From the category archives:

Book Review

Book Review: Leadership Caffeine

December 14, 2011

I’ll be right up front on this book review: I know the author. Art Petty and I are professionally acquainted; we’re fellow leadership bloggers and our paths sometime cross on consulting projects. I’m a huge fan of Art’s writing about leadership—he’s extremely pragmatic, yet self-effacing. You won’t find bombastic pontificating on his blog. What you [...]

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Book Review: The New Leaders’ 100-Day Action Plan

November 10, 2011

Thinking of taking on a bigger leadership role, either inside your company or with a new one? Chances are you already know that getting a strong start is critical to your success. You may be surprised to know exactly just how early a start you need to get. According to authors George Bradt, Jayme Check [...]

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Executive Guide to Integrated Talent Management

August 25, 2011

True confessions time: even though I’m in the field of talent management, I’ve never been 100% clear on exactly what that term encompasses. Ironic, isn’t it? Some folks in the industry focus on recruiting and hiring practices, others on employee skill development. Now, there’s a book on the market that corrals all the various facets [...]

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Great Speakers Form Authentic Relationships

April 26, 2011

A Book Review of Speak Up! by Heather Stubbs Most books on public speaking emphasize external attributes— projecting one’s voice confidently, maintaining eye contact and telling spellbinding stories. These are all important factors says author Heather Stubbs, but to be a truly powerful speaker, you need to first get your internal house in order.  That’s [...]

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Supervisory Influence and the DISC Model of Human Behavior

February 16, 2011

Early in my career as a corporate trainer, my work team leader introduced me to a self-assessment tool called the Personal Profile System (now in a revised version called the DiSC® Classic Profile). We used the DiSC profile as part of our company’s curriculum for newly hired supervisors. The DiSC section of the coursework always [...]

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Supervisory Transition: Roles, Relationships and Remarkable Principles

February 15, 2011

A Conversation with Guy Harris on His New Book “From Bud to Boss” Last week I talked with Guy Harris, co-author of the new book From Bud To Boss: Secrets to a Successful Transition to Remarkable Leadership. In the book, Guy and co-author Kevin Eikenberry craft a comprehensive treatment of the topic. It’s a practical [...]

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The Power of Women

February 9, 2011

Even though I sometimes grow weary of the whole “are men or women better leaders?” debate, I do think there can be value in paying specific attention to the development of women as leaders. Recently, I read a book that offers very concrete suggestions to help women discover their unique talents as leaders. It’s called [...]

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The Culture Convo and Chris Ferdinandi

September 7, 2010

A few weeks ago, I got an email from Chris Ferdinandi, asking if I’d check out an advance copy of his new e-book, Culture Convo.  Chris is an HR Generalist with a learning and development focus for EMC Corporation, a global Fortune 500 company that helps organizations store and manage their digital data. As part [...]

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Author Interview with John Spence

April 20, 2010

  Earlier this year, I discovered the book Awesomely Simple and wrote a book review on it for this blog. I admired the book’s down-to-earth approach and wanted to learn more, so I reached out to its author, John Spence. John agreed to sit down with me last month for an interview.       [...]

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Awesomely Simple

February 14, 2010

Book Review: Awesomely Simple: Essential Business Strategies for Turning Ideas into Action By John Spence In the introduction to his book Awesomely Simple, author John Spence declares: “everything in this book is from real life: you’ll find no fluff, no grand theories, no intellectual back-flips.” Readers who want complex organizational theories or a rigorously annotated [...]

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