Accelerate your career with our comprehensive professional development library. These carefully curated titles provide actionable advice for advancing in your field, mastering new skills, and staying competitive in today's evolving workplace. Covering everything from negotiation tactics and networking strategies to time management and personal branding, our collection helps ambitious professionals at every career stage unlock their potential and achieve their goals.
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If your people know you care about them, they will move mountains. Employee engagement and loyalty expert Heather Younger outlines nine ways to manifest the radical power of caring support in the workplace.
Here's the thing: most leaders think of themselves as caring leaders, but not all of them act in alignment with what that means for employees. Leaders may not be able to identify the level of care they are extending to their employees, but all employees intuitively know whether their bosses or managers are caring for them. Heather Younger argues that if you are looking for increased productivity, customer satisfaction, or employee engagement, you need to care for your employees first.
Genuinely caring for people means that you want to see them succeed for themselves, not just for what they can do for you, your team, or your organization. This book incorporates ten sections with breakout stories and interviews that outline the necessary steps to make all employees feel included and cared for, as well as a call to action for all leaders. Younger states that leaders who have the positive power to change the lives of those they lead shouldn't just want to care for them; they should see it as imperative for the success of their employees and their organization.
Here's the thing: most leaders think of themselves as caring leaders, but not all of them act in alignment with what that means for employees. Leaders may not be able to identify the level of care they are extending to their employees, but all employees intuitively know whether their bosses or managers are caring for them. Heather Younger argues that if you are looking for increased productivity, customer satisfaction, or employee engagement, you need to care for your employees first.
Genuinely caring for people means that you want to see them succeed for themselves, not just for what they can do for you, your team, or your organization. This book incorporates ten sections with breakout stories and interviews that outline the necessary steps to make all employees feel included and cared for, as well as a call to action for all leaders. Younger states that leaders who have the positive power to change the lives of those they lead shouldn't just want to care for them; they should see it as imperative for the success of their employees and their organization.
A research-backed framework for building the kind of trust that reduces turnover, strengthens teams, and makes leaders genuinely worth following.
Most leadership problems trace back to a single root cause: a breakdown in trust. This book gives leaders at every level a clear, proven model for diagnosing where trust is eroding and rebuilding it systematically, drawing on original research and years of work with Fortune 500 companies and government agencies worldwide.
Trusted Leader is structured as two books in one: an engaging business parable and a practical implementation guide.
If your team is underperforming, misaligned, or quietly disengaged, this book offers a structured, repeatable path forward.
Most leadership problems trace back to a single root cause: a breakdown in trust. This book gives leaders at every level a clear, proven model for diagnosing where trust is eroding and rebuilding it systematically, drawing on original research and years of work with Fortune 500 companies and government agencies worldwide.
Trusted Leader is structured as two books in one: an engaging business parable and a practical implementation guide.
- The story: Follow CEO Ethan Parker as a looming product deadline exposes deep cracks in his team's trust, and learn alongside him as he discovers the Eight Pillars framework during an unplanned week at a mountain resort
- The framework: Clarity, compassion, character, competency, commitment, connection, contribution, and consistency, each with dedicated application chapters, diagnostic tools, and strategies you can put to work immediately
- What you'll gain: Practical approaches to reducing attrition, increasing team alignment, setting clearer priorities, and becoming the most trusted voice in your field
- Who it's for: Senior leaders, managers, HR professionals, and anyone responsible for building a high-performance culture, including those leading through change or rebuilding after a trust breakdown
- Real-world grounding: Endorsed by leaders at Anytime Fitness, Caribou Coffee, Red Wing Shoes, Penn State, and the Colorado Rockies, with case examples showing measurable results including a 30 percent reduction in turnover
If your team is underperforming, misaligned, or quietly disengaged, this book offers a structured, repeatable path forward.
Bestselling author Jennifer Kahnweiler (Quiet Influence and The Introverted Leader-over 20,000 copies sold each) offers a five-step process that will help introverts and extroverts understand and appreciate each other and work together to achieve more than they ever could on their own.
Mick and Keith. Jobs and Woz. FDR and Eleanor. Gilbert and Sullivan. History is filled with examples of successful introvert-extrovert partnerships. But how can two people who sometimes seem to be from different planets not just work together but make extraordinary products, create great works of art, and even change history?
