What We Are Reading Articles

What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 7/24/2012

Business Books

Smart Trust

Smart Trust

Smart Trust: Creating Prosperity, Energy, and Joy in a Low-Trust World
Stephen M.R. Covey, Greg Link, Rebecca R. Merrill
Free Press, 2012

From the Book: In a compelling and readable style, Stephen M.R. Covey and long-time business partner Greg Link share enlightening principles and anecdotes of people and organizations that are not only achieving unprecedented prosperity from high-trust relationships and cultures but—even more inspiring—also attaining elevated levels of energy and joy. The sustainable success these leaders and enterprises are exhibiting is paradoxically being produced in what has proved to be the lowest trust climate in years, if not decades. Smart Trust shows what they are doing and the five actions they are commonly taking to prosper, against the odds, in the same circumstances causing so many others to fail.

Emotional Intelligence 2.0

Emotional Intelligence 2.0

Emotional Intelligence 2.0
Travis Bradberry, Jean Greaves
TalentSmart, 2009

From the Book: For the first time ever in a book, TalentSmart’s revolutionary program helps people identify their EQ skills, build these skills into strengths, and enjoy consistent performance in the pursuit of important life objectives. The book contains proven strategies from a decade-long effort to accurately measure and increase emotional intelligence. Trusted by upper-echelon leaders inside companies worldwide, these strategies will enable you to capitalize on the skills responsible for 58% of performance in all types of jobs.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 6/28/2012

Business Books

Trust Worthy Leader

Trust Worthy Leader

The Trust Worthy Leader
Amy Lyman
Jossey-Bass, 2012

From the Book: The Trustworthy Leader reveals the benefits organizations enjoy when trustworthy behavior is practiced consistently by their leaders. Drawing from examples from the Best Companies to Work For, Lyman, cofounder of Great Place to Work® Institute, explains that being trustworthy means that leaders’ behaviors are rooted in their commitment to the value of trust and not simply in an imitation of the practices of others. She identifies six elements that reflect a leader’s trustworthiness: honor, inclusion, engaging followers, sharing information, developing others, and moving through uncertainty to pursue opportunities.

Managing Up and Across

Managing Up and Across

Guide to Managing Up and Across
Harvard Business Review
Harvard Business Review Press, 2011

From the Book: Does your boss make you want to scream? Do you have more than one boss? Do you spend your day herding cats—corralling people who don’t report to you? Do you work across departmental silos? Collaborate with outside contractors? Then you know that managing up and across your company is critical to doing your job well. It’s all about understanding your boss’s and colleagues’ priorities, pressures, and work styles. You need to manage up and across not just because you may have a problem boss, incompetent colleagues, or fabulously hairy projects that touch all parts of your organization. Managing up and across will help you get the information and resources you need to solve your complex problems, increase your effectiveness, and make your work more enjoyable.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 5/30/2012

Business Books

Lead With Purpose

Lead With Purpose

Lead With Purpose
John Baldoni
AMACOM, 2011

From the Book: Ask any leader: What would you give to have an entire company full of committed employees willing to go the extra mile? For all your people to work together as a unified force, knowing exactly what they do, and why they do it? Featuring illuminating stories, interviews, and profiles of leaders from a variety of fields, Lead with Purpose shows readers how to take their organizations to the next level with renewed focus and improved direction.

Self Confidence

Self Confidence

Self-Confidence: The Remarkable Truth of Why a Small Change Can Make a Big Difference
Paul McGee
Capstone, 2010

From the Book: Have you ever wondered how different your life would be if you increased your confidence by just 10%? Paul McGee has. And in his latest book, he explains what confidence is, where it comes from, why it’s important, and how to develop it in yourself and others. Not only does the book deal with confidence in business, romance, social situations, and all areas of life, it explodes common myths, including why ‘over-confidence’ and ‘under-confidence’ are both harmful. Loaded with practical tips on bouncing back from a setback and feeling confident in challenging situations, this inspiring, upbeat book will help fill you with life’s X factor.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 5/1/2012

Business Books

Taking People

Taking People With You

Taking People With You: The Only Way to Make Big Things Happen
David Novak
Portfolio Hardcover, 2012

From the Book: Over his fifteen years at Yum! Brands, the author has developed a trademarked program he calls Taking People with You. He spends several weeks each year personally teaching it to thousands of managers around the world. He convinces them that they’ll never make big things happen until they learn how to get people on their side. No skill in business is more important. And Yum!’s extraordinary success (at least 13 percent growth for each of the last nine years) proves his point. Novak knows that managers don’t need leadership platitudes or business school theories. So he cuts right to the chase with a step-by- step guide to setting big goals, getting people to work together, blowing past your targets, and celebrating after you shock the skeptics.

