Summer Must Reads

Summer is a great time to relax, unwind, and invest in your personal development. Are you looking for your next great leadership read? Check out our recommendations for leadership books below:

  1. Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts. by Brene Brown. Named one of the best books of the year by Bloomberg, Dare to Lead inspires us to become more empathetic and authentic leaders. Brown shares that when we dare to lead, we don’t pretend to have the right answers, but we stay curious and ask the right questions. Brown also encourages us to be courageous and embrace difficult conversations and to lean into vulnerability when it’s required to do good work. If you are looking for a book that will deepen your insight and improve your interpersonal skills, this is it!
  2. The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni. Using the power of story, Lencioni leverages a leadership fable to demonstrate the dysfunctions of a team and provides actionable steps that can be used to overcome challenges to create a more cohesive and successful team. This is an excellent read for new leaders or leaders that are faced with uniting a dysfunctional team.
  3. The Culture Code by Daniel Coyle. Coyle opens the doors to some of the most successful organizations, to share what makes them thrive. Coyles offers examples to understand culture building by identifying three core skills that generate cohesion and cooperation. Coyle provides actionable strategies that you can take to construct a culture where employees and innovation can flourish.
  4. The Convenience Revolution by Shep Hyken. Hyken is an industry-leading customer service and experience expert, and in his latest book, he shares insights into how to make it easier for customers to do business with you. He found that when it is easier to do business with you, customer loyalty grows, which yields increased profits and referrals. In the book, Shep provides the 6 Principles of the Convenience Revolution, which are the essential foundational components that lay the pathway for customer service success. If you’re ready to take your customer service to the next level, this book is for you!
  5. Greater Than Yourself by Steve Farber. Farber is a leadership speaker, author, and executive coach. Steve uses an inspiring fable to demonstrate the greatest leadership lesson of them all, which is to help others be better than yourself. While often we think that when we make people better than ourselves, we will be on the fast-track to irrelevancy Farber shows us that it is not the case. Farber demonstrates the power of inspiring a greater than yourself mentality in your organization and how it can transform your culture into a better place to work and do business with. Farber shares three elements that are essential to creating a GTY culture; expand yourself, give yourself, and replicate yourself. If you are interested in servant-based leadership, this is a must-read.
  6. Best Practices Are Stupid by Stephen Shapiro. Shapiro is an industry leading expert on all things innovation. In this book, Shapiro shares how we can transform our innovation practices and create an innovative culture. Shapiro offers examples of some of the greatest successes and failures within innovation and offers solutions on how you can speed up your innovation efforts. Shapiro inspires you to expand your view of innovation to see it as a responsibility for everyone in your organization, not just your Research and Development Team. This is an essential book if you want to speed up your innovation efforts, improve your bottom line, and stay ahead of your competition.