribes develop—and show you how to assess them and lead them to maximize productivity and growth. A business management book like no other, Tribal Leadership is an essential tool to help managers and business leaders take better control of their organizations by utilizing the unique characteristics of the tribes that exist within.

What You Do Is Who You Are: How to Create Your Business Culture


Ben Horowitz - 2019
    Ben Horowitz has long been fascinated by history, and particularly by how people behave differently than you’d expect. The time and circumstances in which they were raised often shapes them—yet a few leaders have managed to shape their times. In What You Do Is Who You Are, he turns his attention to a question crucial to every organization: how do you create and sustain the culture you want?To Horowitz, culture is how a company makes decisions. It is the set of assumptions employees use to resolve everyday problems: should I stay at the Red Roof Inn, or the Four Seasons? Should we discuss the color of this product for five minutes or thirty hours? If culture is not purposeful, it will be an accident or a mistake.What You Do Is Who You Are explains how to make your culture purposeful by spotlighting four models of leadership and culture-building—the leader of the only successful slave revolt, Haiti’s Toussaint Louverture; the Samurai, who ruled Japan for seven hundred years and shaped modern Japanese culture; Genghis Khan, who built the world’s largest empire; and Shaka Senghor, a man convicted of murder who ran the most formidable prison gang in the yard and ultimately transformed prison culture.Horowitz connects these leadership examples to modern case-studies, including how Louverture’s cultural techniques were applied (or should have been) by Reed Hastings at Netflix, Travis Kalanick at Uber, and Hillary Clinton, and how Genghis Khan’s vision of cultural inclusiveness has parallels in the work of Don Thompson, the first African-American CEO of McDonalds, and of Maggie Wilderotter, the CEO who led Frontier Communications. Horowitz then offers guidance to help any company understand its own strategy and build a successful culture.What You Do Is Who You Are is a journey through culture, from ancient to modern. Along the way, it answers a question fundamental to any organization: who are we? How do people talk about us when we’re not around? How do we treat our customers? Are we there for people in a pinch? Can we be trusted?Who you are is not the values you list on the wall. It’s not what you say in company-wide meeting. It’s not your marketing campaign. It’s not even what you believe. Who you are is what you do. This book aims to help you do the things you need to become the kind of leader you want to be—and others want to follow.

The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Fight Bias


Dolly Chugh - 2018
    But how do we stand up for those values in our turbulent world? The Person You Mean to Be is the smart, "semi-bold" person’s guide to fighting for what you believe in.Dolly reveals the surprising causes of inequality, grounded in the "psychology of good people". Using her research findings in unconscious bias as well as work across psychology, sociology, economics, political science, and other disciplines, she offers practical tools to respectfully and effectively talk politics with family, to be a better colleague to people who don’t look like you, and to avoid being a well-intentioned barrier to equality. Being the person we mean to be starts with a look at ourselves.She argues that the only way to be on the right side of history is to be a good-ish— rather than good—person. Good-ish people are always growing. Second, she helps you find your "ordinary privilege"—the part of your everyday identity you take for granted, such as race for a white person, sexual orientation for a straight person, gender for a man, or education for a college graduate. This part of your identity may bring blind spots, but it is your best tool for influencing change. Third, Dolly introduces the psychological reasons that make it hard for us to see the bias in and around us. She leads you from willful ignorance to willful awareness. Finally, she guides you on how, when, and whom, to engage (and not engage) in your workplaces, homes, and communities. Her science-based approach is a method any of us can put to use in all parts of our life.Whether you are a long-time activist or new to the fight, you can start from where you are. Through the compelling stories Dolly shares and the surprising science she reports, Dolly guides each of us closer to being the person we mean to be.

The Lean Turnaround: How Business Leaders Use Lean Principles to Create Value and Transform Their Company


Art Byrne - 2012
    When he writes 'Go to the Gemba and Run Your Kaizen, ' we must take heed." -- MASAAKI IMAI, bestselling author of Kaizen and Gemba Kaizen"In this wonderful and important book, Byrne shows us that Lean management, understood and practiced correctly, consistently delivers spectacular results." -- BOB EMILIANI, author, Better Thinking, Better Results , and Professor, Connecticut State University"A compelling picture of how Lean techniques and attitudes enable CEOs and senior executives to create a culture for transforming a company and putting it on a highperformance path." -- JERRY J. JASINOWSKI, former President of the National Association of Manufacturers"Art Byrne provides real-world examples of how he exhibited the wisdom and courage to do the right thing, improving work practices at all levels of the organization to deliver the right results for all stakeholders. Which comes first, the wisdom or the courage? Read The Lean Turnaround to find out." -- JOHN SHOOK, Chairman and CEO, Lean Enterprise Institute"Lean is the closest thing to magic I have experienced in my 40 years in business. I recommend Lean and this book to everyone responsible for the performance of a business, particularly those in private equity like me, where leverage magnifies the importance of cash." -- JOHN CHILDS, founder and CEO, of J. W. Childs Associates L.P."A must-read for any leader interested in understanding the strategic advantages from focusing on activities that add value to the customer experience." -- GARY S. KAPLAN, MD, Chairman and CEO of the Virginia Mason Health SystemLean isn't just for manufacturing anymore . . . Few business leaders in the world have applied Lean strategy as successfully as Art Byrne has--and none has the ability to explain how to do it with such succinctness and clarity.Famous for turning around the wire management company Wiremold, where he rethought every aspect of operations from the customer's standpoint--and got everyone else in the company to do likewise--Byrne has successfully implemented Lean strategies in more than 30 companies in 14 different countries.In The Lean Turnaround, this legendary business leader shares everything he has learned during his remarkable career and shows how anyone can achieve similar results. His primary message is this: Lean strategy isn't just for manufacturing. In fact, Byrne is using this very approach in his present position at a private equity firm.Whatever type of company you run, Lean can be used to improve virtually every aspect of operations, from training and leading employees to accounting and payroll issues. The Lean Turnaround explains all the ins and outs of applying Lean strategy to:Eliminate waste in every value-added operation Deliver consistent value to customers Stimulate growth and add jobs Increase wealth for all your stakeholders Build a company culture of continuous improvement (kaizen) Instead of attempting to get customers to conform to your way of doing things--which is, sadly, what most managers are taught to do--you need to configure your company to be responsive to the customers. This is at the core of Byrne's method--and it always works.

