I’ve found these books valuable as a leader, manager, and coach. Each is worth the read, though for very different reasons.

Berger, Jennifer Garvey (2012). Changing on the Job: Developing Leaders for a Complex World. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. A dense, though ultimately rewarding guide to how we can use insights from adult development theory to help others – and ourselves – become more impactful leaders and thoughtful human beings.

Berger, Jennifer Garvey (2019). Unlocking Leadership Mindtraps: How to Thrive in Complexity. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Berger uses an engaging narrative to outline five cognitive biases humans have developed over the course of our evolution that, while once effective for helping to ensure our survival, now prevent us from dealing skillfully with the ever-increasing complexity of the modern world.  

Berger, Warren (2018). The Book of Beautiful Questions: The Powerful Questions That Will Help You Decide, Create, Connect, and Lead. New York, NY: Bloomsbury Publishing. Berger writes about “beautiful questions” that “shift the current thinking, open up new possibilities, and ultimately lead to a breakthrough.” He also lays out compelling arguments for how such questions can help us make better decisions, think more creatively, build more intimate connections with others, and lead teams more effectively.

Block, Peter (2002). The Answer to How is Yes. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Peter Block, author of Flawless Consulting, argues that we live in a culture that rewards us for acting more for the sake of efficiency and financial return than out of a sense of deep purpose and closely-held personal values. The result, he believes, is that we end up doing more and more about things that matter less and less.

Boyatzis, Richard; Smith, Melvin; and Van Oosten, Ellen (2019). Helping People Change: Coaching with Compassion fo Lifelong Learning and Growth. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press. Drawing on an important distinction between “coaching for compliance” and “coaching with compassion,” Boyatzis et. al. make the case for supporting others’ development by focusing not on fixing behavioral problems (compliance) but rather on inspiring clients to move toward a self-defined ideal version of their future selves (compassion).  

Bridges, William (2001). The Way of Transition: Embracing Life’s Most Difficult Moments. Cambridge, MA: Perseus Publishing The Way of Transition is William Bridges’ intensely personal account of his own response to the death of his wife Mondi and a collection of profound reflections on how human beings can thrive through change, even in the most challenging of times. Especially provocative are the author’s interpretation of The Wizard of Oz as a powerful allegory of the process of transition and his argument, in the penultimate chapter of his book, for a greater appreciation of society’s elderly and the wisdom they have accumulated as the result of passing through one life transition after another.

Bryant, Adam and Sharer, Kevin (2021), The CEO Test: Master the Challenges That Make or Break All Leaders, Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press. An engaging overview of seven challenges every leader, including CEOs, face as they take on positions of greater organizational responsibility, from creating and communicating simple strategic plans to managing self-care. Based on CEO interviews Bryant conducted over the years for his “Corner Office” New York Times column and Sharer’s own leadership journey.  

Colonna, Jerry (2019). Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up. New York, NY: Harper. Based largely on a Jungian model of adult development, Reboot weaves a fascinating tale of Colonna’s path through a life of personal trauma that culminates in becoming a much sought-after executive coach to aspiring entrepreneurs. 

Cron, Ian Morgan and Stabile, Suzanne (2016), The Road Back to You: An Enneagram Journey to Self-Discovery. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press. One of my former graduate students recommended this book to me as a introduction to the Enneagram personality assessment tool, and she was spot on. I now regularly use the Enneagram as part of my executive coaching practice. It’s also become an invaluable resource for my own journey of personal development.

Dethmer, Jim et. al (2014). The 15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership: A New Paradigm for Sustainable Success. Dethmer, Chapman and Klemp (self-published). The bible of the Conscious Leadership Group’s model of leadership coaching.

Grant, Adam (2021). Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know. New York, NY: Viking. The argument of Grant’s fourth book can be summed up neatly in one sentence: ” If knowledge is power, knowing what you don’t know is wisdom.” 

Heifetz, R.A. (1994). Leadership Without Easy Answers. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press Leadership Without Easy Answers is an in-depth description of the theory and practice of the adaptive leadership model Heifetz teaches at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. The primary responsibility of the adaptive leader, Heifetz argues in this book, is not to solve an organization’s problems on her own but rather to create an environment that encourages the organization’s members to adapt new values and behaviors, even while they might resist doing so. 

I recommend Leadership Without Easy Answers as a companion to Robert Kegan’s Immunity to Change (below), which presents a model of adult development that borrows heavily from Heifetz’s distinction between technical and adaptive challenges and offers an innovative framework for understanding the often unconscious forces that prevent individuals as well as organizations from realizing meaningful change.

