Careers Reading Lists: Professional Development

LBS Faculty

You aspire to lead with greater impact. The problem is you’re busy executing on today’s demands. You know you have to carve out time from your day job to build your leadership skills, but it’s easy to let immediate problems and old mind-sets get in the way. Herminia Ibarra--an expert on professional leadership and development and a renowned professor at INSEAD, a leading international business school--shows how managers and executives at all levels can step up to leadership by making small but crucial changes in their jobs, their networks, and themselves. In Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader, she offers advice to help you: * Redefine your job in order to make more strategic contributions * Diversify your network so that you connect to, and learn from, a bigger range of stakeholders * Become more playful with your self-concept, allowing your familiar--and possibly outdated--leadership style to evolve Ibarra turns the usual "think first and then act” philosophy on its head by arguing that doing these three things will help you learn through action and will increase what she calls your outsight--the valuable external perspective you gain from direct experiences and experimentation. As opposed to insight, outsight will then help change the way you think as a leader: about what kind of work is important; how you should invest your time; why and which relationships matter in informing and supporting your leadership; and, ultimately, who you want to become. Packed with self-assessments and practical advice to help define your most pressing leadership challenges, this book will help you devise a plan of action to become a better leader and move your career to the next level. It’s time to learn by doing.

From the author of You Are Awesome: Find Your Confidence and Dare to be Brilliant at (Almost) Anything

Essential reading for an astounding summer of sport; If you've ever wondered what makes a champion, Bounce has the answer.

This edition does not include illustrations.

What are the real secrets of sporting success, and what lessons do they offer about life? Why doesn't Tiger Woods "choke"? Why are the best figure skaters those that have fallen over the most and why has one small street in Reading produced more top table tennis players than the rest of the country put together.

Two-time Olympian and sports writer and broadcaster Matthew Syed draws on the latest in neuroscience and psychology to uncover the secrets of our top athletes and introduces us to an extraordinary cast of characters, including the East German athlete who became a man, and her husband - and the three Hungarian sisters who are all chess grandmasters. Bounce is crammed with fascinating stories and statistics.

Looking at controversial questions such as whether talent is more important than practice, drugs in sport (and life) and whether black people really are faster runners, the mind-bending Bounce is a must-read for the hardened sports nut or brand new convert.

We're told that the key to success in life and business is confidence: believe in yourself, and the world is yours. But building confidence can be a challenging task. And, as leading psychologist Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic argues, confidence can actually get in the way of achievement; self-esteem is nothing without competence, the core skills, to back it up.Confidence is feeling capable. Competence is being capable. None of the figures whose success is put down to supreme self-belief, Barack Obama, Madonna, Muhammad Ali could have achieved their goals without the hard-won skills (and years of training) behind the confidence mask. Successful people are confident because of their success, and not the other way around. Whether you want to improve your social skills, get a promotion or that all-important first job, this game-changing exploration of how to build success, in the mould of Robert Cialdini's Influence, Susan Cain's Quiet and Steven Covey's The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, will change the way you think about achievement.

Whether we're 20, 40, 60 or older, many of us are still looking for an answer to that perennial question, 'What do you want to be when you grow up?'. In 'Designing Your Life', Silicon Valley design innovators Bill Burnett and Dave Evans use their expertise to help you work out what you want - and how to get it.

