 Grit: The Power of Passion & Perseverance

In this instant New York Times bestseller, pioneering psychologist Angela Duckworth shows anyone striving to succeed—be it parents, students, educators, athletes, or business people—that the secret to outstanding achievement is not talent but a special blend of passion and persistence she calls “grit.” Drawing on her own powerful story as the daughter of a scientist who frequently noted her lack of “genius,” Duckworth, now a celebrated researcher and professor, describes her early eye-opening stints in teaching, business consulting, and neuroscience, which led to the hypothesis that what really drives success is not “genius” but a unique combination of passion and long-term perseverance. 

Radical Candor: Fully Revised & Updated Edition: Be a Kick-Ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity 

The idea is simple: You don't have to choose between being a pushover and a jerk. Using Radical Candor - avoiding the perils of Obnoxious Aggression, Manipulative Insincerity, and Ruinous Empathy - you can be kind and clear at the same time. Kim Scott was a highly successful leader at Google before decamping to Apple, where she developed and taught a management class. Since the original publication of Radical Candor in 2017, Scott has earned international fame with her vital approach to effective leadership and co-founded the Radical Candor executive education company, which helps companies put the book's philosophy into practice. Radical Candor is about caring personally and challenging directly, about soliciting criticism to improve your leadership and also providing guidance that helps others grow. It focuses on praise but doesn't shy away from criticism - to help you love your work and the people you work with. Radically Candid relationships with team members enable bosses to fulfill their three core responsibilities: Create a culture of Compassionate Candor.
Build a cohesive team.
Achieve results collaboratively. Required listening for the most successful organizations, Radical Candor has raised the bar for management practices worldwide.

The Happiness Advantage

An engaging, deeply researched guide to flourishing in a world of increasing stress and negativity—the inspiration for one of the most popular TED Talks of all time. Happiness is not the belief that we don’t need to change; it is the realization that we can. Our most commonly held formula for success is broken. Conventional wisdom holds that once we succeed, we’ll be happy; that once we get that great job, win that next promotion, lose those five pounds, happiness will follow. But the science reveals this formula to be backward: Happiness fuels success, not the other way around.

Unreasonable Hospitality

Essential lessons in hospitality for every business, from the former co-owner of legendary restaurant Eleven Madison Park. National Best Seller. Today, every business can choose to be a hospitality business—and we can all transform ordinary transactions into extraordinary experiences. Featuring sparkling stories of his journey through restaurants, with the industry’s most famous players like Daniel Boulud and Danny Meyer, Guidara urges us all to find the magic in what we do—for ourselves, the people we work with, and the people we serve.

It's the Manager: Gallup finds the quality of managers and team leaders is the single biggest factor in your organization's long-term success.

While the world’s workplace has been going through extraordinary historical change, the practice of management has been stuck in time for more than 30 years. The new workforce – especially younger generations – wants their work to have a deep mission and purpose, and they don’t want old-style command-and-control bosses. They want coaches who inspire them, communicate with them frequently, and develop their strengths. Packed with 52 discoveries from Gallup’s largest study on the future of work, It’s the Manager shows leaders how to adapt their organizations to rapid change, ranging from new workplace demands to the challenges of managing remote employees, a diverse workforce, the rise of artificial intelligence, gig workers, and attracting – and keeping – today’s best employees. Who is the most important person in your organization to lead your teams through these changes? Decades of global Gallup research reveal: It’s your managers. They are the ones who make or break your organization’s success. When you build great managers -- ones who can maximize the potential of every team member -- you will see organic revenue and profit growth, and you will deliver to every one of your employees what they most want today: a great job and a great life. This is the future of work.

Leaders Eat Last Deluxe: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don't

Imagine a world where almost everyone wakes up inspired to go to work, feels trusted and valued during the day, then returns home feeling fulfilled. This is not a crazy, idealized notion. Today, in many successful organizations, great leaders create environments in which people naturally work together to do remarkable things. In his work with organizations around the world, Simon Sinek noticed that some teams trust each other so deeply that they would put their lives on the line for each other. Other teams, no matter what incentives are offered, are doomed to infighting, fragmentation, and failure. Why? The answer became clear during a conversation with a Marine Corps general. "Officers eat last," he said. Sinek watched as the most junior Marines ate first while the most senior Marines took their place at the back of the line. What's symbolic in the chow hall is deadly serious on the battlefield: Great leaders sacrifice their comfort--even their survival--for the good of those in their care. Too many workplaces are driven by cynicism, paranoia, and self-interest. But the best ones foster trust and cooperation because their leaders build what Sinek calls a "Circle of Safety" that separates the security inside the team from the challenges outside. Sinek illustrates his ideas with fascinating true stories that range from the military to big business, from government to investment banking.

Strengths Based Leadership: Great Leaders, Teams and Why People Follow

In Strengths Based Leadership, number-one New York Times best-selling author Tom Rath and renowned leadership consultant Barry Conchie reveal the results of this research. Based on their discoveries, the book identifies three keys to being a more effective leader: knowing your strengths and investing in others' strengths, getting people with the right strengths on your team, and understanding and meeting the four basic needs of those who look to you for leadership.