Jennifer Kahnweiler says the key is to remember that these relationships are most successful when opposites stop emphasizing their differences and use approaches that move them towards results. She provides a five-step process that helps introverts and extroverts understand each other's “cultures,” use their inevitable conflicts to spur creativity, find the right roles within their partnership, enjoy each other's company, and adapt and adjust their roles when working with clients. These partnerships require constant maintenance-opposites don't attract, they have to work at it. But when they succeed they produce exponential results. Blending the two points of view allows both partners to see and act on things neither partner would have separately.
Mick and Keith. Jobs and Woz. FDR and Eleanor. Gilbert and Sullivan. History is filled with examples of successful introvert-extrovert partnerships. But how can two people who sometimes seem to be from different planets not just work together but make extraordinary products, create great works of art, and even change history?
Jennifer Kahnweiler says the key is to remember that these relationships are most successful when opposites stop emphasizing their differences and use approaches that move them towards results. She provides a five-step process that helps introverts and extroverts understand each other's “cultures,” use their inevitable conflicts to spur creativity, find the right roles within their partnership, enjoy each other's company, and adapt and adjust their roles when working with clients. These partnerships require constant maintenance-opposites don't attract, they have to work at it. But when they succeed they produce exponential results. Blending the two points of view allows both partners to see and act on things neither partner would have separately.
A detailed framework for leaders to move past outdated workplace blame and shame strategies to cultivate resilient teams capable of facing adversity and setbacks confidently.
Workplace finger-pointing stifles creativity, reduces productivity, and limits psychological safety. Although no one sets out to be judgmental, learning new habits is hard. Two experienced leadership and agilists coaches share a road-tested leadership model that continuously embraces humility and failure as part of the growth process to deliver results.
By facilitating blame-free retrospective meetings, leaders chart a productive path forward. They amplify three essential motivators of purpose, autonomy, and co-intelligence within their team. Layered on with four resilience factors: inclusive collaboration, transparent power dynamics, collaborative learning, and embracing conflict. After applying these strategies, learning leaders will help their teams and themselves become more resilient and better equipped to handle any unexpected and challenging tasks that comes their way.
Workplace finger-pointing stifles creativity, reduces productivity, and limits psychological safety. Although no one sets out to be judgmental, learning new habits is hard. Two experienced leadership and agilists coaches share a road-tested leadership model that continuously embraces humility and failure as part of the growth process to deliver results.
By facilitating blame-free retrospective meetings, leaders chart a productive path forward. They amplify three essential motivators of purpose, autonomy, and co-intelligence within their team. Layered on with four resilience factors: inclusive collaboration, transparent power dynamics, collaborative learning, and embracing conflict. After applying these strategies, learning leaders will help their teams and themselves become more resilient and better equipped to handle any unexpected and challenging tasks that comes their way.
Adopting the latest agile tools and practices won't be enough to respond to rapid market change. Leaders must first lay the groundwork by creating the right environment for these tools to work.
An ever-growing pile of frameworks and tools falsely offer an “easy route” to organizational agility. However, responding to rapid market change requires you alter so much more than just your way of working. Your work style is only one of six factors that the Agile Centre's research identifies as the key to success. From years of experience certifying people in agile leadership, product ownership, and scrum mastery, Karim Harbott has created a model that will help your organization achieve all six factors required for success: leadership, culture, structure, engagement, and governance as well as ways of working together. Drawing from Harbott's famous Business Agility Canvas, this book will help leaders get realistic about the scope of the changes needed in their organization and show them how to get started.
An ever-growing pile of frameworks and tools falsely offer an “easy route” to organizational agility. However, responding to rapid market change requires you alter so much more than just your way of working. Your work style is only one of six factors that the Agile Centre's research identifies as the key to success. From years of experience certifying people in agile leadership, product ownership, and scrum mastery, Karim Harbott has created a model that will help your organization achieve all six factors required for success: leadership, culture, structure, engagement, and governance as well as ways of working together. Drawing from Harbott's famous Business Agility Canvas, this book will help leaders get realistic about the scope of the changes needed in their organization and show them how to get started.
Smart machines are replacing more and more jobs. Edward Hess and Katherine Ludwig show how to develop abilities that machines don't have so we can thrive in this Smart Machine Age. Underlying them all is a sense of personal humility: honestly recognizing our limitations and working to mitigate them.
In nearly every industry, smart machines are replacing human labor. It's not just factory jobs-automated technologies are handling people's investments, diagnosing illnesses, and analyzing written documents. If we humans are going to endure, Edward Hess and Katherine Ludwig say we're going to need a dose of humility.
