Brave Leadership

This book will help readers be brave. ​While we may think that we need to follow some kind of prescription to get results, the most amazing leaders are those who dare to be their true selves, powerfully. People want to give them their best. But in a business world that’s so competitive and uncertain, how do you connect with others more authentically to tap into their illusive want? Brave Leadership is the essential guide for leaders in today’s ever-shifting world. Wherever you are in your leadership journey—new, seasoned, young, or old—if you aspire to be the best leader you can be, then this book is for you. It will help you • Uncover your barriers to brave • Escape overwhelm and frustration and learn to manage stress and anxiety • Prepare for high-stakes meetings and conversations • Have the influence you want to have • Set the direction of your career • Connect powerfully • Feel more confident, courageous, satisfied, and purposeful • Tap into the want of the people you lead to get the results you need On a quest to make these powerful conversations more accessible, professional-actress-turned-leadership-educator Kimberly Davis shares the transformative tools she uses in her workshops to help thousands of leaders worldwide. Drawing from years of working with leaders of all experience levels and industries and the latest research in psychology, sociology, business, and the arts, this provocative and inspiring book bridges traditional business how-to with a personal development approach to demystify what it takes to be the brave leader you were born to be.

#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.

The book you hold resonates with this conviction: that leaders such as you have the potential to be the most influential forces on planet Earth. Yours is the staggering responsibility and the matchless privilege of rallying believers and mobilizing their spiritual gifts in order to help people who are far from God become fully devoted followers of Christ. Life transformation and the eternal destinies of real people depend on the redemptive message entrusted to the local church. Are you willing to do whatever it takes to lead your church effectively so God’s message of hope can change the world? Then this book is for you. Courageous Leadership is Bill Hybels’ magnum opus, a book far too important to be written before its time. Only now, after nearly thirty years leading his own church from a handful of people with a burning vision into a globe-spanning kingdom force—only after almost three decades of victories and setbacks, of praying hard and risking big—is Hybels ready at last to share the lessons he has learned, and continues to learn, about Christian leadership. Too much is at stake for you not to maximize your spiritual gift of leadership, insists Hybels. In this passionate, powerful book, he unpacks the tools, tasks, and challenges of your calling. You’ll discover the power of vision and how to turn it into action. You’ll gain frontline insights for developing a kingdom dream team, discovering your leadership style, developing other leaders, making decisions, walking with God, embracing change, staying your God-given course, and much, much more. Drawing on his own richly varied life experiences, Hybels fleshes out vital principles with riveting firsthand stories. This is far more than another book on leadership strategies and techniques. You’ll find those topics in here, to be sure. But beyond them, you’ll find the very essence of one of today’s foremost Christian leaders—his fervent commitment to evangelism and discipleship and his zeal to inspire fellow church leaders even as he seeks to keep growing as a leader himself. If unchurched people matter to you . . . if you love seeing believers serve passionately with their spiritual gifts . . . if God’s heartbeat for the church is your heartbeat as well . . . then this book is a must. Courageous Leadership will convince you to lead with all your might, all your skill, and all your faith. And it will give you the tools to do just that.

IT TAKES GUTS TO LEAD Much has been written about the heads (analytic and strategic ability) and hearts (emotional intelligence) of brave leaders. This book asks the question "What about guts?" and then examines answers offered by a global network of exemplary leaders in their fields. Brave Leaders brings together interview-style explorations with relevant and easy-to-implement exercises to help readers cultivate their own bravery. Both field guide and workbook, Brave Leaders satisfies curiosity about how "guts" factor into brave action and argues that even this element of bravery can be nurtured. The interviews collected here show what bravery looks like in the real world as practiced by people of varying ages and in a variety of fields and circumstances. Together, they make clear that anyone can become an agent of meaningful change for the greater good, whether by engaging in everyday office heroism or by taking a stand in the face of life-threatening circumstances. What one needs is good models, keen insight, and old-fashioned effort and practice. Brave Leaders shows readers how to discover in their own lives opportunities for courageous action and prepares them to take advantage of those opportunities to become a force for good in the world.