The Self-Aware Leader: Play to Your Strengths, Unleash Your Team 

With 50 years of leading and teaching experience, influential leadership expert and speaker John C. Maxwell can help you become your best leadership self. In The Self-Aware Leader, Maxwell teaches you how to: Gauge your effectiveness as a leader.
Make better choices that lead to success.
Discover and correct your own mistakes.
Improve your leadership with the team.
Make the right trades in your career.
Self-awareness is key for new and seasoned leaders who want to avoid micro-managing, handle criticism with grace, and give others the credit they deserve. Maxwell also aims to help current and new managers looking to identify their strengths, become better learners, and improve their listening skills. When leaders don’t see themselves, understand their strengths and weaknesses, or recognize their negative interactions with their team, they limit their influence and undermine their effectiveness. What’s the solution? Become a self-aware leader.

High Performance Habits: How Extraordinary People Become That Way

Twenty years ago, author Brendon Burchard became obsessed with answering three questions: 1. Why do some individuals and teams succeed more quickly than others and sustain that success over the long term? 2. Of those who pull it off, why are some miserable and others consistently happy on their journey? 3. What motivates people to reach for higher levels of success in the first place, and what practices help them improve the most After extensive original research and a decade as the world’s leading high-performance coach, Burchard found the answers. It turns out that just six deliberate habits give you the edge. Anyone can practice these habits and, when they do, extraordinary things happen in their lives, relationships, and careers. Which habits can help you achieve long-term success and vibrant well-being no matter your age, career, strengths, or personality? To become a high performer, you must seek clarity, generate energy, raise necessity, increase productivity, develop influence, and demonstrate courage. The art and science of how to do all this is what this book is about. Whether you want to get more done, lead others better, develop skill faster, or dramatically increase your sense of joy and confidence, the habits in this book will help you achieve it faster. Each of the six habits is illustrated by powerful vignettes, cutting-edge science, thought-provoking exercises, and real-world daily practices you can implement right now. If you’ve ever wanted a science-backed, heart-centered plan to live a better quality of life, it’s in your hands. Best of all, you can measure your progress. A link to a free professional assessment is included in the book.

The Carrot Principle: How the Best Managers Use Recognition to Engage Their People, Retain Talent, and Accelerate Performance

Since its original publication in 2007, the New York Times bestseller The Carrot Principle has received rave reviews in The Wall Street Journal, Fortune, and The New York Times, and has helped a host of managers to energize their teams, and companies to dramatically boost their business results. The book was even adopted by the prestigious FranklinCovey International training and consulting group for its leadership training. This updated edition couldn't come at a better time, as the economic downturn requires us all to come up with creative and cost-effective ways to stimulate growth and productivity. Revealing the groundbreaking results of one of the most in-depth management studies ever undertaken, The Carrot Principle shows definitively that the central character of the most successful managers is that they provide their employees with frequent and effective recognition. With independent results from HealthStream Research and analysis by bestselling leadership experts Adrian Gostick and Chester Elton, this breakthrough study of 200,000 people over ten years found dramatically greater business results when managers offered constructive praise and meaningful rewards in ways that powerfully motivated employees to excel. These managers lead with carrots, not sticks, and in doing so achieve higher: -Productivity
-Engagement
-Retention

Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High

The book that revolutionized business communications has been updated for today’s workplace. Crucial Conversations provides powerful skills to ensure every conversation—especially difficult ones—leads to the results you want. Written in an engaging and witty style, the book teaches readers how to be persuasive rather than abrasive, how to get back to productive dialogue when others blow up or clam up, and it offers powerful skills for mastering high-stakes conversations, regardless of the topic or person. This new edition addresses issues that have arisen in recent years. You’ll learn how to:
Respond when someone initiates a crucial conversation with you
Identify and address the lag time between identifying a problem and discussing it
Communicate more effectively across digital mediums
When stakes are high, opinions vary, and emotions run strong, you have three choices: Avoid a crucial conversation and suffer the consequences; handle the conversation poorly and suffer the consequences; or apply the lessons and strategies of Crucial Conversations and improve relationships and results. Whether they take place at work or at home, with your coworkers or your spouse, crucial conversations have a profound impact on your career, your happiness, and your future. With the skills you learn in this book, you'll never have to worry about the outcome of a crucial conversation again.

Crucial Accountability: Tools for Resolving Violated Expectations, Broken Commitments, and Bad Behavior

Broken promises, missed deadlines, poor behavior--they don't just make others' lives miserable; they can sap up to 50 percent of organizational performance and account for the vast majority of divorces. Crucial Accountability offers the tools for improving relationships in the workplace and in life and for resolving all these problems--permanently.