We need to be humble enough to let go of the idea that “smart” means knowing the most, using that information quickest, and making the fewest mistakes. Smart machines will always be better than we are at those things. Instead, we need to cultivate important abilities that smart machines don't have (yet): thinking critically, creatively, and innovatively and building close relationships with others so we can collaborate effectively. Hess and Ludwig call this being NewSmart.
To develop these abilities, we need to practice four specific behaviors: keeping our egos out of our way, managing our thoughts and emotions to curb any biases or defensiveness, listening to others with an open mind, and connecting with others socially and emotionally. What all these behaviors have in common is, again, humility-avoiding self-centeredness so we can learn from and work with other humans. Hess and Ludwig offer a guide to developing these NewSmart abilities and to creating organizations where these qualities are encouraged and rewarded.
In nearly every industry, smart machines are replacing human labor. It's not just factory jobs-automated technologies are handling people's investments, diagnosing illnesses, and analyzing written documents. If we humans are going to endure, Edward Hess and Katherine Ludwig say we're going to need a dose of humility.
We need to be humble enough to let go of the idea that “smart” means knowing the most, using that information quickest, and making the fewest mistakes. Smart machines will always be better than we are at those things. Instead, we need to cultivate important abilities that smart machines don't have (yet): thinking critically, creatively, and innovatively and building close relationships with others so we can collaborate effectively. Hess and Ludwig call this being NewSmart.
To develop these abilities, we need to practice four specific behaviors: keeping our egos out of our way, managing our thoughts and emotions to curb any biases or defensiveness, listening to others with an open mind, and connecting with others socially and emotionally. What all these behaviors have in common is, again, humility-avoiding self-centeredness so we can learn from and work with other humans. Hess and Ludwig offer a guide to developing these NewSmart abilities and to creating organizations where these qualities are encouraged and rewarded.
"What is impressive is not only how Winters builds a case for the urgency and need for bold, inclusive conversations but that she also gives specific strategies and competencies to turn her theory into practice.”
-Dr. Sheila Robinson, publisher and CEO, Diversity Woman Media
Effective dialogue across different dimensions of diversity, such as race, gender, age, religion, or sexual orientation, fosters a sense of belonging and inclusion, which in turn leads to greater productivity, performance, and innovation. Whether in the workplace, faith communities, or educational settings, our differences can tear us apart rather than bring us together if we do not know how to communicate. Recognizing our collective responsibility to earnestly address our differences and increase understanding and empathy will not only enhance organizational goals but will also lead to a healthier, kinder, and more compassionate world.
Award-winning diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant Mary-Frances Winters has been leading workshops on what she calls Bold, Inclusive Conversations for years. In this book she offers specific dialogue strategies to foster greater understanding on the following topics:
• Recognizing the importance of creating equity and sharing power
• Dealing with the "fragility" of dominant groups--their discomfort in engaging with historically subordinated groups
• Addressing the exhaustion historically marginalized groups feel from constantly explaining their different lived experience
• Exploring how to build trust and create psychologically safe spaces for dialogue
This guide is comprehensive for anyone who wants to break down the barriers that separate us and facilitate discussions on potentially polarizing topics.
-Dr. Sheila Robinson, publisher and CEO, Diversity Woman Media
Effective dialogue across different dimensions of diversity, such as race, gender, age, religion, or sexual orientation, fosters a sense of belonging and inclusion, which in turn leads to greater productivity, performance, and innovation. Whether in the workplace, faith communities, or educational settings, our differences can tear us apart rather than bring us together if we do not know how to communicate. Recognizing our collective responsibility to earnestly address our differences and increase understanding and empathy will not only enhance organizational goals but will also lead to a healthier, kinder, and more compassionate world.
Award-winning diversity, equity, and inclusion consultant Mary-Frances Winters has been leading workshops on what she calls Bold, Inclusive Conversations for years. In this book she offers specific dialogue strategies to foster greater understanding on the following topics:
• Recognizing the importance of creating equity and sharing power
• Dealing with the "fragility" of dominant groups--their discomfort in engaging with historically subordinated groups
• Addressing the exhaustion historically marginalized groups feel from constantly explaining their different lived experience
• Exploring how to build trust and create psychologically safe spaces for dialogue
This guide is comprehensive for anyone who wants to break down the barriers that separate us and facilitate discussions on potentially polarizing topics.