Isaacs, William (1999). Dialogue and the Art of Thinking Together: A Pioneering Approach to Communicating in Business and in Life. New York, NY: Random House. Dialogue is a systems thinking-based deep dive into the kind of conversation that enables individuals, teams, and organizations find common ground around even the most intractable issues. Isaacs argues that dialogue is more than just the exchange or words, but rather the embrace of different points of view – literally, the art of thinking together. 

Johnson, Chris. The Leadership Pause: Sharpen Your attention, Deepen Your Presence, and Navigate the Future. (Nashville, TN: Brainstrust Ink, 2022). Johnson’s counterintuitive argument in this book is that it’s not what you do that makes you an effective leader but rather what you don’t do. If most leadership books are based on the law of addition – do more of this or that to become a more effective leader – Johnson’s book is based instead on the law of subtraction, in the sense that it urges us to do less by slowing down and focusing our full and undivided attention on those few moments that matter most in our professional and personal interactions with others.

Kegan, R. and Lahey, L. (2009). Immunity to Change: How to Overcome it and Unlock the Potential in Yourself and Your Organization. Boston: Harvard Business School Press Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey’s groundbreaking work in the field of adult development has uncovered a powerful mechanism that prevents even the most determined among us from realizing behavioral change. Kegan and Lahey call this phenomenon our “immunity to change,” a collection of often unconscious assumptions, commitments, and mental models that protect our sense of identity and provide a source of psychological comfort — all while making it nearly impossible for us to change the way we interact with others in any significant way. We grow, like the medieval alchemist, by transmuting base metal into gold, transforming suffering into wisdom. As we grow, we become more and more skillful at interacting with our world.

Lao Tzu. Tao Te Ching. Translated by Stephen Mitchell (1994). New York, NY: Harper. 

Maister, D.H., Green, C.H., & Galford, R.M. (2000). The Trusted Advisor. New York, NY: Free Press  The Trusted Advisor offers coaches and consultants invaluable insight into how to build mutually-beneficial, mutually-satisfying trust-based relationships with individual clients and their organizations. Chapter 8, “The Trust Equation,” is itself worth the price you’ll pay for this book.

McLean, Pamela (2019). Self as Coach, Self as Leader: Developing the Best in You to Develop the Best in Others. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. Written primarily for leadership coaches, Self as Coach presents a six-part model of how self-development is essential for developing, coaching, and managing others.

Plett, Heather (2020). The Art of Holding Space: A Practice of Love, Liberation , and Leadership. Vancouver, B.C. Canada: PageTwo Books. This book is an act of pure generosity and is a must read for managers and coaches on how to create relationship with others when your primary goal is their growth and development.

Reynolds, Garr (2012). Presentation Zen: Simple Ideas on Presentation Design and Delivery. Berkeley, CA: New Riders Ostensibly a book about how to create more compelling presentations, Presentation Zen lays out a set of aesthetic and editorial principles (simplicity, natural grace, elegance, the power of white space and silence, and sticking to facts and avoiding opinions) that, when practiced, dramatically improves our communication with others, regardless of the medium we use.

Schein, Edgar (2013). Humble Inquiry: The Gentle Art of Asking Instead of Telling. Oakland, CA: Berrett-Koehler Publishers. Over the course of his book’s 110 pages, Edgar Schein leads the reader through an exploration of the concept of Humble Inquiry, why it’s such powerful tool for building trustworthy relationships, and why the fundamental values of Western culture and the complexities of interpersonal communication make the principles of Humble Inquiry so challenging to put into practice.

Silsbee, Doug (2004). The Mindful Coach: Seven Roles for Facilitating Leader Development. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. The Mindful Coach presents a seven-part model for conducting growth-enhancing conversations with coaching clients, colleague, and leaders. 

Smerek, Ryan (2018). Organizational Learning and Performance: The Science and Practice of Building a Learning Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Written by my colleague Ryan Smerek, Organizational Learning and Performance is a thoughtful, succinct introduction to the science of how individuals and organizations learn, grow, and develop expertise. Ryan and I use this book as the foundational text for the graduate course we co-teach titled “Accelerating Learning and Performance” in Northwestern University’s Master’s Program in Learning and Organizational Change. 

Stulberg, Brad (2021), The Practice Groundedness: A Transformative Path to Success That Feeds – Not Crushes – Your Soul, New York: Portfolio/Penguin.  Stulberg, a performance coach and journalist, shares a healthier, more sustainable model for success that values presence over rote productivity, accepts that progress is non-linear, and prioritizes long-term values, community, and fulfillment over short-term gain. 

Su, Amy Jen and Wilkins, Muriel Maignan (2013). Own the Room: Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press. If executive presence is, as Suzanne Bates writes in The Science of Influence, “the capacity to mobilize others to act,” then Own the Room is a valuable guide for increasing one’s personal influence by communicating with others in a compelling way that is uniquely and distinctively authentic.