As I am getting ready to do another week-long new management development program with my friend and colleague Linda Houden, I am thinking about a question that we are often get asked by participants: “Can you recommend any books on leadership/management for us?” I have written previous blogs about my bias against popular “business books. However, the question is a legitimate one and I have decided to devote the next few blogs to answering it.
An easy recommended reading is Difficult Conversations by Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen of the Harvard Negotiation Project. One of the challenges that I find often confounds even the best leader is how to have that really thorny conversation. This book really helps. It is so accessible and practical that even the busiest leader will find it a worthwhile read. More to follow¦