1. Reinventing You

Dorie Clark

As some of my readers will know, I went through a significant career transition this past year.  After 15 years of leading and developing people in the non-profit world of church, I set out to invest in people in a different setting – at work.  Now, I help leaders design organizations and workplaces in which people thrive.

I love what I do, but I won’t pretend that the process of career transition wasn’t difficult.  It’s a deconstruction of sorts.  It requires a great deal of reflection and internal work, as you ask the big questions like, “Who am I?” and, “What do I want out of life?” It’s also external, as you ask, “How do I want to be perceived in the world?”

In the words of Dorie Clark, it’s a process of reinvention and rebranding.

This book takes you step-by-step through the process of transition, from articulating your skills, identifying your network, and defining your narrative to testing out new directions and reintroducing yourself to the world.

If you’re considering a career transition, have lingering doubts over whether you are where you want to be professionally, or want to know how to advance faster in your current workplace, Clark is the guide you’re looking for.

2. Scaling Up

Verne Harnish

This book feels like a condensed MBA.  In fact, it taught me a lot that I didn’t learn in my graduate studies.  It’s comprehensive in its scope and exceedingly actionable.  Many will know this book as the sequel to the wildly popular Rockefeller Habits.

This book is not aimed towards start-ups or large enterprises but instead is focused on a group that seems to be often left out in business writing – the small to midsize company.  If you have at least 10 employees and $1 million in revenue, and you want to grow, Scaling Up will give you the framework to do it.

Organized around four core areas of business – people, strategy, execution, and cash – this book is filled with worksheets, exercises, and practical steps to become more organized, more focused, and more strategic in your company.

Every successful business reaches a stage in its life cycle where the chaotic, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants whirlwind of the start-up phases needs to give way to a more structured, systematic way of doing things.  Most entrepreneurs struggle with this.  It requires a different mindset and skillset than starting a business.  What got you from A to B will not get you to C.  This book is here to fill the gap and help you take the next step.

If you choose one book this next year to help you develop your business, this is the one I recommend.

3. First, Break all the Rules

Gallup

Few groups can speak with as much credibility on management and employee engagement as Gallup.  They are a research powerhouse and have heard from tens of thousands of employees and managers from around the globe about what it takes to build a fantastic workplace.  Perhaps best known for their popular CliftonStrengths (aka StrengthsFinder) assessment, Gallup has become an authority on organizational leadership.

This book is their manifesto.  Originally authored by Marcus Buckingham almost 20 years ago, the findings from their research are still shaking up the management world and painting a picture of what authentic, human-centred workplaces could look like.  They are on a mission to eradicate old school management mentalities, with their simple platitudes and outdated power structures, and re-instill purpose and joy into the workplace.

Easy to read, this book will help managers engage their teams, hire better, and unlock the human potential in their organization.  If there is one book I would give to both new and experienced managers in 2021, this would be it.

4. Predictable Success

Les McKeown

Some leaders fail to reach their goals, not because they don’t have a compelling vision, but because they don’t know where they are.  It’s like having a map in front of you but not being sure of your own location.  

After working with start-ups and entrepreneurs for decades, McKeown is helping business owners identify where they are on the map.  With his fresh take on the business life cycle, he reveals what each stage looks and feels like, as well as how to move along the curve.

1. Businesses in stage one experience “Early Struggle.”  Your main goals are securing capital and finding a market.

2. Stage two is simply termed “Fun.”  Business is coming in, and you’re flying to keep up.  Structure and systems are very loose and probably not written down anywhere.

3. Stage three is “Whitewater.”  Growth creates complexity, and the shoot-from-the-hip approach of stage two is starting to get you into trouble; time to build some systems.

4. Stage four is the holy grail of “Predictable Success.”  If you can get through the tedious but vital work in stage three, you’ll have a business that can experience sustainable growth.

5. Inevitably, you get to stage five, “Treadmill.”  Some of the systematic momentum of stage three gets out of hand, and you become overly structured and bureaucratic.  

6. If you can’t go back to stage four from Treadmill, you’ll experience stage six, “The Big Rut.”  You’re comfortable and likely complacent.  Rather than take the bold, risky moves that defined you earlier, you’re rearranging the deck chairs on a slowly sinking ship.