Managing

Managing Coaching at Work

Managing Coaching at Work: Developing, Evaluating and Sustaining Coaching in Organizations
Jackie Keddy, Clive Johnson
Kogan Page, 2011

From the Book: Based on direct experience and a realistic understanding of the scope of influence that many coaching champions have within their organizations, Managing Coaching at Work provides practical guidance on all aspects of making workplace coaching work. It serves as an essential reference for any manager or HR professional looking to bring coaching into their organization and for those seeking to move forward, re-energize or maximize the true potential of their existing coaching investment.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 3/28/2012

Business Books

The Advantage

The Advantage

The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business
Patrick Lencioni
Jossey-Bass, 2012

From the Book: There is a competitive advantage out there, arguably more powerful than any other. Is it superior strategy? Faster innovation? Smarter employees? No, New York Times best-selling author, Patrick Lencioni, argues that the seminal difference between successful companies and mediocre ones has little to do with what they know and how smart they are and more to do with how healthy they are. In this book, Lencioni brings together his vast experience and many of the themes cultivated in his other best-selling books and delivers a first: a cohesive and comprehensive exploration of the unique advantage organizational health provides.

Great by Choice

Great by Choice

Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck–Why Some Thrive Despite Them All
Jim Collins
Harper Business, 2011

From the Book: Ten years after the worldwide bestseller Good to Great, Jim Collins returns with another groundbreaking work, this time to ask: Why do some companies thrive in uncertainty, even chaos, and others do not? Based on nine years of research, buttressed by rigorous analysis and infused with engaging stories, Collins and his colleague, Morten Hansen, enumerate the principles for building a truly great enterprise in unpredictable, tumultuous, and fast-moving times.

One Page Talent Management

One Page Talent Management

One Page Talent Management: Eliminating Complexity, Adding Value
Marc Effron, Miriam Ort
Harvard Business Review Press, 2010

From the Book: You know that winning in today’s marketplace requires top quality talent. You also know what it takes to build that talent—and you spend significant financial and human resources to make it happen. Yet somehow, your company’s beautifully designed and well-benchmarked processes don’t translate into the bottom-line talent depth you need. Why? The authors argue that companies unwittingly add layers of complexity to their talent building models—without evaluating whether those components add any value to the overall process. Consequently, simple processes like setting employee performance goals become multi-page, headache-inducing time-wasters that turn managers off to the whole process and fail to improve results.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 2/23/2012

Business Books

Understanding Michael Porter

Understanding Michael Porter

Understanding Michael Porter: The Essential Guide to Competition and Strategy
Joan Magretta
Harvard Business Review Press, 2011

From the Book: Competitive advantage. The value chain. Five forces. Industry structure. Differentiation. Relative cost. If you want to understand how companies achieve and sustain competitive success, Michael Porter’s frameworks are the foundation. But while everyone in business may know Porter’s name, many managers misunderstand and misuse his concepts. Understanding Michael Porter sets the record straight, providing the first concise, accessible summary of Porter’s revolutionary thinking. Written with Porter’s full cooperation by Joan Magretta, his former editor at Harvard Business Review, this new book delivers fresh, clear examples to illustrate and update Porter’s ideas.

Quiet

Quiet

Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
Susan Cain
Crown, 2012

From the Book: At least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who prefer listening to speaking, reading to partying; who innovate and create but dislike self-promotion; who favor working on their own over brainstorming in teams. Although they are often labeled “quiet,” it is to introverts that we owe many of the great contributions to society–from van Gogh’s sunflowers to the invention of the personal computer. Passionately argued, impressively researched, and filled with indelible stories of real people, Quiet shows how dramatically we undervalue introverts, and how much we lose in doing so.

The Power of Habit

The Power of Habit

The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business
Charles Duhigg
Random House 2012

From the Book: In The Power of Habit, award-winning New York Times business reporter Charles Duhigg takes us to the thrilling edge of scientific discoveries that explain why habits exist and how they can be changed. With penetrating intelligence and an ability to distill vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives, Duhigg brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation. Along the way we learn why some people and companies struggle to change, despite years of trying, while others seem to remake themselves overnight.

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Oldies, But Goodies

Author: btj-admin, Date: 1/26/2012

Regularly we post What We Are Reading and share that with our clients and colleagues (our most recent one was posted on 12-13-11). It occurred to us that while we constantly strive to have the latest and greatest leadership and business books and periodicals on our bookshelves (or our electronic readers), some of the books we refer to regularly are several years old; and, they have stood the test of time. Their concepts and principles are solid; their theories and practices transcend industries, economic conditions, and decades. While a few things may have changed, a few companies may have come and gone, the core principles have remained.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 12/13/2011

Business Books

The Coming Jobs War

The Coming Jobs War

The Coming Jobs War
Jim Clifton
Gallup Press, 2011

From the Book: Drawing on 75 years of Gallup studies, the author explains why jobs are the new global currency for leaders. More than peace or money or any other good, the business, government, military, city, and village leaders who can create good jobs will own the future. The problem is that leaders don’t know how to create jobs – especially in America. What they should do is recognize that the world is in a war for jobs.