Collaborative strategies work when they're designed by teams-where each person is heard, valued, and held accountable. This book is a practical guide for project team leaders and individual contributors who want their teams to play by a better set of rules.
Where do teams go wrong? Having the right people with the right skills doesn't mean they'll know how to work together as a team. David and Mary Sherwin maintain it's all in the design. Through a blend of straightforward activities, conversational stories, and dialogues that help model different forms of team interaction, this book will help teams:
• Create workday rituals that aid them in making better decisions and following through on their work responsibilities
• Identify patterns of behavior that are getting in the way of team performance, and design and test potential ways to them
• Reinforce habits that help team members bring the human element into their interactions and foster open communication
Readers of this book will be more prepared to set up and survive challenging projects alongside their coworkers with a shared sense of ownership, and an eye towards retaining the integrity of their teams in the long term. Using a process that has worked at some of the world's cutting edge companies, the authors detail the steps to take control of team design and plan for success. The key is to give every team member a voice in designing the team's rules, and in keeping it aligned with the design over the life of the team.
Where do teams go wrong? Having the right people with the right skills doesn't mean they'll know how to work together as a team. David and Mary Sherwin maintain it's all in the design. Through a blend of straightforward activities, conversational stories, and dialogues that help model different forms of team interaction, this book will help teams:
• Create workday rituals that aid them in making better decisions and following through on their work responsibilities
• Identify patterns of behavior that are getting in the way of team performance, and design and test potential ways to them
• Reinforce habits that help team members bring the human element into their interactions and foster open communication
Readers of this book will be more prepared to set up and survive challenging projects alongside their coworkers with a shared sense of ownership, and an eye towards retaining the integrity of their teams in the long term. Using a process that has worked at some of the world's cutting edge companies, the authors detail the steps to take control of team design and plan for success. The key is to give every team member a voice in designing the team's rules, and in keeping it aligned with the design over the life of the team.
Edited by legendary business author Ken Blanchard and featuring contributions by authors like Simon Sinek, Brené Brown, Stephen M. R. Covey, and Marshall Goldsmith, this collection offers expert advice on how to implement an increasingly popular and highly effective approach to leadership.
Servant leadership is the secret behind the success of some of the world's leading organizations. Succinctly put, serving leaders lead by serving their people, not by exalting themselves.
Through the stories and reflections of leading businesspeople, bestselling authors, and spiritual leaders, this collection offers tools for implementing this proven but radical leadership model. The book is organized into three sections:
-What is Servant Leadership? describes different aspects of servant leadership
-Models of Servant Leadership focuses on people who have been identified as classic servant leaders
-Putting Servant Leadership to Work features firsthand accounts of how servant leadership has been implemented in various organizations and the difference it has made in both results and human satisfaction.
Servant leadership is the secret behind the success of some of the world's leading organizations. Succinctly put, serving leaders lead by serving their people, not by exalting themselves.
Through the stories and reflections of leading businesspeople, bestselling authors, and spiritual leaders, this collection offers tools for implementing this proven but radical leadership model. The book is organized into three sections:
-What is Servant Leadership? describes different aspects of servant leadership
-Models of Servant Leadership focuses on people who have been identified as classic servant leaders
-Putting Servant Leadership to Work features firsthand accounts of how servant leadership has been implemented in various organizations and the difference it has made in both results and human satisfaction.
The must-have book for everyone who wants to be heard. More than just a book on business speech, it looks at the range of common communication mistakes--from repeating oneself to speaking too quickly--that can result in a poor impression
Ditch the negative mental habits that derail conversations and destroy projects, and discover a framework for forging authentic, enduring, and productive connections.
All too often, we find our conversations stuck in cyclical patterns of unproductive behavior. We listen half-heartedly, react emotionally, and respond habitually, or what Chuck Wisner calls “sleep talking.”
Conscious Conversations explores the way we can reframe our thoughts, emotions, reactions, and interactions so we form a connection from the very first conversation and keep our discourse positive and productive throughout any endeavor. Wisner identifies four universal types of conversations and offers specific advice on maximizing the effectiveness of each:
• Storytelling-Acknowledging and investigating the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves and others
• Collaborating-Exploring the way our stories interact with other people's stories
• Creating-Cocreating possibilities and discovering unforeseen solutions to sticky problems
• Committing-Coordinating our actions with others to get things done
These conversations unfold sequentially: our awareness of our stories transforms our ability to listen and collaborate, which opens our thoughts to creative possibilities, guiding us toward mindful agreements. This framework makes it possible to identify, understand, and deactivate disruptive emotional triggers; listen with empathy to people with opposing perspectives; and forge relationships built on trust.
