'Shawn Callahan is a master at telling stories, applying stories and coaching others in the art of storytelling. This is a delightful book that is hard to put down.' --Gary Klein, world-leading psychologist and author of Intuition at Work 'A wonderful book that's both practical and fun to read. As we've experienced, Shawn's training programs are phenomenal, and now everyone has access to his techniques in Putting Stories to Work.' --Gerry Lynch, General Manager, Mars New Zealand 'Putting Stories to Work really helps you notice stories and bring them to life in your business in a way that's simple, practical and compelling. This book is full of interesting stories that are so relatable. It's a must-read.' --Lisa Mills, International Head of TESCO Academy The most successful leaders are storytellers. By mastering business storytelling, they achieve extraordinary business results. As a modern-day leader, you know you should develop this skill, but you don't have the time to do this in an ad-hoc way. What you need is a practical, reliable method to follow, one that will allow your business to reap the benefits of storytelling as soon as possible. In Putting Stories to Work, Shawn Callahan gives you a clear process for mastering business storytelling. He demolishes the thinking that storytelling has no place at work, reminding us that sharing stories is what we all do naturally, every day, and that it's one of the most powerful tools for getting things done. You just need to adapt this natural superpower to boost your business. Shawn's story mastery process of Discover, Remember, Share and Refresh is based on over two decades' work with high-achieving global companies. In Putting Stories to Work, each step is spelled out in detail, backed up by research, and, needless to say, illustrated by plenty of great stories. Learn how to find and share stories to connect with new people. How to explain why change is needed. How to influence opinions and promote success. And much more. Most importantly, learn how to take the latent skill of storytelling and turn it into a potent business habit. Imagine your colleagues telling the story of how you took the most diverse and opinionated group of experts and had them all working towards the same goal. Or the one about how you persuaded the executive team to change their minds and got a great result for the business. Or the one where everyone got inspired and turned things around. Imagine that your people all know exactly what the company strategy is and how they're making a difference to the organisation. As the successful film executive Peter Guber put it: 'Storytelling is not show business. It's good business'.

The first and only guide to diagnosing and dealing with the hidden or covert factors that can ruin even the most meticulously planned change processes. Organizational change initiatives often fail because they focus exclusively on the rational, overt aspects of change, overlooking the powerful role played by concealed or irrational factors. It’s well known that these covert processes—such as hidden agendas, blind spots, office politics, tacit assumptions, secret hopes, wishes and fears—frequently sabotage change efforts, but up until now nobody has offered a rigorous, consistent way of identifying and dealing with them. Drawing on over thirty years of experience as an organizational change consultant to global corporations and government agencies, Robert J. Marshak shows precisely how to bring these hidden processes to light and deal with their negative impact. Marshak identifies five different dimensions of covert processes, presents an integrated model to explain the ultimate source of all of them, and shows how to diagnose whether any covert processes might be at work in your organization. He then offers specific tools and techniques for engaging and managing these “under-the-table” processes and for creating the kind of organizational environment in which such hidden dynamics are unable to flourish. Covert Processes at Work is a comprehensive and practical guide that managers, leaders, and consultants can use to deal with the hidden dynamics that are often at the root of many organizational problems. “Adding these tools…will take both your practice and your clients to a whole new level of capability and impact.” —Karen Boylston, PhD, Managing Director, Duke Corporate Education

An argument for reimagining skill in a way that can extend economic opportunity to workers at the bottom of the labor market. America has a jobs problem--not enough well-paying jobs to go around and not enough clear pathways leading to them. Skill development is critical for addressing this employment crisis, but there are many unresolved questions about who has skill, how it is attained, and whose responsibility it is to build skills over time. In this book, Nichola Lowe tells the stories of pioneering workforce intermediaries--nonprofits, unions, community colleges--that harness this ambiguity around skill to extend economic opportunity to workers at the bottom of the labor market.

In his New York Times bestseller Steal Like an Artist, Austin Kleon showed readers how to unlock their creativity by “stealing” from the community of other movers and shakers. Now, in an even more forward-thinking and necessary book, he shows how to take that critical next step on a creative journey—getting known. Show Your Work! is about why generosity trumps genius. It’s about getting findable, about using the network instead of wasting time “networking.” It’s not self-promotion, it’s self-discovery—let others into your process, then let them steal from you. Filled with illustrations, quotes, stories, and examples, Show Your Work! offers ten transformative rules for being open, generous, brave, productive. In chapters such as You Don’t Have to Be a Genius; Share Something Small Every Day; and Stick Around, Kleon creates a user’s manual for embracing the communal nature of creativity— what he calls the “ecology of talent.” From broader life lessons about work (you can’t find your voice if you don’t use it) to the etiquette of sharing—and the dangers of oversharing—to the practicalities of Internet life (build a good domain name; give credit when credit is due), it’s an inspiring manifesto for succeeding as any kind of artist or entrepreneur in the digital age.