18 Minutes

18 Minutes

18 Minutes: Find Your Focus, Master Distraction, and Get the Right Things Done
Peter Bregman
Business Plus, 2011

From the Book: Based upon the author’s weekly Harvard Business Review columns, 18 MINUTES clearly shows how busy people can cut through all the daily clutter and distractions and find a way to focus on those key items which are truly the top priorities in our lives. The author works from the premise that the best way to combat constant and distracting interruptions is to create productive distractions of one’s own.

StandOut

StandOut

StandOut: The Groundbreaking New Strengths Assessment from the Leader of the Strengths Revolution
Marcus Buckingham
Thomas Nelson, 2011

From the Book: The product of a massive data set and rigorous statistical testing, the StandOut assessment unveils your two key strength roles and shows you how find your edge and win at work. Where other assessments stop at description, StandOut takes the next step and provides practical advice on what to do to make the most of the strengths you have.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 11/8/2011

Business Books

Little Bets

Little Bets

Little Bets: How Breakthrough Ideas Emerge From Small Discoveries
Peter Sims
Free Press, 2011

From the Book: What do Apple CEO Steve Jobs, comedian Chris Rock, prize-winning architect Frank Gehry, the story developers at Pixar films, and the Army Chief of Strategic Plans all have in common? Bestselling author Peter Sims found that all of them have achieved breakthrough results by methodically taking small, experimental steps in order to discover and develop new ideas. Rather than believing they have to start with a big idea or plan a whole project out in advance, trying to foresee the final outcome, they make a series of little bets about what might be a good direction.

Corner Office

Corner Office

The Corner Office: Indispensable and Unexpected Lessons from CEOs on How to Lead and Succeed
Adam Bryant
Times Books, 2011

From the Book: With interviews with more than 75 CEOs and other top executives at companies of all sizes, the author compiles insights on such questions as what does it take to lead an organization? What are the keys to achieving the highest levels of success? Business luminaries speak thoughtfully about team creation, keeping the mission on target, management, employee relationships, the importance of feedback, and the creation of an efficient corporate culture.

Emotionally Intelligent Team

Emotionally Intelligent Team

The Emotionally Intelligent Team: Understanding and Developing the Behaviors of Success
Marcia Hughes, James Bradford Terrell
Jossey-Bass, 2007

From the Book: As the fields of neurology and organizational development continue to evolve, there is a growing body of evidence that clearly demonstrates that particular emotional and social intelligent behaviors have a direct correlation with organizational success. The authors offer practical information and a guide for businesses that want to draw on the power of the emotional competencies of their teams. They reveal how individuals, team members, and leaders can take the steps to become more emotionally intelligent team members and show how to put in place the practices and exercises that will help any team grow in emotional intelligence.

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What We Are Reading

Author: btj-admin, Date: 10/6/2011

Business Books

The Anywhere Leader

The Anywhere Leader

The Anywhere Leader: How to Lead and Succeed in Any Business Environment
Mike Thompson
Jossey-Bass, 2011

From the Book: The world is rapidly changing AND unpredictable, necessitating leaders who adjust quickly to changing priorities and unfamiliar terrain. Anyone in business today must be able to lead through uncertainty and disruption. The Anywhere Leader offers a blueprint for developing today’s leaders who can handle surprising challenges—from mergers to global relocation—and who thrive in turbulent times by being open to new concepts, passionate about progress, and resourceful with the tools available.

Change Anything

Change Anything

Change Anything: The New Science of Personal Success
Kerry Patterson et al
Business Plus, 2011

From the Book: A stunning new approach to how individuals can not only change their lives for the better in the workplace, but also their lives away from the office, including (but not limited to) finding ways to improve one’s working relationship with others, one’s overall health, outlook on life, and so on.

5 Levels of Leadership

5 Levels of Leadership

The 5 Levels of Leadership: Proven Steps to Maximize Your Potential
John C. Maxwell
Center Street, 2011

From the Book: True leadership isn’t a matter of having a certain job or title. In fact, being chosen for a position is only the first of the five levels every effective leader achieves. To become more than “the boss” people follow only because they are required to, you have to master the ability to invest in people and inspire them. To grow further in your role, you must achieve results and build a team that produces. You need to help people to develop their skills to become leaders in their own right. And if you have the skill and dedication, you can reach the pinnacle of leadership-where experience will allow you to extend your influence beyond your immediate reach and time for the benefit of others.

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