How Highly Effective People Speak: How High Performers Use Psychology to Influence With Ease

Why do we think what we think? Think we know what we think we know? Believe what we believe? Like what we like? Do what we do? Why do others trust or distrust us? Respect or disrespect us? Listen to or ignore us? Reach out to or neglect us? Like or dislike us? Praise or slander us? Believe or doubt us? That's not all... Why do others follow our lead or stand in our way? Give us opportunities or send them elsewhere? Support our striving for success and appreciate our message or toss it – and us – aside? Decades of cutting-edge (but unheard-of) scientific research presents an answer... Because hidden, little-known secrets of psychology influence everything about us... Neglecting them is swimming upstream. You can't change minds, win friends, or influence people. You can't earn undivided attention or get the respect you deserve. You undermine your professional image, stagnate your career, and destroy your confidence until communication makes you anxious. You don't deserve this. Neither did I. I remember wondering, "Why do people never support my ideas? Why am I drowning in a sea of 'sorry, maybe later' (AKA never)? Why have I stopped succeeding?" Luckily, everything changed when I answered one question... What are the communication habits of highly effective people? It comes down to one secret: Highly effective people speak about how the human mind evolved to interpret information. The result? They easily persuade and instantly influence, turning communication from an obstacle into an opportunity. They enrich their careers, get more done, and advance with stunning speed. They impact and inspire others, rising to positions of leadership. They quickly succeed, excel with ease, and shape the world. They attract support, feel confident, and smash goal after goal. Who are they? Presidents and CEOs; top performers and respected professionals; leaders and visionaries.

Intentional Leadership: The Big 8 Capabilities Setting Leaders Apart

We live in a time of unprecedented speed, connection, and uncertainty. While many organizations are adapting to this new reality by reinventing business models, significantly fewer are examining the implications of these changes for developing effective leadership. In Intentional Leadership, Rose M. Patten draws on her expertise as one of Canada’s most influential leaders to shine a spotlight on this emergent and often neglected space. Drawing on learnings and a framework tested with over 900 senior leaders across industries and geographies, Intentional Leadership presents a guide for continuous renewal, focusing on the human side of leading. Patten debunks common myths, emphasizing that leadership capabilities do not just develop over time, but require self-awareness, feedback, intention, adjustment, and practice. Whether you are a CEO of a large corporation, an activist, raising a family, working in government, or leading a not-for-profit organization, Intentional Leadership meets you where you are and provides the necessary tools for self-reflection and growth as a leader.

When They Win, You Win: Being a Great Manager Is Simpler Than You Think

From the legendary Silicon Valley manager who inspired Radical Candor, the three simple rules for creating happy, engaged teams. Businesses everywhere are plagued by managers who seem to think that keeping their staff miserable is the best way to deliver profits. This is a failure of leadership that also hurts the bottom line; research has shown that maintaining a happy, engaged workforce consistently drives measurably better business results across the board. In When They Win, You Win, Russ Laraway, the Chief People Officer of Goodwater Capital, provides a simple, coherent, and complete leadership standard that teaches organizational planners and managers how to develop incredible levels of employee engagement. The book identifies three key elements: clear direction-setting, frequent coaching, and active engagement with employees on their long-term career goals. Russ Laraway's approach to management, developed at Google, Twitter, Qualtrics, and Goodwater, shows the way to cultivate a happy, productive, and engaged team. Happy results are sure to follow—for you, your customers, your shareholders, and your employees alike.

The First 90 Days, Updated and Expanded: Proven Strategies for Getting Up to Speed Faster and Smarter 

The world’s most trusted guide for leaders in transition. Transitions are a critical time for leaders. In fact, most agree that moving into a new role is the biggest challenge a manager will face. While transitions offer a chance to start fresh and make needed changes in an organization, they also place leaders in a position of acute vulnerability. Missteps made during the crucial first three months in a new role can jeopardize or even derail your success. In this updated and expanded version of the international bestseller The First 90 Days, Michael D. Watkins offers proven strategies for conquering the challenges of transitions - no matter where you are in your career. Watkins, a noted expert on leadership transitions and adviser to senior leaders in all types of organizations, also addresses today’s increasingly demanding professional landscape, where managers face not only more frequent transitions but also steeper expectations once they step into their new jobs. By walking you through every aspect of the transition scenario, Watkins identifies the most common pitfalls new leaders encounter and provides the tools and strategies you need to avoid them. You’ll learn how to secure critical early wins, an important first step in establishing yourself in your new role. Each chapter also includes checklists, practical tools, and self-assessments to help you assimilate key lessons and apply them to your own situation. Whether you’re starting a new job, being promoted from within, embarking on an overseas assignment, or being tapped as CEO, how you manage your transition will determine whether you succeed or fail. Use this book as your trusted guide. 