SUMMARY Living Brave(TM) is a mindset and methodology that answers the question 'what would we do if we were Living Brave(TM)? Understand the individual & cultural mechanic, mindset and methodology of Trust, Accountability, Bravery and Connection Get clarity on how leaders let go of position and power to increase trust and enable discretionary effort Understand how the social media platform rewrote peoples expectations for those in senior roles See how leadership is behavioural and a mindset and is not based on positional power Identify the beliefs and levers that enable bravery and accountable behaviours Gain clarity around your own leadership position Connect with your own identity as a Leader of Self Enable others to hold space with their own version of Living Brave(TM) FORWARD "I have no hesitation in recommending this book" - Major General Paul Nanson, CBE (Commandant Royal Military Academy Sandhurst) TESTIMONIALS "Trusted counsel to the senior team. Authentic, motivational, inspirational, making a positive contribution to the success of our business. A fantastic ability to 'cut through the noise' and deal with the things that really matter." - Anthony O'Keeffe, MD, LINK Asset Services "Fantastic coach, such vast experience, there doesn't seem to be a situation he hasn't come across. Knowledgeable, engaging, inspiring and firm in equal measure, the kind of leader any of us want to be. His 'craft' combined with his humility make him an outstanding partner to any leadership team." - Elona Mortimer-Zhika, CEO, IRIS Software "A breath of fresh air to our business and instrumental in converting our hopes and aspirations into a reality." - Colin Jellicoe, HRD, VINCI Construction "Rarely in life do you come across someone who genuinely inspires you to greater leadership, gives you tools to excel and is truly brilliant at what they do. Outstanding in his ability to coach, mentor, communicate, inspire. Above all, he delivers results that add true value." - Mark Taylor, Global CEO, InXpress AUTHOR Guy Bloom is a leadership specialist working with organisations and senior leaders to step into the space of Living Brave. He is the driving force behind Living Brave(TM), working with individuals and organisations to create truly trusted, accountable, brave and connected leaders. Guy has spent his working life investigating the human and organisational drivers that create long term systemic change. A life-long martial artist he is an instructor in three martial art systems, a four-time Hall of Famer and an advocate of how fears can be overcome with a proven technique, the correct mindset and the bit no one likes......practice and feedback. He spends most of his work life as an executive and team coach. In his spare time, Guy judge's leadership awards has won a few of them, writes articles, is working on a second and third book. This is all geared to ensure his two sons have a clear legacy of what leadership is for themselves and that those who truly want to define themselves as Living Brave(TM) have an approach that is deeply rooted in methodology and mindset. His favourite quote is from the lawyer, politician and diplomat Adlai E. Stevenson, "It's hard to lead a cavalry charge if you think you look funny on a horse", as Guy says after sharing this, "I'll that let sit for a moment.

Your business needs you to be brave when it comes to inclusion. David McQueen has coached leaders across all sectors to step up to inclusive leadership, transforming their processes, policies and ways of working to support diversity and reap the rewards. Many leaders are terrified of doing the wrong thing, so they do nothing. That is not an option. Discover how to think strategically about problem-solving and decision-making so that you embed inclusivity in your organization, no matter the pace of change you face, and future-proof your talent management, product development, customer experience and more. David McQueen is a leadership coach, international speaker and facilitator. He is the cofounder of professional development company Q Squared Ltd, the host of The BRAVE Leader podcast and a blogger on all things leadership and culture change.

A WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER “Five gritty leaders whose extraordinary passion and perseverance changed history…a gripping read on a timeless and timely topic” —Angela Duckworth, #1 bestselling author of Grit An enthralling historical narrative filled with critical leadership insights, Forged in Crisis, by celebrated Harvard Business School historian Nancy Koehn, spotlights five masters of crisis: polar explorer Ernest Shackleton; President Abraham Lincoln; legendary abolitionist Frederick Douglass; Nazi-resisting clergyman Dietrich Bonhoeffer; and environmental crusader Rachel Carson. What do such disparate figures have in common? Why do their extraordinary stories continue to amaze and inspire? In delivering the answers to those questions, Nancy Koehn offers a remarkable template by which to judge those in our own time to whom the public has given its trust. She begins each of the book’s five sections by showing her protagonist on the precipice of a great crisis: Shackleton marooned on an Antarctic ice floe; Lincoln on the verge of seeing the Union collapse; escaped slave Douglass facing possible capture; Bonhoeffer agonizing over how to counter absolute evil with faith; Carson racing against the cancer ravaging her in a bid to save the planet. The narrative then reaches back to each person’s childhood and shows the individual growing—step by step—into the person he or she will ultimately become. Significantly, as we follow each leader’s against-all-odds journey, we begin to glean an essential truth: leaders are not born but made. In a book dense with epiphanies, the most galvanizing one may be that the power to lead courageously resides in each of us. Whether it’s read as a repository of great insight or as exceptionally rendered human drama, Forged in Crisis stands as a towering achievement.

An inspirational, practical, and research-based guide for standing up and speaking out skillfully at work. Have you ever wanted to disagree with your boss? Speak up about your company's lack of diversity or unequal pay practices? Make a tough decision you knew would be unpopular? We all have opportunities to be courageous at work. But since courage requires risk—to our reputations, our social standing, and, in some cases, our jobs—we often fail to act, which leaves us feeling powerless and regretful for not doing what we know is right. There's a better way to handle these crucial moments—and Choosing Courage provides the moral imperative and research-based tactics to help you become more competently courageous at work. Doing for courage what Angela Duckworth has done for grit and Brene Brown for vulnerability, Jim Detert, the world's foremost expert on workplace courage, explains that courage isn't a character trait that only a few possess; it's a virtue developed through practice. And with the right attitude and approach, you can learn to hone it like any other skill and incorporate it into your everyday life. Full of stories of ordinary people who've acted courageously, Choosing Courage will give you a fresh perspective on the power of voicing your authentic ideas and opinions. Whether you’re looking to make a mark, stay true to your values, act with more integrity, or simply grow as a professional, this is the guide you need to achieve greater impact at work.