7. The final stage is “Death Rattle.”  You might have one last burst of energy here before you close your doors, but there is really no coming back from this one.  A radical reinvention, essentially starting a new business, is the only way out at this point.

Each stage has its telltale signs and a strategy to move towards Predictable Success.  Once you know where you are on the map, you know where your next step is. 

5. Managerial Accounting (8th ed.)

Weygandt, Kimmel, & Kieso

That’s right, an accounting textbook has made the top ten list.  I’m as surprised as you are.  That’s the beauty of learning, though; you develop new interests and broaden your understanding of yourself in the process. 

As I discovered, not only is managerial accounting critical for your business, but there is a certain beauty and satisfaction in it too.  Unlike so much of the work I do developing people and organizations, where the way forward is often complex and hard to measure, accounting provides clarity – the numbers either work or they don’t.

For those who are as new to this as I was a year ago, managerial accounting is different than financial accounting.  Financial accounting is about compliance and regulatory requirements – all the things you need to worry about for tax season and potential audits.  Managerial accounting, on the other hand, is not regulated and is strictly concerned with the numbers that help you make better business decisions. 

A successful business needs to know things like how to allocate overhead, how profit margins change with the volume of goods sold, what the break-even point will be on a new product, which pricing strategy to use, when to invest in capital expenses like new buildings or equipment, and how to track cash flow.

While I believe that business is about more than just making money, all the good that you could possibly do in the world will be fairly short-lived if you don’t get a handle on the numbers.

6. The Culture Question

Grieser, Stutzman, Loewen, & Labun

ACHIEVE Centre for Leadership

The subtitle says it all – How to Create a Workplace Where People Like to Work.

As managers, one of our primary roles is to create an environment in which people thrive.  As Adam Grant puts it, we find ways to make work not suck for our people.

If this sounds too “soft” for some, the authors remind us that it also creates a significant and sustainable competitive advantage for businesses.  Not only does a focus on healthy culture increase engagement and productivity, but it is vital for attracting and retaining the right people in today’s talent market.

So, what does a healthy workplace culture look like?  After extensive interviews and surveys of thousands of employees, they’ve discovered six common themes:

1. Communicate your purpose and values. Be clear on who you are and why you exist, and then relentlessly embed that into the DNA of your workplace.
2. Provide meaningful work. Be intentional in designing jobs that tap into people’s internal motivations.
3. Focus your leadership team on people. Don’t just manage the work; lead the people.  Invest, coach, and develop your teams.
4. Build meaningful relationships. Form community and help your people create lasting relational bonds with each other. 
5. Create peak performing teams. Social connections are vital, but you’re not running a country club.  Learn how to build teams that consistently hit their goals.
6. Practice constructive conflict management. Toxic relationships can destroy a culture faster than just about anything else.  Great managers know how to address tension and conflict.

This is a playbook that every manager needs to hang on their wall.  If you want to dive in a little deeper, be sure to check out my full review.

7. Defining Moments

James Badaracco

Every leader will wrestle with the problem of “dirty hands.”

Jean-Paul Sartre coined this term to defy simplistic black-and-white thinking and to emphasize the messiness of being human.  While we would love to place both people and their decisions into neat categories of good and bad, this is almost never the reality.

Decisions are easy when right and wrong are obvious.  These take no wisdom and no courage.  But we do not often get the luxury of moral clarity.  The most difficult decisions a leader will make are between right and right.  The degrees of “rightness” may fluctuate, sure, the interpretations may vary between parties, but it is seldom a choice between 100% purity or 100% malevolence. 

Badaracco jumps right into the middle of this mess and attempts to provide some handholds for leaders to help them navigate.  Though we attempt to simplify matters with maxims like, “Do what allows you to sleep at night,” real ethical dilemmas are more complex than this.  We need more than “sleep-test ethics.”  His ability to avoid simplistic answers without getting lost in incomprehensible academic jargon is refreshing.

Perhaps the aspect of this book I enjoyed the most is simply how freeing it felt.  We can beat ourselves up as leaders trying to pursue the right path forward, frustrated that no matter what decision we make, someone will disagree and even villainize us in the process.  Badaracco gives permission to make the tough call and encourages us to show grace to ourselves and others.

