eBook downloads, eBook resources & eBook authors
The Imperfect Leader is a must read for every Kingdom leader regardless of their culture, denomination, gender, experience or lack thereof. Brown skilfully and sensitively unpacks some of the pressing issues that leaders face today, offering invaluable practical wisdom and Biblical spiritual insights as she shares from more than 20 years of ministry experience in excess of 60 nations.
In Imperfect Leadership: A book for leaders who know they don't know it all, Steve Munby eloquently reflects upon and describes a leadership approach that is strong on self-awareness and positive about the importance of asking for help. Foreword by Michael Fullan. When asked to describe his own leadership style, Steve uses the word 'imperfect' . This is not something he apologises for; he feels imperfect leadership should be celebrated. Too often we are given examples of leaders who are put on some kind of pedestal, lauded as superheroes who have it all worked out and are so good at what they do that nobody else can come close. This book is the antidote to that flawed perception. Imperfect Leadership is an honest reflection upon leadership. It is about Steve's journey, covering his highs and lows and, ultimately, how he learned to refine and improve his leadership. It is about messy, trial-and-error, butterflies-in-the-stomach leadership and about thoughtful and invitational leadership - and the positive impact it can have. At the heart of the book are edited highlights of the 12 keynote speeches delivered to increasingly large audiences of school leaders between 2005 and 2017. These speeches, delivered at the Seizing Success and Inspiring Leadership conferences, form the structure around which Steve's story and insights are wrapped. Steve's account covers some fundamental shifts in the English education system over this 12-year period and describes how school leaders altered their leadership as this context changed. Furthermore, it delves into how his own leadership developed as his personal context changed, and explores how the notion that a leader needs to be good at all aspects of leadership is not only unrealistic, but is also bad for the mental and physical health of leaders and will do nothing to attract new people into leadership positions. Ultimately, Steve hopes that as you read this book you will see the value of imperfect leadership and of the positive impact it can make. For those reading it who have yet to step up into leadership, his sincere wish is that it will encourage and empower aspirational leaders rather than discourage them. Suitable for all those in or aspiring to leadership positions in education.
Total Leaders 2.0 is the twenty-first-century's quick guide to leadership and successful change. It places the best thinking of several dozen, cutting-edge leadership and change gurus of the past two decades into an integrated, compelling, easily understood, and practical leadership framework: the Total Leader 2.0 Model. The model's five domains and fifteen performance roles enable leaders in any field of endeavor to systematically address the challenges of organizational change in today's technologically-driven, dramatically changing world-what the book's first two chapters vividly describe as the Age of Empowerment. This new edition of the widely read Total Leaders book: 1) significantly deepens the theoretical grounding and applicability of the original Total Leader Model, and 2) expands its connection to other significant dimensions of leadership, professionalism, personal empowerment, learning, life, and change. This book provides education leaders with a powerful 'outside the box' perspective on today's pressing educational issues and a systematic process-called strategic design-for moving their organizations from an Industrial Age grounding to an Age of Empowerment way of educating for the twenty-first century.
All Leaders Face Adversity. Exceptional Leaders Thrive in It. Leadership is often a struggle, and yet strong taboos keep us from talking openly and honestly about our difficulties for fear of looking weak and seeming to lack confidence. But Steven Snyder shows that this discussion is vital—adversity is precisely what unlocks our greatest potential. Using real-life stories drawn from his extensive research studying 151 diverse episodes of leadership struggle—as well as from his experiences working with Bill Gates in the early years of Microsoft and as a CEO and executive coach—Snyder shows how to navigate intense challenges to achieve personal growth and organizational success. He details strategies for embracing struggle and offers a host of unique tools and hands-on practices to help you implement them. By mastering the art of struggle, you’ll be better equipped to meet life’s challenges and focus on what matters most. “Leadership and the Art of Struggle provides you with the opportunity to learn from Snyder’s remarkable wisdom. It is a living guide that you can return to time and time again as new situations arise.” —From the foreword by Bill George, former CEO, Medtronic; Professor of Management Practice, Harvard Business School; and author of the bestselling True North “The leadership book of the year...one of the most intelligent, revealing, and practical books on the subject I have ever read. It confronts a vital truth: that challenge is the crucible for greatness and that these adversities introduce us to ourselves.” —Jim Kouzes, coauthor of the bestselling The Leadership Challenge “Steven Snyder covers all the bases from channeling your energy to managing conflict, including a great segment about overcoming your leadership blind spots...This encouraging book is a must-read!” —Ken Blanchard, coauthor of The One Minute Manager and Great Leaders Grow “Leadership and the Art of the Struggle gives you clear and compelling advice on transforming pitfalls into possibilities.” —Jodee Kozlak, Executive Vice President, Human Resources, Target
The key element that sets the incredibly effective leader apart from everyone else is their commitment to never settle for less than the very best. This internal drive is what fuels the grind and what allows for the seemingly impossible to be done. This drive indicates one thing. It is a daily symbol of the leader’s firm recognition that they are unfinished. It is the personification of never being satisfied. It is the commitment to drain every last ounce of talent from our bodies while we have an opportunity to serve. In The Unfinished Leader: A School Leadership Framework for Growth and Development, PJ, Nick, and Mike leverage decades of school and school system leadership and national and international leadership development and share the what, the how, and the why on the leader's journey. This book highlights the key characteristics of an effective leader: humble, vulnerable, courageous, open-minded, and inclusive and shows how these characteristics mixed with the mindset that personal development is never finished is necessary to achieve the lofty goals required to best support our kids and our communities. This book asserts that leadership is not an event to be conquered and checked off of a list. Leadership is a journey, and the zenith of our individual journeys is never quite attainable as the very best among us continue to drive forward tirelessly to become better versions of themselves. This book is a guidepost to help leaders understand they are works in progress and to help create a vision for their individual futures.