Make Time: How to Focus on What Matters Every Day

Nobody ever looked at an empty calendar and said, "The best way to spend this time is by cramming it full of meetings!" or got to work in the morning and thought, Today I'll spend hours on Facebook! Yet that's exactly what we do. Why? In a world where information refreshes endlessly and the workday feels like a race to react to other people's priorities faster, frazzled and distracted has become our default position. But what if the exhaustion of constant busyness wasn't mandatory? What if you could step off the hamster wheel and start taking control of your time and attention? That's what this book is about. As creators of Google Ventures' renowned "design sprint," Jake and John have helped hundreds of teams solve important problems by changing how they work. Building on the success of these sprints and their experience designing ubiquitous tech products from Gmail to YouTube, they spent years experimenting with their own habits and routines, looking for ways to help people optimize their energy, focus, and time. Now they've packaged the most effective tactics into a four-step daily framework that anyone can use to systematically design their days. Make Time is not a one-size-fits-all formula. Instead, it offers a customizable menu of bite-size tips and strategies that can be tailored to individual habits and lifestyles. Make Time isn't about productivity, or checking off more to-dos. Nor does it propose unrealistic solutions like throwing out your smartphone or swearing off social media. Making time isn't about radically overhauling your lifestyle; it's about making small shifts in your environment to liberate yourself from constant busyness and distraction.

Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones

No matter your goals, Atomic Habits offers a proven framework for improving--every day. James Clear, one of the world's leading experts on habit formation, reveals practical strategies that will teach you exactly how to form good habits, break bad ones, and master the tiny behaviors that lead to remarkable results. If you're having trouble changing your habits, the problem isn't you. The problem is your system. Bad habits repeat themselves again and again not because you don't want to change, but because you have the wrong system for change. You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems. Here, you'll get a proven system that can take you to new heights.

Make Meetings Matter: How to Turn Meetings from Status Updates to Remarkable Conversations

No one wants to be called in for a meeting that could've been an email. No one wants to sit in a meeting where everyone's distracted or talking over each other. If you're going to attend or lead a meeting, don't you want it to…well, matter? Meetings are a chance to initiate a conversation with your teammates. You can communicate information with them that wouldn't have the same hold digitally. You can foster new relationships with your coworkers, and learn from their new ideas and perspectives. So why do so many people dread meetings? Because they're doing them all wrong. Change the way people think about meetings. Transform their opinions by holding a meeting that is efficient and productive, that is open and communicative, that is useful and important. Revolutionize the definition of a meeting. Learn to make them matter. Paul Axtell affirms the importance of meetings, and he redesigns them using the vital foundation of conversation. With real-life examples and actionable advice, he shows you how to design meetings for results, leads them to achieve agendas that move projects forward, and even allows time for building the relationships that make working together in a remarkable way possible. Based on his award-winning efficiency training, this book will revolutionize the meeting―moving it from that dreaded obligation to a powerful way to get things done in business and life.

Boundaries for Leaders

In a voice that is motivating and inspiring, Dr. Cloud offers practical advice on how to manage teams, coach direct reports, and instill an organization with strong values and culture. Boundaries for Leaders is essential reading for executives and aspiring leaders who want to create successful companies with satisfied employees and customers while becoming more resilient leaders themselves.

Boundary Boss: The Essential Guide to Talk True, Be Seen, and (Finally) Live Free

Most of us were never taught how to effectively express our preferences, desires or deal-breakers. Instead, we hide our feelings behind passive-aggressive behavior, deny our own truths, or push our emotions down until we get depressed or so frustrated that we explode, potentially destroying hard-won trust and relationships. The most successful and satisfied people on the planet have one thing in common: the ability to create and communicate clear, healthy boundaries. This ability is, hands down, the biggest game changer when it comes to creating a healthy, happy, self-determined life. In Boundary Boss, psychotherapist Terri Cole reveals a specific set of skills that can help you stop abandoning yourself for the sake of others (without guilt or drama) and get empowered to consciously take control of every aspect of your emotional, spiritual, physical, personal, and professional life.


Boundaries Where You End And I Begin: How To Recognize And Set Healthy Boundaries 

Have you recently walked away from a date or a conversation feeling uncomfortable or violated? Are you looking for ways to set limits with your spouse, kids, parents, or boss? This essential guide to setting and respecting boundaries is for anyone wanting to better understand themselves and others. Just as a cut in our skin causes pain and injury, a breach of any of our physical, emotional, or sexual boundaries can be very harmful to our bodies and minds. We may need help to heal from past boundary violations, respect the boundaries of those around us, and learn how to set healthy limits for the future, particularly if we have a history of trauma, unhealthy relationships, addiction, or adverse childhood experiences. Drawing on decades of personal and professional experience as a therapist—as well as stories from others who have learned how to heal from serious boundary violations—Anne Katherine, MA, brings us an invaluable, foundational guide on the who, what, and why of boundaries. With nearly 100,000 copies sold, Boundaries: Where You End and I Begin has already helped thousands of readers stand up for themselves and nurture healthier relationship.

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us

Most people believe that the best way to motivate is with rewards like money—the carrot-and-stick approach. That's a mistake, says Daniel H. Pink (author of To Sell Is Human: The Surprising Truth About Motivating Others). In this provocative and persuasive new book, he asserts that the secret to high performance and satisfaction-at work, at school, and at home—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 life. He examines the three elements of true motivation—autonomy, mastery, and purpose-and offers smart and surprising techniques for putting these into action in a unique book that will change how we think and transform how we live.

