Culture Solutions Group

Recommended Reading for Today's Managing Leaders

Within each of the following sections, the recommended readings are presented in order of perceived relevance and impact for today’s managing leaders (without regard for published date).  Every leader is on a unique leadership development path and will, therefore, consider some of the readings in a different order of priority and importance.  All books listed are considered, by Culture Solutions Group, as “must reads” to survive and thrive in today’s business world.  Enjoy!

• By Bossidy & Charan 
• Fastbreak: The CEO's Guide to Strategy Execution. By Childress 
• Leadership and Self Deception. Arbinger Institute 
• The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference. By Gladwell 
• The Method Method: Seven Obsessions that Helped a Scrappy Start-Up Turn an Industry Upside Down. By Ryan & Lowery 
• Focus: The Hidden Driver of Excellence. By Goleman 
• Creating WE: Change I-Thinking to WE-Thinking & Build a Healthy, Thriving Organization. By Glaser 
• The Speed of Trust: The One Thing that Changes Everything. By Covey 
• The 8th Habit: From Effectiveness to Greatness. By Covey 
• Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don’t. By Collins 
• What Matters Most. By Hamel.
• Leadership Jazz: The Essential Elements of a Great Leader. By De Pree 
• Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More than Your IQ. By Goleman 
• Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make Competition Irrelevant. By Kim & Mauborgne.
• Competitive Strategy. By Porter 
• The Strategy-Focused Organization. By Kaplan & Norton 

• The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do In Life and In Business. By Duhigg 
• Transitions: Strategies for Coping with Difficult, Painful, and Confusing Times in Life. By Bridges 
• Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change. By Bridges 
• Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard. By Heath & Heath 
• Changing Minds: The Art & Science of Changing Our Own and Other People’s Minds. By Gardner 
• First, Break All the Rules. By Buckingham & Coffman 
• Sacred Cows Make the Best Burgers: Paradigm Busting Strategies for Developing Change-Ready People and Organizations. By Kriegal & Brandt 
• The Dance of Change. By Senge 
• Who Moved My Cheese? An Amazing Way to Deal with Change in Your Work and In Your Life. By Johnson 

• The Anatomy of Peace: Resolving the Heart of Conflict. Arbinger Institute 
• Dealing with People You Can’t Stand: How to Bring Out the Best in People at their Worst. By Brinkman & Kirschner 
• Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High. By Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switzler 
• Crucial Confrontations: Tools for Resolving Broken Promises, Violated Expectations, and Bad Behavior. By Patterson, Grenny, McMillan & Switzler 
• Difficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most. By Stone, Patton & Heen 
• 151 Quick Ideas To Deal With Difficult People. By Draffen 
• How to Work for an Idiot: Survive & Thrive without Killing Your Boss. By Hoover 
• The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t. By Sutton 

• Now, Discover Your Strengths. By Buckingham & Clifton 
• Leading with the Heart: Coach K’s Successful Strategies for Basketball, Business and Life. By Kryzyewski 
• Developing High Performance People: The Art of Coaching. By Mink, Owen & Mink 
• 101 Tough Conversations To Have With Employees A Manager's Guide To Addressing Performance, Conduct, And Discipline Challenges. By Falcone 
• Fierce Conversations: Achieving Success At Work & In Life, One Conversation At A Time. By Scott 
• The Heart of Coaching: Using Transformational coaching to Create a High Performance Culture. By Crane 
• The Portable Coach: 28 Surefire Strategies for Business & Personal Success. By Leonard 
• Growing Your Company’s Leaders. By Fulmer & Conger 
• QBQ: The Question Behind the Question – What to Really Ask Yourself. By Miller 

• The Orange Revolution: How One Great Team Can Transform an Entire Organization. By Gostick & Elton 
• It’s Your Ship: Management Techniques from the Best Damn Ship in the Navy. By Abrashoff 
• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. By Lencioni 
• Overcoming the Five Dysfunctions of a Team: A Field Guide for Leaders, Managers & Facilitators. By Lencioni 
• The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Team Building. By Pell 
• Death by Meeting: A Leadership Fable about Solving the Most Painful Problem in Business. By Lencioni 
• The Seventeen Indisputable Laws of Teamwork. By Maxwell 
• High Five: The Magic of Working Together. By Blanchard & Bowles 

• Blink: The Power of Thinking without Thinking. By Gladwell 
• How We Decide. By Lehrer 
• Heads You Win: How the Best Companies Think. By Spitzer & Evans 

• Drive: The Surprising Truth about What Motivates Us. By Pink 
• Taking People with You: The Only Way to Make Big Things Happen. By Novak 
• The Power of Acknowledgement. By Umlas 
• Happiness at Work: Be Resilient, Motivated, and Successful – No Matter What. By Rao 
• What Happy Companies Know: How the Science of Happiness Can Change Your Company for the Better. By Baker, Greenberg & Hemingway 
• Love ‘Em or Lose ‘Em: Getting Good People to Stay. By Kaye & Jordan-Evans 
• 1001 Ways to Reward Employees. By Nelson 
• The Set-Up to Fail Syndrome. By Manzou & Barsoux 

• Generations at Work: Managing the Clash of Veterans, Boomers, Xers, and Nexters in Your Workplace. By Zemke, Raines & Filipczak 
• Geezers & Geeks: How Era, Values & Defining Moments Shape Leaders. By Bennis & Thomas 
• Beyond Generation X: A Practical Guide for Managers. By Raines 
• Lean In: Women, Work & the Will to Lead. By Sandberg 

• WE: How to Increase Performance and Profits through Full Engagement. By Karsan & Kruse 
• You Don’t Need a Title to be a Leader. By Sanborn 
• Leadership from the Inside Out. By Cashman 
• The 3 Keys to Empowerment: Releasing the Power within People for Astonishing Results. By Blanchard, Carlos & Randolph 
• Leading Up: How to Lead Your Boss so you Both Win. By Useem 
• 10 Steps to Empowerment: A Common-Sense Guide to Managing People. By Tracy 

• Mojo: How to Get It, How to Keep It, How to Get It Back if You Lost It. By Goldsmith 
• Mentally Tough: The Principles of Winning at Sports Applied to Winning at Business. By Loehr & McLaughlin 
• Loving What Is: Four Questions that can Change Your Life. By Katie 
• The Big Leap: Conquer Your Fear and Take Your Life to the Next Level. By Hendricks 
• Daring Greatly: How the Courage to be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent and Lead. By Brown 
• The Shift: Taking Your Life from Ambition to Meaning. By Dyer 
• Beyond the Fairway: Zen Lessons, Insights, and Inner Attitudes of Golf. By Wallach 
• The Other 90%: How to Unlock Your Vast Untapped Potential for Leadership and Life. By Cooper 
• A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose. By Tolle 
• Steering by Starlight: The Science and Magic of Finding Your Destiny. By Beck 

• What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. By Goldsmith 
• Curious? Discover the Missing Ingredient to a Fulfilling Life. By Kashdan 
• Learning to Fall: The Blessings of an Imperfect Life. By Simmons. 
• Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength. By Baumeister & Tierney 
• Catch Fire: The 7-Step Program to Ignite energy, Defuse Stress and Power Boost Your Performance. By McLaughlin 
• Stress for Success. By Loehr 
• Creative Stress: A Path for Evolving Souls Living through Personal & Planetary Upheaval. By O’Dea 
• Toughness Training for Life. By Loehr