Leadership decisions are hard.  Badaracco doesn’t necessarily make them easier, but his empathy and perspective somehow makes the burden of responsibility feel a little lighter.

8. The E-Myth Revisited

Michael Gerber

This is one of those classics that you just know you should be reading.  I can’t begin to count how many times I’ve heard this book referenced by business leaders and other authors.  If you’ve heard anyone use the phrase, “Work on your business, not in it,” your familiar with the core premise of Gerber’s book.

Originally written in the 80’s, it sought to help business leaders step outside of the urgent whirlwind of tasks that make up the day-to-day and to focus on the longer term, more important work of building and developing the business. 

The “e-myth,” or entrepreneur myth, is the belief that most people who start businesses are entrepreneurs.  They’re not.  In Gerber’s mind, they’re technicians.  They have a particular skill or area of expertise but, in reality, know very little about what it means to run a business.  As a result, many people have not so much built a business as they have simply created a job for themselves.  They might not have a traditional boss, but they’re still functioning like employees.

Many small business owners never get out of the rut of this employee-mindset and end up running themselves ragged trying to keep their head above water (and many don’t).  In Gerber’s words,

“The purpose of your life is not to serve your business, but the primary purpose of your business is to serve your life.”

Once you embrace the role of entrepreneur, you begin to focus on building a business that works even when you’re not around.  Using the franchise model as an example, Gerber believes the goal is to create a model that you could theoretically franchise out to someone else and feel confident that it will work just as well in another setting as your own.  With detailed operations manuals and carefully defined systems and processes, everyone knows exactly what it takes to be successful.

While there are critics of Gerber’s model, the basic premise of learning to be more intentional in developing your business is advice that any small business owner could benefit from.

9. Getting Started in Consulting

Alan Weiss

Ok, so this is a pretty niche book recommendation.  Most of you don’t need to pick up a copy.

If, however, like me, you’ve recently transitioned your career and are functioning as an independent service provider to businesses, you’ll find this book to be quite valuable.  My particular focus is organizational design, but you could specialize in IT, marketing, accounting, agribusiness, or any other aspect of business consulting and still implement Weiss’ advice. 

The author is not trying to help you build the particular content of your services, but rather to build a business model around your existing services.  In other words, this book will not help you become an expert, but will help you craft a business around your expertise.  Weiss will walk you through all of the basics – marketing, selling your services, setting prices, growing a practice, and developing the mindset and habits needed to succeed as a solo consultant.

If you’re an independent contractor, freelancer, or “solopreneur,” this is a book you’ll want on your shelf.

10. The Name of the Wind

Patrick Rothfuss

Fiction continues to prove its worth to me.  Perhaps it is the escape into a parallel world or simply the power of the narrative form, but there is something peaceful, even therapeutic, about immersing yourself in a story well told.

And this is a story particularly well told.  Rothfuss is a master at his craft.  He has created a main character that is complex and compelling, which you can’t help but become attached to.  This is a coming-of-age tale of a young boy named Kvothe (pronounced like “Quothe”), who discovers he has gifts and powers far beyond that of his peers.  The story follows his path as he studies at the University to become an “arcanist” (a scientific wizard, of sorts).  In the process, he uncovers a dark world that would prefer to stay secret.

Though the book does not move quickly, I would not call it slow.  It’s unhurried.  There is adventure, but it’s not action-packed.  You are taking a long walk with a friend who is telling you his story.  Though it’s clearly set in the world of fantasy, the characters are decidedly human (well, most of them).  It’s hopeful, but also tragic.  It’s emotional.  You find yourself saddened by the steady stream of hard hands dealt to the protagonist, which makes the brief moments of victory feel all the more satisfying.

It is said that one of the best methods for developing empathy is reading good fiction.  Entering into another person’s story and seeing the world through their eyes is a critical skill in today’s polarized world.  Character-driven fiction, written with the skill of Rothfuss, strengthen this muscle.

Bottom line, this is an engaging story.  It will appeal to a wider audience than just fans of fantasy fiction.  In many ways, it defies the normal conventions of the genre and stands on its own. 

If you decide to dive in, be warned that it is a trilogy that is not yet finished.  The second book, The Wise Man’s Fear, was written in 2011, and there is no indication that the third will be released anytime soon.  It’s a difficult wait. Once you begin, you won’t want to stop.