How leadership with love can make lasting changes, even in the toughest situations Lead Fearlessly, Love Hard offers real, actionable advice for those seeking to change the education system from within. While countless books, articles, and speeches decry the challenges disadvantaged students in low-performing schools face, no one has offered a clear path forward through these challenges—until now. Author Linda Cliatt-Wayman, principal of Strawberry Mansion High School in Philadelphia, grew up in the same North Philadelphia neighborhood where she now leads and fought every single day for the chance to become a part of the solution. Today, she is a turnaround principal and popular TED Talk speaker who helps children living in poverty achieve more than they ever thought possible. In Lead Fearlessly, Love Hard, she provides hope, optimism, and a call to action to help all students reach their true potential. Steadfast leadership and clear principles can overcome almost anything, and this book shows you how to focus your passion, apply your skills, and lead your students down the path to a better future. Discover and develop the leader within Take responsibility and move forward every day Give each student the critical interaction they crave Be a force for real, positive change in neighborhood schools Highlighting the intersection of strong visionary and strategic thinking with on-the-ground, day-to-day implementation, this narrative-driven guide tells the stories of real students and educators to show how clear principles and strong guidance can turn around schools—and the students they serve.

Why isn’t everyone creative? Why doesn’t education foster more ingenuity? Why is expertise often the enemy of innovation? Bestselling creativity expert Michael Michalko shows that in every ?eld of endeavor — from business and science to government, the arts, and even day-to-day life — natural creativity is limited by the prejudices of logic and the structures of accepted categories and concepts. Through step-by-step exercises, illustrated strategies, and inspiring real-world examples, he shows readers how to liberate their thinking and literally expand their imaginations by learning to synthesize dissimilar subjects, think paradoxically, and enlist the help of the subconscious mind. He also reveals the attitudes and approaches that diverse geniuses share — and anyone can emulate. Fascinating and fun, Michalko’s strategies facilitate the kind of lightbulb-moment thinking that changes lives — for the better.

Storytelling is humanity’s oldest way of connecting to others. But for businesses and managers, it can also be a powerful tool to help organizations grow and thrive. A leader’s role is to create engagement and belief so that people will act. And there’s no more powerful way to grab attention, be remembered, and engage action than by telling stories—about who you are, what you do, and why you do it. Today, “storytelling” is a hot topic in organizations… but most leaders still struggle to act upon it. How do we find and tell our stories quickly, in an environment of urgency where we can hardly pause to catch our breath? For more than a decade Hutchens has tested his method of rapid and strategic story development with innovation teams in Silicon Valley, across global Fortune 100 leadership teams, and more. Hutchens has honed a unique process that is active, potent, and strategically focused . . . and also a lot of fun. In Story Dash, Hutchens shares a repeatable process to find, develop, and deploy your “narrative assets”—that is, your urgent core stories that hold value. Even better, he will help you do it FAST; often in less than a day. Story Dash will help you to: Access your natural capacity for storytelling Find your stories—and figure out which ones to tell Build your narrative so it lands with unforgettable impact Find your own voice of authentic leadership Bring more of who you are to your teams and your markets Fully illustrated and written in a clear, sharp voice, Story Dash shares the fastest way to find lots of stories that will create action around the work you care about most.

“Callings will inspire readers at every stage of their careers to view work with a new appreciation for the possibilities it holds beyond the mundane.” —Booklist Stories of passion, courage, and commitment, following individuals as they pursue the work they were born to do, from StoryCorps founder Dave Isay In Callings, StoryCorps founder Dave Isay presents unforgettable stories from people doing what they love. Some found their paths at a very young age, others later in life; some overcame great odds or upturned their lives in order to pursue what matters to them. Many of their stories have never been broadcast or published by StoryCorps until now. We meet a man from the barrios of Texas whose harrowing experiences in a family of migrant farmers inspired him to become a public defender. We meet a longtime waitress who takes pride in making regulars and newcomers alike feel at home in her Nashville diner. We meet a young man on the South Side of Chicago who became a teacher in order to help at-risk teenagers like the ones who killed his father get on the right track. We meet a woman from Little Rock who helps former inmates gain the skills and confidence they need to rejoin the workforce. Together they demonstrate how work can be about much more than just making a living, that chasing dreams and finding inspiration in unexpected places can transform a vocation into a calling. Their shared sense of passion, honor, and commitment brings deeper meaning and satisfaction to every aspect of their lives. An essential contribution to the beloved StoryCorps collection, Callings is an inspiring tribute to rewarding work and the American pursuit of happiness.

Don't leave your faith at the door...