The Powell Principles: 24 Lessons from Colin Powell, a Battle-Proven Leader


Oren Harari - 1899
    "The Powell Principles " outlines the decision-making habits, success strategies, and leadership philosophies of Secretary of State Colin Powell, and provides fascinating examples of how Powell has used them to overcome numerous obstacles in his climb to the top. Filled with insights that are refreshingly honest, this concise, powerful book reveals how you can dramatically improve your leadership skills and achieve unmatched levels of professional success, while inspiring others to extraordinary performance.

Art of Leadership


J. Donald Walters - 2001
    Most leaders need reminding everyday that with their privileges comes responsibility and obligation. If any young man or woman seeking to become a leader and not a manager only reads one book on leadership, let it be this one!

Finite and Infinite Games: A Vision of Life as Play and Possibility


James P. Carse - 1986
    Infinite games are more mysterious -- and ultimately more rewarding. They are unscripted and unpredictable; they are the source of true freedom.In this elegant and compelling work, James Carse explores what these games mean, and what they can mean to you. He offers stunning new insights into the nature of property and power, of culture and community, of sexuality and self-discovery, opening the door to a world of infinite delight and possibility."An extraordinary little book . . . a wise and intimate companion, an elegant reminder of the real."-- Brain/Mind Bulletin

Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well


Douglas Stone - 2014
    Bosses, colleagues, customers—but also family, friends, and in-laws—they all have “suggestions” for our performance, parenting, or appearance. We know that feedback is essential for healthy relationships and professional development—but we dread it and often dismiss it.That’s because receiving feedback sits at the junction of two conflicting human desires. We do want to learn and grow. And we also want to be accepted just as we are right now. Thanks for the Feedback is the first book to address this tension head on. It explains why getting feedback is so crucial yet so challenging, and offers a powerful framework to help us take on life’s blizzard of off-hand comments, annual evaluations, and unsolicited advice with curiosity and grace.The business world spends billions of dollars and millions of hours each year teaching people how to give feedback more effectively. Stone and Heen argue that we’ve got it backwards and show us why the smart money is on educating receivers— in the workplace and in personal relationships as well.Coauthors of the international bestseller Difficult Conversations, Stone and Heen have spent the last ten years working with businesses, nonprofits, governments, and families to determine what helps us learn and what gets in our way. With humor and clarity, they blend the latest insights from neuroscience and psychology with practical, hard-headed advice. The book is destined to become a classic in the world of leadership, organizational behavior, and education.

The Culture Code: An Ingenious Way to Understand Why People Around the World Buy and Live as They Do


Clotaire Rapaille - 2006
    His groundbreaking revelations shed light not just on business but on the way every human being acts and lives around the world. Rapaille’s breakthrough notion is that we acquire a silent system of Codes as we grow up within our culture. These Codes—the Culture Code—are what make us American, or German, or French, and they invisibly shape how we behave in our personal lives, even when we are completely unaware of our motives. What’s more, we can learn to crack the Codes that guide our actions and achieve new understanding of why we do the things we do. Rapaille has used the Culture Code to help Chrysler build the PT Cruiser—the most successful American car launch in recent memory. He has used it to help Procter & Gamble design its advertising campaign for Folger’s coffee – one of the longest-lasting and most successful campaigns in the annals of advertising. He has used it to help companies as diverse as GE, AT&T, Boeing, Honda, Kellogg, and L’Oréal improve their bottom line at home and overseas. And now, in The Culture Code, he uses it to reveal why Americans act distinctly like Americans, and what makes us different from the world around us. In The Culture Code, Dr. Rapaille decodes two dozen of our most fundamental archetypes—ranging from sex to money to health to America itself—to give us “a new set of glasses” with which to view our actions and motivations. Why are we so often disillusioned by love? Why is fat a solution rather than a problem? Why do we reject the notion of perfection? Why is fast food in our lives to stay? The answers are in the Codes. Understanding the Codes gives us unprecedented freedom over our lives. It lets us do business in dramatically new ways. And it finally explains why people around the world really are different, and reveals the hidden clues to understanding us all.

The Scout Mindset: Why Some People See Things Clearly and Others Don't


Julia Galef - 2019
    In other words, we have what Julia Galef calls a soldier mindset. From tribalism and wishful thinking, to rationalizing in our personal lives and everything in between, we are driven to defend the ideas we most want to believe--and shoot down those we don't.But if we want to get things right more often, argues Galef, we should train ourselves to have a scout mindset. Unlike the soldier, a scout's goal isn't to defend one side over the other. It's to go out, survey the territory, and come back with as accurate a map as possible. Regardless of what they hope to be the case, above all, the scout wants to know what's actually true.In The Scout Mindset, Galef shows that what makes scouts better at getting things right isn't that they're smarter or more knowledgeable than everyone else. It's a handful of emotional skills, habits, and ways of looking at the world--which anyone can learn. With fascinating examples ranging from how to survive being stranded in the middle of the ocean, to how Jeff Bezos avoids overconfidence, to how superforecasters outperform CIA operatives, to Reddit threads and modern partisan politics, Galef explores why our brains deceive us and what we can do to change the way we think.