What Are Your Blind Spots? Conquering the 5 Misconceptions that Hold Leaders Back 

Uncover your blind spots and reset your leadership approach for long-lasting success in any business far too many business leaders today are using outdated practices to engage and motivate their people―and they’re failing miserably. Truly resilient, thriving organizations are those that are purpose-driven and focus on more than pure profits. Purpose, or underlying company philosophy, not only drives strategic change but also encourages customer loyalty and employee engagement. To succeed, leaders must be willing to discard old ways of thinking and detrimental business habits—and recognize their blind spots. Authors Jim Haudan and Rich Berens identify the five most common leadership blind spots that hamper success: Purpose, Story, Engagement, Trust, and Truth. They take you straight into the boardroom of well-known leadership teams to illustrate how these blind spots play out and the impact they have on organizations. You’ll learn how to identify and overcome your blind spots and embrace positive, forward-thinking new practices. What Are Your Blind Spots equips you with the tools needed for a personal leadership reset. You’ll discover how to increase engagement, productivity, and growth in your organization. This is an invaluable guide for executives, managers, team leaders, and human resource professionals looking for an effective way to engage and motivate employees at every level of an organization.

Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies

Drawing upon a six-year research project at the Stanford University Graduate School of Business, Collins and Porras took eighteen truly exceptional and long-lasting companies -- they have an average age of nearly one hundred years and have outperformed the general stock market by a factor of fifteen since 1926 -- and studied each company in direct comparison to one of its top competitors. They examined the companies from their very beginnings to the present day -- as start-ups, as midsize companies, and as large corporations. Throughout, the authors asked: "What makes the truly exceptional companies different from other companies?" What separates General Electric, 3M, Merck, Wal-Mart, Hewlett-Packard, Walt Disney, and Philip Morris from their rivals? How, for example, did Procter & Gamble, which began life substantially behind rival Colgate, eventually prevail as the premier institution in its industry? How was Motorola able to move from a humble battery repair business into integrated circuits and cellular communications, while Zenith never became dominant in anything other than TVs? How did Boeing unseat McDonnell Douglas as the world's best commercial aircraft company -- what did Boeing have that McDonnell Douglas lacked? By answering such questions, Collins and Porras go beyond the incessant barrage of management buzzwords and fads of the day to discover timeless qualities that have consistently distinguished out-standing companies. They also provide inspiration to all executives and entrepreneurs by destroying the false but widely accepted idea that only charismatic visionary leaders can build visionary companies. Filled with hundreds of specific examples and organized into a coherent framework of practical concepts that can be applied by managers and entrepreneurs at all levels, Built to Last provides a master blueprint for building organizations that will prosper long into the twenty-first century and beyond.

Victory Through Organization: Why the War for Talent is Failing Your Company and What You Can Do about It

Destined to be a classic in the field, this game-changing book from HR visionary Dave Ulrich tackles one of the greatest challenges in Human Resources today: the talent wars. As companies grow increasingly and aggressively competitive in hiring and nurturing individual employees, this book offers a refreshing, revolutionary alternative. By creating dynamic systems that leverage talent throughout the organization, you can create a unified whole that is greater than the sum of its parts. In the long run, that’s what gives your company the competitive edge it needs. Based on the research findings of the latest round of Ulrich’s legendary HR Competency Survey, this groundbreaking book is sure to spark debate, shatter myths, and inspire real change throughout the HR community. Filled with fact-based insights and field-tested strategies, it proves that your organization’s success lies, not in the talent you have, but in what you do with the talent once you have it. This book shows you how to build capabilities, strengthen systems, and empower human capital—for longer-lasting success.

Tiny Habits: The Small Changes That Change Everything

BJ Fogg is here to change your life - and revolutionize how we think about human behavior. Based on 20 years of research and Fogg’s experience coaching more than 40,000 people, Tiny Habits cracks the code of habit formation. With breakthrough discoveries in every chapter, you’ll learn the simplest proven ways to transform your life. Fogg shows you how to feel good about your successes instead of bad about your failures. This proven, step-by-step guide will help you design habits and make them stick through positive emotion and celebrating small successes. Whether you want to lose weight, de-stress, sleep better, or be more productive each day, Tiny Habits makes it easy to achieve - by starting small. 

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

The seven habits have become famous and are integrated into everyday thinking by millions and millions of people. Why? Because they work! With Sean Covey’s added takeaways on how habits can be used in our modern age, the wisdom of the seven habits will be refreshed for a new generation of leaders. They include: Habit one: Be proactive
Habit two: Begin with the end in mind
Habit three: Put first things first
Habit four: Think to win/win
Habit five: Seek first to understand, then to be understood
Habit six: Synergize
Habit seven: Sharpen the saw This beloved classic presents a principle-centered approach to solving both personal and professional problems. With penetrating insights and practical anecdotes, Stephen R. Covey reveals a step-by-step pathway for living with fairness, integrity, honesty, and human dignity - principles that give us the security to adapt to change and the wisdom and power to take advantage of the opportunities that change creates.


Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know

Intelligence is usually seen as the ability to think and learn, but in a rapidly changing world, there's another set of cognitive skills that might matter more: the ability to rethink and unlearn. In our daily lives, too many of us favor the comfort of conviction over the discomfort of doubt. We listen to opinions that make us feel good, instead of ideas that make us think hard. We see disagreement as a threat to our egos, rather than an opportunity to learn. We surround ourselves with people who agree with our conclusions when we should be gravitating toward those who challenge our thought process. The result is that our beliefs get brittle long before our bones. We think too much like preachers defending our sacred beliefs, prosecutors proving the other side wrong, and politicians campaigning for approval - and too little like scientists searching for truth. Intelligence is no cure, and it can even be a curse: being good at thinking can make us worse at rethinking. The brighter we are, the blinder to our limitations we can become. Organizational psychologist Adam Grant is an expert on opening other people's minds - and our own. As Wharton's top-rated professor and the bestselling author of Originals and Give and Take, he makes it one of his guiding principles to argue like he's right but listen like he's wrong. With bold ideas and rigorous evidence, he investigates how we can embrace the joy of being wrong, bring nuance to charged conversations, and build schools, workplaces, and communities of lifelong learners. You'll learn how an international debate champion wins arguments, a Black musician persuades white supremacists to abandon hate, a vaccine whisperer convinces concerned parents to immunize their children, and Adam has coaxed Yankees fans to root for the Red Sox. Think Again reveals that we don't have to believe everything we think or internalize everything we feel. It's an invitation to let go of views that are no longer serving us well and prize mental flexibility over foolish consistency. If knowledge is power, knowing what we don't know is wisdom.

The First-Time Manager

Learn to conquer every challenge like a pro with clear, candid advice in The First-Time Manager. For nearly four decades, this trusted guide has brought newcomers up to speed on the nitty-gritty realities of managing people. The updated seventh edition delivers new information that helps you manage across generations, use online performance appraisal tools, persuade with stories, oversee remote employees, build a team dynamic, match a boss’ style, and more. The jump from star employee to a new manager is bigger than most people realize - with opportunities to fail at every step. Stumbling your way through isn’t an option. In The First-Time Manager, you will learn skills including: leading meetings,
hiring employees,
motivating others,
actively listening,
staying calm under pressure,
overcoming resistance and much more.
With little experience or training, a coveted promotion can become a trial by fire. No one needs that. Turn to the book that thousands have relied on to hit the ground running.

Talent Magnet: How to Attract and Keep the Best People (The High Performance Series)

More than vision, strategy, creativity, marketing, finance, or even technology, it is ultimately people that determine organizational success. That's why virtually every organization wants more top talent. But do you know what they're looking for? It might not be what you think! Talent Magnet will show you how to attract and keep great people.


Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience 

In Atlas of the Heart, Brown takes us on a journey through eighty-seven of the emotions and experiences that define what it means to be human. As she maps the necessary skills and an actionable framework for meaningful connection, she gives us the language and tools to access a universe of new choices and second chances—a universe where we can share and steward the stories of our bravest and most heartbreaking moments with one another in a way that builds connection. Over the past two decades, Brown’s extensive research into the experiences that make us who we are has shaped the cultural conversation and helped define what it means to be courageous with our lives. Atlas of the Heart draws on this research, as well as on Brown’s singular skills as a storyteller, to show us how accurately naming an experience doesn’t give the experience more power—it gives us the power of understanding, meaning, and choice. 

The Art of Thinking Clearly

Despite the best of intentions, humans are notoriously bad—that is, irrational—when it comes to making decisions and assessing risks and tradeoffs. Psychologists and neuroscientists refer to these distinctly human foibles, biases, and thinking traps as “cognitive errors.” Cognitive errors are systematic deviances from rationality, from optimized, logical, rational thinking and behavior. We make these errors all the time, in all sorts of situations, for problems big and small: whether to choose the apple or the cupcake; whether to keep retirement funds in the stock market when the Dow tanks, or whether to take the advice of a friend over a stranger. The “behavioral turn” in neuroscience and economics in the past twenty years has increased our understanding of how we think and how we make decisions. It shows how systematic errors mar our thinking and under which conditions our thought processes work best and worst. Evolutionary psychology delivers convincing theories about why our thinking is, in fact, marred. The neurosciences can pinpoint with increasing precision what exactly happens when we think clearly and when we don’t. Drawing on this wide body of research, The Art of Thinking Clearly is an entertaining presentation of these known systematic thinking errors--offering guidance and insight into everything why you shouldn’t accept a free drink to why you SHOULD walk out of a movie you don’t like it to why it’s so hard to predict the future to why shouldn’t watch the news. The book is organized into 100 short chapters, each covering a single cognitive error, bias, or heuristic. Examples of these concepts include: Reciprocity, Confirmation Bias, The It-Gets-Better-Before-It-Gets-Worse Trap, and the Man-With-A-Hammer Tendency. In engaging prose and with real-world examples and anecdotes, The Art of Thinking Clearly helps solve the puzzle of human reasoning.

