Courageous Leadership

#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.

Tap into everyday courage for extraordinary results The Courageous Leader presents a much-needed reminder for leaders everywhere: it takes courage. Courage is not just about heroic acts in grandiose situations—it's about everyday, solid-as-a-rock support and leadership that motivates, inspires, and delivers. It's about taking a risk on a great idea, and it's about seeing opportunities in the day-to-day. Courageous leaders aren't necessarily the bold "Navy SEALS" of the workplace; they're the everyday people who lead steadily through rough waters. They don't seek out discomfort, but accept it as part of the process when it occurs, and still deliver exceptional results. This book shows you how to tap into your courage reserves and build your steel. Real stories of everyday leaders show you how it's done, and provide a new lens for seeing real strength in adversity—and practicing it yourself. Tough situations do arise, but great leaders show courage every day. Keeping your strength in reserve for the big problems leaves you operating at less-than-full capacity the rest of the time—and your people deserve better. This book shows you how to exercise courage every day in small situations to build the unshakeable foundation of a great leader. Move beyond your comfort zone Develop your ability to focus through tough times Tap into your natural courage and hone your leadership ability Leverage your strength in situations large and small The more you exercise courage, the stronger it gets; this book shows you how to use it every day to more effectively navigate small challenges—when the big problems arise, you'll face them with The Courageous Leader.

Its not easy being a leader. It takes courage and commitment, the willingness to step out of our comfort zone, the need to readily adapt to change, and the obligation to develop our skill set and the skills within our organization. To some this is fearful. Dealing with the unknown or facing a known weakness creates discomfort. Another way to look at it is that courage and commitment are required to become a stronger leader. Embracing both the fear and courage emotions we feel can actually be inspirational! After observing many leaders who have come through PeopleTek programs, we noticed that the ones who are successful both in life and work have a specific set of characteristics and behaviors. Living your life with courage is how it all begins! Courage is the single most important attribute any leader must have in order to be effective and successful. We call this CourageAbility. CourageAbility is the ability to live both your dreams and professional life the way you want, while achieving your goals and exceeding in your lifes ambitions and objectives. It is taking and empowering yourself and others to go where you or they have never gone before. The 12 CourageAbility factors include: 1. Passion - Having and living your dream. 2. Documenting your goals. 3. Committing to your goals. 4. Understanding your strengths and the strengths of others. 5. Communicating with confidence and clarity. 6. Understanding and managing conflict with a purpose. 7. Developing others. 8. Delegating. 9. Developing a skill. 10. Remaining controlled. 11. Rewarding and recognizing. 12. Succeeding and learning from failure. A CourageAbility self assessment is provided; identify your high and low scores and determine how closely your behaviors align with your beliefs!

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.

Overcome fear and adversity in the workplace with courage! Courage is the first virtue of leadership success. Leaders require courage to make bold decisions even when there are dissenters, to say what needs to be said no matter the consequences, and to place their trust in those they manage. Yet surprisingly, despite the central role that courage plays in leadership success, until now there have been few training programs devoted solely to building courage in the workplace. The Courageous Leadership workshop introduces a new organizational development practice called courage-building. As a new professional discipline, courage-building is predicated on the assumption that people perform better when they are behaving courageously than when they are anxious and afraid. To be a courage-builder, however, you have to role model courageous behavior. This workshop is designed to help you do just that. The objectives of this workshop are to: Learn about the three different types of courage and when (and how) to use each Gain insight into your own "courage history" so that you can use your past to strengthen your future Understand the impact that fear has on personal and organizational performance Learn about two distinct ways of leading, and approaches for inspiring more courageous behavior among the people with whom you work Identify specific actions for extending the value of the workshop so that you can continue benefiting from it going forward Become a courageous leader By learning to apply the strategies and approaches that are introduced in the Courageous Leadership workshop, and then applying them in your workplace, you will help people step up to challenges more readily, embrace change more fully, and speak up more assertively. When you put your courage to work, and when you step past the threshold of your zone of comfort, the entire workplace benefits.

For every person in every organization, there comes a moment when he of she must have the courage to step forward and meet the needs of the time. Regardless of whether your time is now or in the future, you must be prepared and willing to seize that moment as a courageous leader.

Develop and enhance Leadership Courage to lead every day with equity and excellence! Have you ever wondered how or where you find the inner strength and determination to stand up and lead fellow administrators, teachers, or students to meet ever-changing expectations? Courage is a "must have" for effective leadership. Everyday Courage guides readers to develop Leadership Courage from within and become exceptional and resilient. In addition to expanding instructional leadership, practical elements and features include: • How to Take Action: make specific plans to activate moral courage, intellectual courage, empathetic courage, and disciplined courage • Daily Practices: exercises in accountability, trust, and risk-taking maintain courageous leadership for equity, excellence, and inclusion • Courage Quotient: assess and consider your areas of strength and opportunities for growth through deliberate practice Whether you are new to leadership or seeking revitalization, Cathy Lassiter’s experience in all levels of educational management will focus you toward leading from a courageous mindset. "Leadership is about fostering growth, building capacity, and collaboratively working with stakeholders to create new ideas - this takes a great deal of courage. Cathy Lassiter creates a pathway for leaders to develop that courage, and shows them how to do it with empathy. Everyday Courage for School Leaders is an outstanding read for anyone new to leadership and those who need to revitalize their thinking." - Peter DeWitt, Author/Consultant "A great resource to support leaders as they revise, reflect, and reassure staff, students, and community of the possibilities through their leadership as we embrace the courage to accomplish goals to achieve success." - Brenda Yoho, Director of Educational Support Programs