10 Proven Self-Improvement Books for 2010
At the beginning of each year many of us make resloutions to change our lives and set goals to be accomplished in the next twelve months. Come the next December 31, we discover we are no closer to achieving those resolutions than we were on January 1. The commitments we made early on didn’t “stick”.
One source of personal motivation comes from the experience and teaching of others. Here are ten books (not new, but with a proven track record) to help kick-start your self improvement.
1. 21 Indispensable Qualities Of A Leader: Becoming The Person Others Will Want To Follow
“Everything rises and falls on leadership,” says Dr. Maxwell, “but knowing how to lead is only half the battle. Understanding leadership and actually leading are two different activities.” Dr. Maxwell explains that the key to transforming yourself from someone who understands leadership to a person who successfully leads in the real world is character. Your character qualities activate and empower your leadership ability, or they can stand in the way of your success! In his latest book, Dr. Maxwell discusses several other key attributes to being a good leader including:
- Charisma: The First Impression Can Seal the Deal
- Courage: One Person With Courage Is a Majority
- Problem Solving: You Can’t Let Your Problems Be a Problem
- Teachability: To Keep Leading, Keep Learning
- Vision: You can Seize Only What You Can See
If you look at all great leaders of the past and present, you’ll find that they possess the 21 qualities that are discussed in The 21 Indispensable Qualities of a Leader. If you can become the leader you ought to be on the inside, you will be able to become the leader that you want to be on the outside. “If you are able to do that,” says Maxwell, “you’ll find there’s nothing in this world you cannot do.”
Effectively managing personnel–as well as one’s own behavior–is an extraordinarily complex task that, not surprisingly, has been the subject of countless books touting what each claims is the true path to success. That said, Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton’s Now, Discover Your Strengths does indeed propose a unique approach: focusing on enhancing people’s strengths rather than eliminating their weaknesses. Following up on the coauthors’ popular previous book, “First, Break All the Rules,” it fully describes 34 positive personality themes the two have formulated (such as Achiever, Developer, Learner, and Maximizer) and explains how to build a “strengths-based organization” by capitalizing on the fact that such traits are already present among those within it.
3. The 5 Patterns of Extraordinary Careers: The Guide for Achieving Success and Satisfaction
Aside from some perfunctory tips on job searching, resume writing and interviewing, the authors, both consultants with the head-hunting firm Spencer Stuart, approach careers as problems in psychology and group dynamics. They urge mid-career executives with suppressed feelings of anxiety and helplessness to view a career as a free-form project of self-actualization that should fit with their personalities and inspire passion. More pragmatically, career building is also an exercise in image-management that should convey potential and experience to employers and their head-hunting consultants. This partly involves canny career moves allowing talent to shine. But climbing the ladder also requires consummate office politics-manipulating perceptions, networking with the powerful, strategic quid pro quos, gaining power by “masquerading as the leader”-all accomplished without stepping on toes, stifling subordinates or “sucking up.” The authors convey these lessons in a sometimes turgid mixture of opaque managementese (“successful executives… literally achieve positive impact at an accelerating rate”), squishy survey data (“extraordinary executives… leverage both their strengths and their passions more than six times as often as average employees”) and case studies in which executives move from industry to industry in a meteoric, triumphal procession of nebulous jobs in consulting, marketing and finance. The blend of motivational therapeutics and softly Machiavellian tactics may help some executives get out of their rut, but the generic, almost contentless corporate work experiences on display seem far from extraordinary.
Full of modern day insight, the story of Who Moved My Cheese? invites individuals and organizations to enjoy less stress and more success by learning to deal with the inevitable change.
5. The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change was a groundbreaker when it was first published in 1990, and it continues to be a business bestseller with more than 10 million copies sold. Stephen Covey, an internationally respected leadership authority, realizes that true success encompasses a balance of personal and professional effectiveness, so this book is a manual for performing better in both arenas. His anecdotes are as frequently from family situations as from business challenges.
6. How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci: Seven Steps to Genius Every Day
Here’s a personal growth guidebook that’s won the admiration and recommendation of Ted Hughes, Poet Laureate of England. He calls this “a brilliant, practical guide to awakening and training our vast, unused resources of intelligence and ability.” Author Michael Gelb, founder of High Performance Learning and consultant for companies including AT&T and National Public Radio, says that we all can unlock the “da Vincian” genius inside us. Gelb says there are seven critical principles that need to be followed for success, whether you’re learning a new language, studying to be a gourmet chef, or just hoping to be more effective on the job:
- Curiosita: An insatiably curious approach to life.
- Dimonstratzione: A commitment to test knowledge through experience.
- Sensazione: The continual refinement of the senses, especially sight, as the means to clarify experience.
- Sfumato: A willingness to embrace ambiguity, paradox, and uncertainty.
- Arte/Scienza: The development of the balance between science and art, logic and imagination (“whole-brain thinking”).
- Corporalita: The cultivation of ambidexterity, fitness, and poise.
- Connessione: A recognition and appreciation for the connectedness of all things and phenomena; “systems thinking.”
Gelb discusses each of these principles in relation to what da Vinci accomplished, thereby giving this book a built-in history lesson. The illustrations from the master’s work and time add a nice warmth to the work. As the president of NPR said after working with Gelb, this is a program recommended for “anyone who wants to experience a personal and professional Renaissance.”
Tom Peters takes you through 50 distinct yet interrelated concepts about work as it exists amid international business, technology and the Internet. He maintains that only the white-collar workers who brand and “Inc.” themselves will survive the changes that he anticipates in the next 15 years. And then he tells you how. As Peters says himself, the revolution has started; it is time to get on board. Given that call to arms, getAbstract.com recommends this hands-on book about how to take control of the rest of your career.
8. What Should I Do with My Life?: The True Story of People Who Answered the Ultimate Question
In What Should I Do with My Life? Po Bronson manages to create a career book that is a page-turner. His 50 vivid profiles of people searching for “their soft spot–their true calling” will engage readers because Bronson is asking himself the same question. He explores his premise, that “nothing is braver than people facing up to their own identity,” as an anthropologist and autobiographer. He tackles thorny, nuanced issues about self-determination. Among them: paradoxes of money and meaning, authorship and destiny, brain candy and novelty versus soul food. Bronson’s stories, limited to professional people and complete with photos, are gems. They include a Los Angeles lawyer who became a priest, a Harvard MBA catfish farmer turned biotech executive, and a Silicon Valley real estate agent who opened a leather crafts factory in Costa Rica.
Rhinoceros Success is packed with insightful tips on how to improve in all the key areas of your life: social, spiritual, work, financial, family and physical. Imagine having two-inch-thick skin, charging at every opportunity with the unstoppable belief that you will become successful! With that mindset, what would your business look like in six months?
A nice sequel to Rhinocerous Success that you will also enjoy. A few things it reminded me of is that leaders are often under attack from all sides, and it’s important to watch your own back because often nobody else will.
Disclosure: the above links are all affiliate connections to Amazon. If you click through and buy a book, I will receive a payment.Related articles by Zemanta
- Humility as a Leadership Trait (blogs.harvardbusiness.org)
- Awesomeness and Conversation (conversationagent.com)
- Lead From the Front, Not From the Rear (startupprofessionals.com)
- Top 5 business books you and your staff should read (nomadshostels.com)
- Are You a Good Manager? How Can You Tell? (myventurepad.com)
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I enjoyed your article. You made some good choices. I have read some, but there are a few that are new to me.
Thanks for the info!