Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? A Better Way to Evaluate Leadership Potential

Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? A Better Way to Evaluate Leadership Potential
Author: Jeffrey Cohn
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2011-05-17
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0470601949

Silver Medal Winner, Business and Leadership, 2012 Nautilus Book Awards Almost 70% of Americans believe that we are suffering from a crisis of leadership, but rather than asking, why are leaders failing, we need to ask, "Why aren't we choosing better leaders?" Ever wonder what goes on behind closed board room doors when organizations pick their top leaders? It can be a contentious, secretive, even brutal process. Most of our leaders look good on paper—they have charisma, credentials, and confidence—yet they lack the real qualities that are necessary to succeed. In Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders?, Cohn and Moran share the same insights and ideas they use to help organizations make better choices. Revealing seven essential attributes of all great leaders, they offer a fresh and powerful evaluation technique anyone can use to assess leader potential. Through dynamic, first-hand accounts from the business world, entertainment, sports, politics, education, and philanthropy, the authors offer the ultimate insider access and reveal how top organizations find and choose the best talent. Offers multiple ways to evaluate leaders, and how these 7 leadership attributes combine to create the best (and worst) in leaders Features interviews with with Mike Krzyzewski, Coach, 2008 US Men's Olympic Basketball team, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon; George Steinbrenner, Scott Davis, CEO of UPS; Peter Loscher, CEO of Siemens; Toby Cosgrove, CEO, Cleveland Clinic; Hollywood movie directors, and many others Includes academic study and field training at institutions such as Harvard, Yale, INSEAD, and IMD for developing future leaders. Fresh and compelling, Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? shows how great leaders can be spotted and why they succeed – and is soon to the definitive resource guide for about choosing better leaders.

Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? A Better Way to Evaluate Leadership Potential

Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? A Better Way to Evaluate Leadership Potential
Author: Jeffrey Cohn
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 288
Release: 2011-03-31
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1118062205

Silver Medal Winner, Business and Leadership, 2012 Nautilus Book Awards Almost 70% of Americans believe that we are suffering from a crisis of leadership, but rather than asking, why are leaders failing, we need to ask, "Why aren't we choosing better leaders?" Ever wonder what goes on behind closed board room doors when organizations pick their top leaders? It can be a contentious, secretive, even brutal process. Most of our leaders look good on paper—they have charisma, credentials, and confidence—yet they lack the real qualities that are necessary to succeed. In Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders?, Cohn and Moran share the same insights and ideas they use to help organizations make better choices. Revealing seven essential attributes of all great leaders, they offer a fresh and powerful evaluation technique anyone can use to assess leader potential. Through dynamic, first-hand accounts from the business world, entertainment, sports, politics, education, and philanthropy, the authors offer the ultimate insider access and reveal how top organizations find and choose the best talent. Offers multiple ways to evaluate leaders, and how these 7 leadership attributes combine to create the best (and worst) in leaders Features interviews with with Mike Krzyzewski, Coach, 2008 US Men's Olympic Basketball team, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon; George Steinbrenner, Scott Davis, CEO of UPS; Peter Loscher, CEO of Siemens; Toby Cosgrove, CEO, Cleveland Clinic; Hollywood movie directors, and many others Includes academic study and field training at institutions such as Harvard, Yale, INSEAD, and IMD for developing future leaders. Fresh and compelling, Why Are We Bad at Picking Good Leaders? shows how great leaders can be spotted and why they succeed – and is soon to the definitive resource guide for about choosing better leaders.

Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?