All too often, we find our conversations stuck in cyclical patterns of unproductive behavior. We listen half-heartedly, react emotionally, and respond habitually, or what Chuck Wisner calls “sleep talking.”
Conscious Conversations explores the way we can reframe our thoughts, emotions, reactions, and interactions so we form a connection from the very first conversation and keep our discourse positive and productive throughout any endeavor. Wisner identifies four universal types of conversations and offers specific advice on maximizing the effectiveness of each:
• Storytelling-Acknowledging and investigating the stories we tell ourselves about ourselves and others
• Collaborating-Exploring the way our stories interact with other people's stories
• Creating-Cocreating possibilities and discovering unforeseen solutions to sticky problems
• Committing-Coordinating our actions with others to get things done
These conversations unfold sequentially: our awareness of our stories transforms our ability to listen and collaborate, which opens our thoughts to creative possibilities, guiding us toward mindful agreements. This framework makes it possible to identify, understand, and deactivate disruptive emotional triggers; listen with empathy to people with opposing perspectives; and forge relationships built on trust.
A step-by-step leadership framework for moving from passive DEI awareness to active advocacy, grounded in nearly two decades of consulting practice and hard-won personal experience.
Leaders often know inequity exists in their organizations but don't know how to act, or worry they'll get it wrong. This expanded second edition gives them a clear, non-judgmental path forward using the acclaimed Inclusive Leader Continuum, a four-stage model that meets readers wherever they are and maps specific actions for moving forward.
What's inside:
Who it's for: Leaders at any level, from first-time managers to senior executives, especially those who feel uncertain about where to start or how to show up more effectively.
What you’ll leave with: The language, frameworks, and confidence to stop sitting on the sidelines and start using your influence to build workplaces where everyone can thrive.
Leaders often know inequity exists in their organizations but don't know how to act, or worry they'll get it wrong. This expanded second edition gives them a clear, non-judgmental path forward using the acclaimed Inclusive Leader Continuum, a four-stage model that meets readers wherever they are and maps specific actions for moving forward.
What's inside:
- Four stages of inclusive leadership: unaware, aware, active, and advocate, each with hallmarks, real-world stories, and practical strategies
- Tools including the inner circle inventory, the iceberg identity framework, and a free online inclusive leader assessment
- A new chapter on identity, privilege, and what holds leaders back, written as a “call-in” rather than a call-out
- Chapter discussion guides designed for individual reflection and team learning
Who it's for: Leaders at any level, from first-time managers to senior executives, especially those who feel uncertain about where to start or how to show up more effectively.
What you’ll leave with: The language, frameworks, and confidence to stop sitting on the sidelines and start using your influence to build workplaces where everyone can thrive.
A practical and irreverent guide to taking the sting out of feedback and reclaiming it as a motivating, empowering experience for everyone involved.
Feedback! Ugh. Say the word to a colleague, your spouse, or a friend, and watch the person's blood pressure rise and defenses go up. For most of us, it's a word loaded with experiences that may include bias, politics, pain, regret, and anger. However, if we take a step back and think about its true intent, we realize that feedback needn't be a bad thing. We humans want to improve, grow, and advance, and we need insights that can help us move in the right direction. If we close ourselves off from understanding how others experience us, then we close ourselves off to a life of learning and growth. The authors address how feedback got such a bad rap and how we can fix it. They provide three key Fs (focused, fair, and frequent) for positive feedback. They also include a slew of practical exercises and strategies to change how we view and experience feedback.
Feedback! Ugh. Say the word to a colleague, your spouse, or a friend, and watch the person's blood pressure rise and defenses go up. For most of us, it's a word loaded with experiences that may include bias, politics, pain, regret, and anger. However, if we take a step back and think about its true intent, we realize that feedback needn't be a bad thing. We humans want to improve, grow, and advance, and we need insights that can help us move in the right direction. If we close ourselves off from understanding how others experience us, then we close ourselves off to a life of learning and growth. The authors address how feedback got such a bad rap and how we can fix it. They provide three key Fs (focused, fair, and frequent) for positive feedback. They also include a slew of practical exercises and strategies to change how we view and experience feedback.