Leadership Resources

Nerd alert!

I love learning. I love education. I love evolving my thinking.

And as a result, I read and research a lot.

Anything that can help with a different way of thinking about a problem, or just some practical tips and tricks to better support others – I’m all for it!

And if you want to get more thoughts, resources and links about Leadership, sign up to my fortnightly newsletter.

• TED talk Simon Sinek Ideas worth Spreading

• Tribe of Learning by Col Fink (creating a community of learners)
• Women Leading by Christine Nixon and Amanda Sinclair
• Dare to Lead by Brené Brown
• Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
• Give and Take, why helping others drives our success by Adam Grant
• Change Makers by Digby Scott
• Good to Great by Jim Collins
• The 360 Degree Leader: Developing Your Influence from Anywhere in the Organisation, by John Maxwell
• Power to the Middle: Why Managers Hold the Keys to the Future of Work, by Schaninger, Hancock and Field
• Leading from the Middle: A Playbook to Influence Up, Down, and Across the Organisation, by Scott Mautz.
• Managing Up: How to Move Up. Win at Work, and Succeed with Any Type of Boss, by Mary Abbajay
• Managing Narcissists, Blamers, Dramatics and More… Research-Driven Scripts for Managing Difficult Personalities at Work, by Mark Murphy.
• Five Must-Reads for Middle Managers – provides a synopsis of five books.

• Explore difference between Leadership and Management
• Balancing empowering leadership and management
• Leaders versus managers – are they different? personality, attitudes toward goals, conceptions of work, relations with others, sense of self, development of leadership, can organisations develop leaders?
• Leadership versus management: the 5 main differences – leaders set the vision, managers follow it; leaders think ideas vs managers who think execution; leaders inspire people vs manager drive their success; leaders look to the future, manager work in the present; leaders shape the culture vs manager endorsing it.  
• Maximising the middle: unleashing the potential of middle managers – key strategies for success: career progression paths, implement coaching and mentoring, recognise diverse strengths, foster a culture of feedback and continuous learning.
• Supporting Middle Managers – provides key rationale for better support of middle managers. Training investment, communication and feedback, support groups, employee feedback. Vision and Strategy.
• Leadership vision – suggestion that you can’t be a successful people leader without a vision.

• Article What is Effective Communication
• Management Communication
• Course The Art of Epic Communication.
• Organisational Communication Strategy Tips
• Identifying problems to be an effective communicator – technical, cognitive or emotional. Simple yet useful in better understanding what may be an underlying issue to assist with communicating.
• Leadership communication: how to build trust in the workplace – what it is, the importance barriers, 9 ways to build trust, consequences of poor leadership communication.

• Set aside some time to read the following: 17 Top Management Skills
• 7 essential qualities that make a great leader – communication (creativity, motivation, positivity, feedback, empathy), strong convictions, risk-taking, influence, trust and transparency, understanding multi-generational workplace, vision and purpose.
• How to develop middle managers: 4 skills they need to succeed – leading the business, leading teams, leading networks, leading self. Includes a list of strategies to engage, principles of leader-first instructional design.

• Collaborative Leader – an example from Salesforce of a collaborative approach using technology.
• Empathetic Leadership – what this is, why it is an important trait, how to become one, and other leadership styles to consider.
• Transformational Leadership – what it is, its importance in business success, core elements of this style of leadership.
• Servant Leadership – definitions, benefits, and best practices.
• Top 3 leadership styles, and how to identify your own – democratic leadership, coach-style leadership, servant leadership; three least effective leadership styles – bureaucratic, autocratic, transactional.
• Remote management of employees

• Aligning organisations values with culture and success – good tips and tricks. Provides examples of values, why these are important and how having a strong company culture builds a strong business.
• Building a Positive Workplace Culture – touches on leadership, authentic, attributes of leadership. Good list of core components.
• Defining what is corporate culture and why it matters – touches on leadership, communication, alignment with delivery, inspirational case studies.

• Top 13 employee experience tips for getting it right
• How leadership can impact employee engagement – interview with Kate Pritchard.
• Gallup Workplace 2015