Just as people don't need another book on the health benefits of increasing exercise and eating more vegetables, leaders don't need another book on good management practices. What's missing is an exploration of the links between knowledge about leadership principles and the personal values and attitudes that underlie them. Hanging the Mirror: The Discipline of Reflective Leadership embarks on such an exploration. Viewing leadership growth as a profoundly transformative process, Hanging the Mirror challenges leaders to unfreeze their current thinking, reconsider their operating assumptions, and adopt new behaviors. Drawing on behavioral research as well as our 25 years of management consulting experience, Hanging the Mirror challenges leaders to take an honest look at their behavior and the way it shapes the human systems they head. It suggests that a searching reexamination of fundamental convictions and beliefs is key to bridging the divide between knowledge and action. Hanging the Mirror lays out a discipline of reflective leadership that any leader can adopt. It is a process of gaining self-knowledge and developing self-mastery with the goal of becoming an ever more effective leader of people. It prompts leaders to:¿ Candidly identify the values and beliefs that shape their behavior¿ Objectively compare those values to what is known, through research, about leading people effectively¿ Look at their moment-by-moment leadership choices (their beliefs in action) to determine whether they truly believe what they think they believe¿ Rethink beliefs that run counter to knowledge and make different knowledge-based leadership choices. Eschewing quick fix solutions, Hanging the Mirror demonstrates that the preeminent challenge facing leadership is improving daily choices through ongoing reflection and contemplation. Because lasting transformation is never achieved without effort, Hanging the Mirror does not aim to be an ¿easy¿ read. It seeks to challenge, stretch and even confront its readers. But herein lies its value. As one of our clients once told another, ¿This isn't for everyone. They push and push and then push some more. But if you're ready for it, it's like nothing you've seen before.

Discover true leadership with this actionable guide from a world renowned leadership expert, psychoanalyst, and executive coach In Leading Wisely: Becoming a Reflective Leader in Turbulent Times, renowned leadership expert, psychoanalyst and executive coach Manfred Kets De Vries delivers an insightful and unique exploration of what it means to lead with wisdom. The book demonstrates that exclusive reliance on knowledge, data, and information yields a superficial leadership style lacking in depth and discernment. What's more important in the wisdom equation is possessing humility, judgment, empathy, compassion, and night vision. With eleven chapters full of anecdotes and tales from a variety of spiritual and cultural traditions that enrich and lend a deeper significance to the choices we make as leaders and members of organizations, Leading Wisely provides readers with: A thorough exploration of dealing with negative—but entirely natural motivations, like envy and greed An emphasis on the Golden Rule—treating others as we like to be treated ourselves An opportunity to be courageous—to consciously and intentionally pick our battles, saving energy for what really matters Lessons on how to listen intently and actively, truly hearing what our colleagues, friends, family, and followers are saying before reacting Finding happiness within ourselves Leading Wisely: Becoming a Reflective Leader in Turbulent Times is a startlingly incisive book, filled with messages that make the book required reading for anyone in a position of leadership or power. It also belongs in the libraries of well-being and health practitioners who frequently deal with businesspeople as clients or patients.

If the world of leadership is the world of action, why does being reflective matter? Why take time out? Why explore the inner world of thought and feeling, the quieter outer processes of dialogue and conversation? This guidebook provides answers to those questions. And it offers intriguing, refreshing and satisfying ways to deepen our leadership capacities through reflection. It is a pocket resource for those who lead by title as well as those who simply make the world a better place by their example. An aid to leaders who are on the run, it is particularly meant for those weary souls who need to find a breathing space in their busy lives in order to be more powerful in service to what matters most to them. It reflects the author's words from her poem Fire: What makes a fire burn is space between the logs, a breathing space…

The Reflective Leader brings together theory and core concepts through reflective practice, reflexivity, and experiential learning to crystallize current thinking regarding introspection and contextual intelligence in understanding and improving the effectiveness of leaders.

The Reflective Leader brings together theory and core concepts through reflective practice, reflexivity, and experiential learning to crystallize current thinking regarding introspection and contextual intelligence in understanding and improving the effectiveness of leaders.

Many people think great leaders are activists who lead from the front - but most are ordinary people who learn wisdom. This practical and inspiring guide shows how reflecting is the key to long-term effective leadership - both inside and outside the church.