Master the interpersonal side of management to enhance productivity and boost success Engagement is the manager's essential primer for dealing with difficult people and managing your team. Bestselling authors Lee G. Bolman and Joan V. Gallos are back with an engaging business novella that relates real, practical techniques captured in the 4-step SURE model for handling people problems. The story centers around a manager in a new job, and her experiences applying the four steps in leading her new team. Brief interludes punctuate the story throughout to provide room for reflection, and to explain the complex interpersonal dynamics at play in commonly encountered situations. Key lessons are underscored as the foundation for a sound people strategy, and the features and details of each rule are laid out in a clear, concise manner. You'll learn alongside the story's manager as she uses the model to find artful solutions to problems that could have easily derailed her chances of success. People are the hardest part of a manger's job. No matter how well-matched their skill sets, there is always the potential for interpersonal conflicts and strains to throw the team off-course. This book shows you deft strategies for addressing those challenges with a well thought-out framework for getting your team fully invested in the group's success. Find creative solutions to persistent issues Dig into the interpersonal dynamics at work Learn how to handle--and manage--difficult people Apply key strategies for engaging the team This compact, easy-to-apply set of guidelines draws on your leadership skills while providing a strong foundation for a new managerial approach. Effective management is frequently a tightrope between results and morale, and Engagement shows you how to find your balance and steady your team.

The world's bestselling guide to negotiation.
Getting to Yes has been in print for over thirty years, and in that time has helped millions of people secure win-win agreements both at work and in their private lives. Including principles such as:
Don't bargain over positions
Separate the people from the problem and
Insist on objective criteria
Getting to Yes simplifies the whole negotation process, offering a highly effective framework that will ensure success.

SHORTLISTED FOR THE CMI MANAGEMENT BOOK OF THE YEAR AWARD The essential guide to turning tough questions into positive opportunities Difficult questions can be thrown at you from your first job interview through to challenges you get when you've made it to the top. If you find yourself on the firing line on a regular or occasional basis this is the perfect go-to guide to help you turn tough questions into positive opportunities. Great Answers to Tough Questions at Work promotes a confident 'win-win-win' mindset for questioner, answerer and wider audiences beyond. Author Michael Dodd provides golden formulae and proven strategies for constructing inspirational answers--however challenging, vicious, tricky or stupid the question. He outlines simple but successful techniques for dealing with the kind of nightmare questions which all ambitious people in the workplace have to face along their journey, whatever stage of their career. Contains critical communication skills for executives, managers, leaders and those aspiring to fill these roles Covers a wide range of work place scenarios such as job interviews, performance reviews, negotiations, customer relations, parliamentary inquiries and cross-examination Discusses how to see the issues underlying tough questions that you face in a different, more positive, solution-oriented way Includes case study examinations of key moments where people in the public spotlight have done something particularly well or particularly badly while answering questions and draws out the lessons for readers.

How to Coach Your Team helps business managers coach their teams to peak professional performance. It includes: Becoming a team coach coaching skills for team managers Understanding your team - identifying how your team works; deciphering personalities and motivations; building the right environment for success Achieving better outcomes setting goals; managing performance; facilitating collaboration Building a happier team building trust; giving and receiving feedback; having positive conversations Improving team communication working smartly; improving meetings; working virtually A team coaching plan to help you put it all together and stay on track How to Coach Your Team is a toolkit for working together with your team to achieve success. Many of the questionnaires and ideas can be shared and there are guided opportunities to assess and monitor your progress on a regular basis.

How do you manage performance? If you come across as too directive you may get a reputation for harshness. If you are too nice you risk being known as a gullible and easily outmanoeuvred. Neither approach works.

'Employee engagement' is the magical ingredient: it makes staff genuinely committed, creating excellent work. Few organizations actually achieve it, though all say they want it. Coaching is the most reliable a way of producing it.

InManager as Coach, Jenny Rogers challenges many of the traditional assumptions about what works in management and shows you, step by step, how to be a brilliant manager and get fantastic results:

Reduce your stress
Develop employees' key skills
Create a culture of engagement
Improve bottom line results

"Pfeffer [blends] academic rigor and practical genius into wonderfully readable text. The leading thinker on the topic of power, Pfeffer here distills his wisdom into an indispensable guide." --Jim Collins, author of New York Times bestselling author Good to Great and How the Mighty Fall Some people have it, and others don't. Jeffrey Pfeffer explores why, in Power. One of the greatest minds in management theory and author or co-author of thirteen books, including the seminal business-school text Managing With Power, Jeffrey Pfeffer shows readers how to succeed and wield power in the real world.