Why Do So Many Incompetent Men Become Leaders?
Author: Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 205
Release: 2019-02-19
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1633696332

Look around your office. Turn on the TV. Incompetent leadership is everywhere, and there's no denying that most of these leaders are men. In this timely and provocative book, Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic asks two powerful questions: Why is it so easy for incompetent men to become leaders? And why is it so hard for competent people--especially competent women--to advance? Marshaling decades of rigorous research, Chamorro-Premuzic points out that although men make up a majority of leaders, they underperform when compared with female leaders. In fact, most organizations equate leadership potential with a handful of destructive personality traits, like overconfidence and narcissism. In other words, these traits may help someone get selected for a leadership role, but they backfire once the person has the job. When competent women--and men who don't fit the stereotype--are unfairly overlooked, we all suffer the consequences. The result is a deeply flawed system that rewards arrogance rather than humility, and loudness rather than wisdom. There is a better way. With clarity and verve, Chamorro-Premuzic shows us what it really takes to lead and how new systems and processes can help us put the right people in charge.

Lift

Lift
Author: Ryan W. Quinn
Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2015-07-31
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1626564027

Just as the Wright Brothers combined science and practice to finally realize the dream of flight, Ryan and Robert Quinn combine research and personal experience to demonstrate how to reach a psychological state that elevates us and those around us to greater heights of achievement, integrity, openness, and empathy. It's the psychological equivalent of aerodynamic lift, and it is the fundamental state of leadership. This book draws on recent advances in positive psychology and organizational science to describe four questions that, when asked in any situation, will help us experience the fundamental state of leadership. Engaging personal stories illustrate how the Quinns and others have applied these concepts at work, at home, and in the community. --

How to Lead When Your Boss Can't (or Won't)

How to Lead When Your Boss Can't (or Won't)
Author: John C. Maxwell
Publisher: HarperCollins Leadership
Total Pages: 158
Release: 2019-10-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0785231161

Don’t let a bad boss or manager hold you back from being successful! Every day millions of people with high potential are frustrated and held back by incompetent leaders. New York Times bestselling author and leadership expert John C. Maxwell knows this because the number one question he gets asked is about how to lead when the boss isn’t a good leader. You don’t have to be trapped in your work situation. In this book, adapted from the million-selling The 360-Degree Leader, and now distilled down for busy professionals, Maxwell unveils the keys to successfully navigating the challenges of working for a bad boss. In How to Lead When Your Boss Can’t (or Won’t), Maxwell teaches you how to: position yourself for current and future success, take the high road with a poor leader, avoid common pitfalls, work well with teammates, and develop influence wherever you find yourself. Practicing the principles taught in this book will result in endless opportunities—for your organization, your career, and your life. You can learn how to lead when your boss can’t (or won’t).

Leadership in the Headlines

Leadership in the Headlines
Author: Andrew Hill
Publisher: Pearson UK
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2016-06-07
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1292112794

Good leaders walk a tightrope between doing and daring – often in the glare of the public spotlight. In Leadership in the Headlines, Andrew Hill, the award-winning Management Editor of the Financial Times, shares his insider insights into the who’s and how’s of effective leadership. Packed with practical lessons, this book divides the best of Andrew’s wry and insightful columns into eight ‘acts’ of leadership, with new commentary enhancing each one. Whether you’re new to Andrew Hill’s columns or a loyal reader, you’ll gain fresh perspectives on the tough job of leading and take away tips about how to refine your own management skills.

The Leadership Gap

The Leadership Gap
Author: Lolly Daskal
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 242
Release: 2017-05-30
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1101981377

Do people see you as the kind of leader you want to be? Are your strongest leadership qualities getting in the way of your greatness? After decades of advising and inspiring some of the most eminent chief executives in the world, Lolly Daskal has uncovered a startling pattern: within each leader are powerful abilities that are also hidden impediments to greatness. She’s witnessed many highly driven, overachieving leaders rise to prominence fueled by well-honed skill sets, only to falter when the shadow sides of the same skills emerge. Now Daskal reveals her proven system, which leaders at any level can apply to dramatically improve their results. It begins with identifying your distinctive leadership archetype and recognizing its shadow: ■ The Rebel, driven by confidence, becomes the Imposter, plagued by self-doubt. ■ The Explorer, fueled by intuition, becomes the Exploiter, master of manipulation. ■ The Truth Teller, who embraces candor, becomes the Deceiver, who creates suspicion. ■ The Hero, embodying courage, becomes the Bystander, an outright coward. ■ The Inventor, brimming with integrity, becomes the Destroyer, who is morally corrupt. ■ The Navigator, trusts and is trusted, becomes the Fixer, endlessly arrogant. ■ The Knight, for whom loyalty is everything, becomes the Mercenary, who is perpetually self-serving. Using psychology, philosophy, and her own experience, Daskal offers a breakthrough perspective on leadership. She’ll take you inside some of the most cloistered boardrooms, let you in on deeply personal conversations with industry leaders, and introduce you to luminaries who’ve changed the world. Her insights will help you rethink everything you know to become the leader you truly want to be.

