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Books: The New Leadership Landscape
In the great garden of business, leadership is a perennial. Unlike trendy management concepts that pop up every few years and disappear just as quickly, leadership is an evergreen, always within sight, seldom changing. So it’s particularly challenging for business leaders to come up with fresh insights on the topic. These three new books, however, manage to look at leadership from different angles.
Leading Through Conflict: How Successful Leaders Transform Differences Into Opportunities by Mark Gerzon (Harvard Business School Press, 2006). Gerzon, founder of the nonprofit Mediators Foundation, argues that the best leaders at any level successfully mediate conflict to keep their companies moving forward. His book offers eight tools, or strategies, designed to help leaders excel as mediators.
Taking Advice: How Leaders Get Good Counsel and Use it Wisely by Dan Ciampa (Harvard Business School Press, 2006). Consultant Ciampa blames many business failures on executives who fail to get the right advice. Taking Advice suggests how leaders should seek help dealing with specific challenges and make the most of the counsel they receive. It also describes ways to build a personal "advice network."
Your Leadership Legacy: Why Looking Toward the Future Will Make You a Better Leader Today by Robert M. Galford and Regina Fazio Maruca (Harvard Business School Press, 2006). Galford, an executive educator, and Maruca, a former Harvard Business Review editor, say it’s never too early for leaders to start thinking about what they leave behind. Their book offers practical ways that executives can shape their legacies so that they -- and their organizations -- benefit both now and down the road.
About the Author
Anne Stuart, the former executive editor of Redmond Channel Partner, is a business technology freelance writer based in Boston, Mass.