An instant national bestseller! Stanley McChrystal, the retired US Army general and bestselling author of Team of Teams, profiles thirteen of history’s great leaders, including Walt Disney, Coco Chanel, and Robert E. Lee, to show that leadership is not what you think it is—and never was. Stan McChrystal served for thirty-four years in the US Army, rising from a second lieutenant in the 82nd Airborne Division to a four-star general, in command of all American and coalition forces in Afghanistan. During those years he worked with countless leaders and pondered an ancient question: “What makes a leader great?” He came to realize that there is no simple answer. McChrystal profiles thirteen famous leaders from a wide range of eras and fields—from corporate CEOs to politicians and revolutionaries. He uses their stories to explore how leadership works in practice and to challenge the myths that complicate our thinking about this critical topic. With Plutarch’s Lives as his model, McChrystal looks at paired sets of leaders who followed unconventional paths to success. For instance. . . · Walt Disney and Coco Chanel built empires in very different ways. Both had public personas that sharply contrasted with how they lived in private. · Maximilien Robespierre helped shape the French Revolution in the eighteenth century; Abu Musab al-Zarqawi led the jihadist insurgency in Iraq in the twenty-first. We can draw surprising lessons from them about motivation and persuasion. · Both Boss Tweed in nineteenth-century New York and Margaret Thatcher in twentieth-century Britain followed unlikely roads to the top of powerful institutions. · Martin Luther and his future namesake Martin Luther King Jr., both local clergymen, emerged from modest backgrounds to lead world-changing movements. Finally, McChrystal explores how his former hero, General Robert E. Lee, could seemingly do everything right in his military career and yet lead the Confederate Army to a devastating defeat in the service of an immoral cause. Leaders will help you take stock of your own leadership, whether you’re part of a small team or responsible for an entire nation.
Classicist Beneker translates three political essays written by the philosopher, statesman, and moralist Plutarch of Chaeronia. These essays are timeless reflections on the proper way to lead and serve, publicly, at least with respect to the European and American political traditions.
From Putin, Trump, and Bolsonaro to Erdoğan, Orbán, and Xi, an intimate look at the rise of strongman leaders around the world. The first truly global treatment of the new nationalism, underpinned by an exceptional level of access to its key actors, from the award-winning journalist and author of Easternization. This is the most urgent political story of our time: authoritarian leaders have become a central feature of global politics. Since 2000, self-styled strongmen have risen to power in capitals as diverse as Moscow, Beijing, Delhi, Brasilia, Budapest, Ankara, Riyadh, and Washington. These leaders are nationalists and social conservatives, with little tolerance for minorities, dissent, or the interests of foreigners. At home, they claim to be standing up for ordinary people against globalist elites; abroad, they posture as the embodiments of their nations. And everywhere they go, they encourage a cult of personality. What’s more, these leaders are not just operating in authoritarian political systems but have begun to emerge in the heartlands of liberal democracy. Gideon Rachman has been in the same room with most of these strongmen and reported from their countries over a long journalistic career. While others have tried to understand their rise individually, Rachman pays full attention to the widespread phenomenon and uncovers the complex and often surprising interaction among these leaders. In the process, he identifies the common themes in our local nightmares, finding global coherence in the chaos and offering a bold new paradigm for navigating our world.
Uncommon Leaders have a gift: While inspiring and serving others with integrity, they also model a commitment to self-care and reflective practices. These skillful leaders are focused on being intentional and mindful of their values, beliefs, and guiding principles---in short, they “live well”. This high level of self-awareness informs the leader’s capacity to model courage and integrity---to “lead strong”. Grounded in their beliefs and values, these leaders routinely offer skillful feedback that impacts performance; they also have the capacity to plan and hold difficult conversations with professionalism. Uncommon Leadership supplies the reader with practical strategies, information and exercises to develop skills, as well as inspirational ideas for maintaining strong and effective leadership over a sustained period of time. Each chapter includes ways in which the reader may transfer their learning to their own practice, as well as a graphic quote that serves as a reminder of key points. Practicing leaders will find this a helpful guide for significant professional growth; aspiring and early career leaders will find it a valuable tool they will return to often for reference.
