Becoming Leaders

In this second edition, Williams and Emerson update their popular handbook for professional women in engineering, science, and technology with timely information and practical tips for career success.

Successful leaders don't rest on the laurels. Leadership must be a living process, and life means growth. "Great Leaders Grow" shows leaders and aspiring leaders precisely which areas to focus on so they can remain effective throughout their lives.

Manage without giving up the work you love and discover the leader within. Conventional management thinking says that to manage effectively you must delegate. It implies that managers fall into a dangerous trap when they continue to perform tasks they love from a previous role. And it says that to not “let go” is to give in to a controlling tendency that robs staff of development opportunities. But not everyone agrees. Today’s increasingly knowledge-driven, cost-competitive work world is changing the way management gets done. More and more, people in management roles are becoming can-do leaders who must continue to practice their specialty while managing and developing the skills of others. But this group has had few guidelines to follow—until now. In Becoming a Can-Do Leader, executive coaches Frank Satterthwaite and Jamie Millard say it’s time that management thinking catches up with reality. Their extensive experience training and coaching player-managers at all levels has shown that successful managers both delegate and do. Whether you’re trying to survive your first promotion or coaching executives who yearn to keep up with their field, essential guidelines for can-do leadership are inside this book. You’ll find workplace examples that ring true, as well as unique strategies and tools that both help you identify your values and provide insight into your natural leadership style. Don’t let your knowledge and skills decline by stepping completely out of the professional picture. It’s time to get productively and selectively involved in the work, enabling you to manage more effectively and keep up with important advances in your field—all while developing and leading your team to success. Discover how to work strategically with staff while continuing to grow expertise in your profession. That’s can-do leadership.

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.

12 guiding principles for achieving success with honor and integrity in business and life Becoming Your Best includes inspiring and instructive business stories as well as a great deal of practical advice. The book's 12 principles can help any leader develop a culture of excellence and include Be True to Character; Use Your Imagination; Tap the Power of Knowledge; Never Give Up; Seek Peace & Balance; and Lead with a Vision. Steven Shallenberger has more than 40 years of experience as a successful entrepreneur, CEO, executive, corporate trainer, and community leader. He is also the founder of Synergy Companies, an energy management and environmental solutions company with more than 400 employees.

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Brené Brown has taught us what it means to dare greatly, rise strong, and brave the wilderness. Now, based on new research conducted with leaders, change makers, and culture shifters, she’s showing us how to put those ideas into practice so we can step up and lead. Don’t miss the five-part HBO Max docuseries Brené Brown: Atlas of the Heart! NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BLOOMBERG Leadership is not about titles, status, and wielding power. A leader is anyone who takes responsibility for recognizing the potential in people and ideas, and has the courage to develop that potential. When we dare to lead, we don’t pretend to have the right answers; we stay curious and ask the right questions. We don’t see power as finite and hoard it; we know that power becomes infinite when we share it with others. We don’t avoid difficult conversations and situations; we lean into vulnerability when it’s necessary to do good work. But daring leadership in a culture defined by scarcity, fear, and uncertainty requires skill-building around traits that are deeply and uniquely human. The irony is that we’re choosing not to invest in developing the hearts and minds of leaders at the exact same time as we’re scrambling to figure out what we have to offer that machines and AI can’t do better and faster. What can we do better? Empathy, connection, and courage, to start. Four-time #1 New York Times bestselling author Brené Brown has spent the past two decades studying the emotions and experiences that give meaning to our lives, and the past seven years working with transformative leaders and teams spanning the globe. She found that leaders in organizations ranging from small entrepreneurial startups and family-owned businesses to nonprofits, civic organizations, and Fortune 50 companies all ask the same question: How do you cultivate braver, more daring leaders, and how do you embed the value of courage in your culture? In this new book, Brown uses research, stories, and examples to answer these questions in the no-BS style that millions of readers have come to expect and love. Brown writes, “One of the most important findings of my career is that daring leadership is a collection of four skill sets that are 100 percent teachable, observable, and measurable. It’s learning and unlearning that requires brave work, tough conversations, and showing up with your whole heart. Easy? No. Because choosing courage over comfort is not always our default. Worth it? Always. We want to be brave with our lives and our work. It’s why we’re here.” Whether you’ve read Daring Greatly and Rising Strong or you’re new to Brené Brown’s work, this book is for anyone who wants to step up and into brave leadership.

Deemed “the dean of leadership gurus” by Forbes magazine, Warren Bennis has for years persuasively argued that leaders are not born—they are made. Delving into the qualities that define leadership, the people who exemplify it, and the strategies that anyone can apply to achieve it, his classic work On Becoming a Leader has served as a source of essential insight for countless readers. In a world increasingly defined by turbulence and uncertainty, the call to leadership is more urgent than ever. Featuring a provocative new introduction, this new edition will inspire a fresh generation of potential leaders to excellence.

The author of Getting from College to Career reinvents the concept of management for a new generation, offering a fresh and relevant approach to career success that shows them how to make the next step: becoming a leader. We are in the midst of a leadership revolution, as power passes from Baby Boomers to Millennials. All grown up, the highly educated Generation Y is moving into executive positions in corporations and government, as well as running their own businesses, where they are beginning to have a profound impact that will last for decades. Written exclusively for Gen Y readers to address their unique needs, Becoming the Boss is a brisk, tech savvy success manual filled with real-world, actionable tips, from an expert they respect and relate to. Lindsey Pollak defines what leadership is and draws on original research, her own extensive experience, and interviews with newly minted Gen Y managers and entrepreneurs around the world to share the secrets of what makes them successful leaders—and shows young professionals how to use that knowledge to rise in their own careers. From learning to develop a style that appeals to your older colleagues, to discovering the key trends affecting your career, to mastering the classic rules of excellence that never go out of style, Becoming the Boss helps you identify your next professional move and shows you how to get there.