The Opposable Mind

The Opposable Mind
Author: Roger L. Martin
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2009-07-07
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1422148106

If you want to be as successful as Jack Welch, Larry Bossidy, or Michael Dell, read their autobiographical advice books, right? Wrong, says Roger Martin in The Opposable Mind. Though following best practice can help in some ways, it also poses a danger. By emulating what a great leader did in a particular situation, you'll likely be terribly disappointed with your own results. Why? Your situation is different. Instead of focusing on what exceptional leaders do, we need to understand and emulate how they think. Successful businesspeople engage in what Martin calls integrative thinking, creatively resolving the tension in opposing models by forming entirely new and superior ones. Drawing on stories of leaders as diverse as AG Lafley of Procter & Gamble, Meg Whitman of eBay, Victoria Hale of the Institute for One World Health, and Nandan Nilekani of Infosys, Martin shows how integrative thinkers are relentlessly diagnosing and synthesizing by asking probing questions including: What are the causal relationships at work here? and What are the implied trade-offs? Martin also presents a model for strengthening your integrative thinking skills by drawing on different kinds of knowledge including conceptual and experiential knowledge. Integrative thinking can be learned, and The Opposable Mind helps you master this vital skill.

Higher Ambition

Higher Ambition
Author: Michael Beer
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 260
Release: 2011-08-23
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1422142329

Meeting the new standard for leadership. Higher Ambition is required reading for every leader who refuses to compromise between people and performance. Choosing one or the other may have worked in the past, but it won’t work now. As global competition stiffens and businesses face increased public scrutiny and renewed government regulation, leaders must win on all fronts—with their people, their customers, their communities, and their shareholders. In short, they must deliver superior economic and social value. Brimming with powerful stories and thoughtful advice from CEOs themselves, Higher Ambition equips leaders with the practical insights they need to meet this new and higher standard. The authors, an international team of experts from leading business schools and consultancies, offer a unique view into the minds of some of the most successful and insightful leaders of our time: CEOs from vanguard companies around the world that have demonstrated the distinctive ability to do good while also doing well. These organizations are as diverse as Standard Chartered Bank, Infosys, Volvo, Cummins, IKEA, the Tata Group, and Campbell’s Soup. Readers will learn the principles and practices these pioneering leaders are using to: • Build enduring enterprises that simultaneously solve for people and profits • Forge winning strategies that leverage their companies’ unique cultural and human capabilities • Dramatically raise the aspirations and ambitions of their people • Energize and align their diverse global firms • Relentlessly upgrade leadership capabilities throughout their organizations Drawing on the author team’s extensive research and in-depth interviews with successful leaders from around the globe, this provocative new book is poised to become a management classic in the tradition of In Search of Excellence and Built to Last.

Lessons in Leadership

Lessons in Leadership
Author: Steve Adubato
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2016-09
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0813580579

In this practical guide, Emmy Award-winning public broadcasting anchor Steve Adubato teaches readers to be self-aware, empathetic, and more effective leaders at work and at home. His powerful case studies spotlighting dozens of leaders—from Pope Francis to New Jersey governor Chris Christie—are complemented by concrete tips and tools based in real-life scenarios. With Lessons in Leadership, readers can learn to steer others through difficult economic times, to mentor rising leaders, to provide straight talk to underperforming employees, and even how to lead a company through a significant change.