Measure What Matters: How Google, Bono, and the Gates Foundation Rock the World with OKRs

In the fall of 1999, John Doerr met with the founders of a start-up whom he'd just given $12.5 million, the biggest investment of his career. Larry Page and Sergey Brin had amazing technology, entrepreneurial energy, and sky-high ambitions, but no real business plan. For Google to change the world (or even to survive), Page and Brin had to learn how to make tough choices on priorities while keeping their team on track. They'd have to know when to pull the plug on losing propositions, to fail fast. And they needed timely, relevant data to track their progress—to measure what mattered. Doerr taught them about a proven approach to operating excellence: Objectives and Key Results. He had first discovered OKRs in the 1970s as an engineer at Intel, where the legendary Andy Grove ("the greatest manager of his or any era") drove the best-run company Doerr had ever seen. Later, as a venture capitalist, Doerr shared Grove's brainchild with more than fifty companies. Wherever the process was faithfully practiced, it worked. In this goal-setting system, objectives define what we seek to achieve; key results are how those top-priority goals will be attained with specific, measurable actions within a set time frame. Everyone's goals, from entry level to CEO, are transparent to the entire organization. The benefits are profound. OKRs surface an organization's most important work. They focus effort and foster coordination. They keep employees on track. They link objectives across silos to unify and strengthen the entire company. Along the way, OKRs enhance workplace satisfaction and boost retention. In Measure What Matters, Doerr shares a broad range of first-person, behind-the-scenes case studies, with narrators including Bono and Bill Gates, to demonstrate the focus, agility, and explosive growth that OKRs have spurred at so many great organizations. This book will help a new generation of leaders capture the same magic.

The Art of Gathering: How We Meet and Why It Matters

In The Art of Gathering, Priya Parker argues that the gatherings in our lives are lackluster and unproductive--which they don't have to be. We rely too much on routine and the conventions of gatherings when we should focus on distinctiveness and the people involved. At a time when coming together is more important than ever, Parker sets forth a human-centered approach to gathering that will help everyone create meaningful, memorable experiences, large and small, for work and for play. Drawing on her expertise as a facilitator of high-powered gatherings around the world, Parker takes us inside events of all kinds to show what works, what doesn't, and why. She investigates a wide array of gatherings--conferences, meetings, a courtroom, a flash-mob party, an Arab-Israeli summer camp--and explains how simple, specific changes can invigorate any group experience. The result is a book that's both journey and guide, full of exciting ideas with real-world applications. The Art of Gathering will forever alter the way you look at your next meeting, industry conference, dinner party, and backyard barbecue--and how you host and attend them.

Lead With Balance: How To Master Work-Life Balance in an Imbalanced Culture

Valuable Techniques to Living a Balanced Life
Has your “regular” workday started to last over nine hours? Have you been missing important family events to satisfy the boss? Are you regularly skipping healthy meals and trips to the gym just to squeeze more into your day? If so, you’re not the only one. Countless individuals struggle with maintaining steady personal and work lives.
In Lead with Balance, university professor, speaker, and executive consultant Donnie Hutchinson addresses this issue head-on and explains how leaders, employees, and students can properly manage all the important facets of life. A balanced life leads to increased well-being, happiness, satisfaction, and productivity―a win-win for everyone.
Through proper time management and focus, anyone can find their life’s balance. Don’t lose sight of the most significant moments in life. We can all learn from the Millennials. It’s time to take action and enjoy living!

Never Split the Difference: Negotiating as if Your Life Depended on It

A former international hostage negotiator for the FBI offers a new field-tested approach to high-stakes negotiations - whether in the boardroom or at home. After a stint policing the rough streets of Kansas City, Missouri, Chris Voss joined the FBI, where his career as a hostage negotiator brought him face-to-face with a range of criminals, including bank robbers and terrorists. Reaching the pinnacle of his profession, he became the FBI's lead international kidnapping negotiator. Never Split the Difference takes you inside the world of high-stakes negotiations and into Voss' head, revealing the skills that helped him and his colleagues succeed where it mattered most: in saving lives. In this practical guide, he shares the nine effective principles - counterintuitive tactics and strategies - you, too, can use to become more persuasive in both your professional and personal lives. Life is a series of negotiations you should be prepared for buying a car, negotiating a salary, buying a home, renegotiating rent, and deliberating with your partner. Taking emotional intelligence and intuition to the next level, Never Split the Difference gives you the competitive edge in any discussion.