The third volume in the internationally bestselling McKinsey Trilogy, The McKinsey Engagement is an action guide to realizing the consistently high level of business solutions achieved by the experts at the world's most respected consulting firms. Former consultant Dr. Paul Friga distills the guiding principles first presented in the bestselling The McKinsey Way and the tested-in-the-trenches methodologies outlined in The McKinsey Mind, and combines them with many of the principles and procedures implemented by the military and other organizations. The result is nothing less than the business equivalent of a Special Forces Field Manual. True to its stated goal of arming consultants and corporate problem solvers with a blueprint for achieving consistently phenomenal results, The McKinsey Engagement is short on theory and long on action. Each chapter focuses on one element in the celebrated TEAM FOCUS problem-solving model and features a concise discussion of a key concept or principle, followed by: Clear rules of engagement A set of operating tactics Sophisticated problem solving tools Easy-to-follow action steps Exercises, checklists, and training tips War stories and best practices case studies A toolkit for bringing clarity, discipline, and purpose to all your problem-solving and change management initiatives, The McKinsey Engagement is an indispensable guide for consultants, as well as for executives, managers, students, and corporate trainers.

If any of the following behaviors sound like you or someone you work with, beware! In Why CEOs Fail, David L. Dotlich and Peter C. Cairo describe the most common characteristics of derailed top executives and how you can avoid them: Arrogance--you think that you're right, and everyone else is wrong. Melodrama--you need to be the center of attention. Volatility--you're subject to mood swings. Excessive Caution--you're afraid to make decisions. Habitual Distrust--you focus on the negatives. Aloofness --you're disengaged and disconnected. Mischievousness--you believe that rules are made to be broken. Eccentricity--you try to be different just for the sake of it. Passive Resistance--what you say is not what you really believe. Perfectionism--you get the little things right and the big things wrong. Eagerness to Please--you try to win the popularity contest.

Forget everything you thought you knew about how to motivate people - at work, at school, at home. It's wrong. As Daniel H. Pink explains in his new and paradigm-shattering book Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, the secret to high performance and satisfaction in today's world is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.
Drawing on four decades of scientific research on human motivation, Pink exposes the mismatch between what science knows and what business does - and how that affects every aspect of our lives. He demonstrates that while the old-fashioned carrot-and-stick approach worked successfully in the 20th century, it's precisely the wrong way to motivate people for today's challenges. Along the way, he takes us to companies that are enlisting new approaches to motivation and introduces us to the scientists and entrepreneurs who are pointing a bold way forward.

A mindful revolution is reshaping the workplace.The world's most dynamic businesspeople are using mindfulness to become happier and more fulfilled at work - and more successful. In Mindful Work, New York Times business reporter David Gelles explains how mindful managers are using meditation, yoga and other mindfulness techniques to boost leadership, reduce stress and improve health. Featuring insights from revitalised employees, high-level managers at global companies and meditation masters, Mindful Work is an inspirational guide to the upsurge in mindfulness among companies as diverse as Google, Facebook and General Mills. Blending timeless insights and modern-day management theory, Gelles explains the practical benefits of the mindfulness boom, and offers a programme for changing the way we work - a change that will make us less stressed, more focused and happier.

oday we find ourselves in possession of stupendous know-how, which we willingly place in the hands of the most highly skilled people. But avoidable failures are common, and the reason is simple: the volume and complexity of our knowledge has exceeded our ability to consistently deliver it - correctly, safely or efficiently.In this groundbreaking book, Atul Gawande makes a compelling argument for the checklist, which he believes to be the most promising method available in surmounting failure. Whether you're following a recipe, investing millions of dollars in a company or building a skyscraper, the checklist is an essential tool in virtually every area of our lives, and Gawande explains how breaking down complex, high pressure tasks into small steps can radically improve everything from airline safety to heart surgery survival rates. Fascinating and enlightening, The Checklist Manifesto shows how the simplest of ideas could transform how we operate in almost any field.