How to Be a Great Boss

Studies have repeatedly shown that the majority of employees are disengaged at work. But it doesn't have to be this way. Often, the difference between a group of indifferent employees and a fully engaged team comes down to one simple thing—a great boss. In How to Be a Great Boss, Gino Wickman and Rene' Boer present a straightforward, practical approach to help bosses at all levels of an organization get the most from their people. They share time-tested tools that have worked for more than 30,000 bosses in every industry. You can learn to be a great boss—and dramatically improve both your organization's performance and your team's excitement about their work. In this book, you will discover: How to surround yourself with great people
How to make more effective use of your time
The difference between leadership and management and why they're equally important
The five leadership practices and five management practices of all great bosses
How to create accountability
How to develop productive, relationships with each of your people
How to deal with direct reports that don't meet your expectations

Applied Empathy

Having built his career working with iconic brands and institutions such as General Electric, Google, Nike, Warby Parker, and also The United Nations and the Obama Administration, Michael Ventura offers entrepreneurs and executives a radical new business book and way forward. Empathy is not about being nice. It’s not about pity or sympathy either. It’s about understanding—your consumers, your colleagues, and yourself—and it’s a direct path to powerful leadership. As such, Applied Empathy presents real strategies, based on Sub Rosa’s design work and the popular class Ventura and his team have taught at Princeton University, on how to make lasting connections and evolve your business internally (your employees, culture, and product/services) as well as externally (your brand, consumers, and value). “The most neglected fact in business is we’re all human. Michael Ventura makes a powerful argument that empathy is the secret sauce of 21st century business. The more digital we get, the more empathy we need” (Chip Conley, New York Times bestselling author of Emotional Equation). For leaders of all levels, this groundbreaking guide lays the foundation to establish a diverse, inventive, and driven team that can meet the challenges of today’s ever-evolving marketplace. If you want to connect to the people you work with, you have to understand them first.

Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success

For generations, we have focused on the individual drivers of success: passion, hard work, talent, and luck. But today, success is increasingly dependent on how we interact with others. It turns out that at work, most people operate as either takers, matchers, or givers. Whereas takers strive to get as much as possible from others and matchers aim to trade evenly, givers are the rare breed of people who contribute to others without expecting anything in return. Using his pioneering research as Wharton's youngest tenured professor, Grant shows that these styles have a surprising impact on success. Although some givers get exploited and burn out, the rest achieve extraordinary results across a wide range of industries. Combining cutting-edge evidence with captivating stories, this landmark book shows how one of America's best networkers developed his connections, why the creative genius behind one of the most popular shows in television history toiled for years in anonymity, how a basketball executive responsible for multiple draft busts transformed his franchise into a winner, and how we could have anticipated Enron's demise four years before the company collapsed--without ever looking at a single number. Praised by bestselling authors such as Dan Pink, Tony Hsieh, Dan Ariely, Susan Cain, Dan Gilbert, Gretchen Rubin, Bob Sutton, David Allen, Robert Cialdini, and Seth Godin--as well as senior leaders from Google, McKinsey, Merck, Estée Lauder, Nike, and NASA--Give and Take highlights what effective networking, collaboration, influence, negotiation, and leadership skills have in common. This landmark book opens up an approach to success that has the power to transform not just individuals and groups, but entire organizations and communities.

Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed

One day, Lori Gottlieb is a therapist who helps patients in her Los Angeles practice. The next, crisis causes her world to come crashing down. Enter Wendell, the quirky but seasoned therapist in whose of­fice she suddenly lands. With his balding head, cardigan, and khakis, he seems to have come straight from Therapist Central Casting. Yet he will turn out to be anything but. As Gottlieb explores the inner chambers of her patients’ lives — a self-absorbed Hollywood producer, a young newlywed diagnosed with a terminal illness, a senior citizen threatening to end her life on her birthday if nothing gets better, and a twenty-something who can’t stop hooking up with the wrong guys — she finds that the questions they are struggling with are the very ones she is now bringing to Wendell. With startling wisdom and humor, Gottlieb invites us into her world as both clinician and patient, examining the truths and fictions we tell ourselves and others as we teeter on the tightrope between love and desire, meaning and mortality, guilt and redemption, terror and courage, hope, and change. Maybe You Should Talk to Someone is rev­olutionary in its candor, offering a deeply per­sonal yet universal tour of our hearts and minds and providing the rarest of gifts: a boldly reveal­ing portrait of what it means to be human, and a disarmingly funny and illuminating account of our own mysterious lives and our power to transform them.

Addicted to Drama

In this groundbreaking book, clinical psychologist and mind-body expert Dr. Scott Lyons turns the notion of the “drama queen” on its head, showing that drama is actually an addiction and those who are suffering with it are experiencing a much deeper psychological, biological, and social pain. For a person addicted to drama, the intensity becomes their way of coping. Their life is a constant cycle of crisis, chaos, and chronically high levels of stress. They may never be able to relax without an internal alarm going off, sending them spiraling back toward chaos. Drama is the stirring, the excitement, the exaggeration, the eruption, the unrest, and the medicine to feel alive in relation to the numbing of the internal and external world around them. For a person addicted to drama, the drama is often how they survive—or think they do.

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