Written by David Dotlich and Peter Cairo-- two of the country's top executive coaches and educators-- Unnatural Leadership debunks the common notion of the natural leader as a flawless figure. The book describes the truth about being a real leader in a business environment turned upside down by e-commerce, diversity, security concerns, globalization, and matrix structures. Drawing on personal experience working with successful leaders in top-tier companies throughout the world, Dotlich and Cairo identify a style of leadership used by those who succeed in complicated business and people situations, a style that maximizes a leader's strengths and acknowledges weaknesses.

Since Jean Lipman-Blumen's The Allure of Toxic Leaders shook the corporate world in 2005, countless articles, books, and Internet blogs have appeared on the topic. Despite such interest and response, no study of toxic leadership had appeared from a Christian point of view until this volume, Kenn Gangel's Surviving Toxic Leaders. Gangel begins by showing that toxic leadership existed throughout biblical history. Making generous use not only of biblical materials but also of contemporary leadership literature, Gangel names the causes and cures of power abuse, cheating, bullying, laziness, and dictatorial behavior in today's leaders. Readers will benefit from Gangel's leadership experience and expertise. He has been a pastor, a college dean (twice), and a college president. Gangel currently edits The Seal, a review of leadership literature. Practical and personal, Surviving Toxic Leaders abounds with stories of real people and their situations. Everyone who has ever had "trouble at work" will benefit from Surviving Toxic Leaders.

Trust continues to be a leading concept in organizational commitment. Milligan (2003) conducted a survey looking at trust in the Air Force among junior officers. This study was conducted as a follow-up study to determine whether trust continues to be an issue in the Air Force. The purpose of this study is to measure the comparative strengths and weaknesses, as well as the significance, of leadership s ability to gain trust from its subordinates in order to reduce the numbers of officers leaving after their commitment. This research measures organizational commitment and trust in a random sample of 372 Air Force captains. All participants completed the following surveys: The Management Behavior Climate Assessment, Organizational Commitment Scales, Intent to Leave Scale, and a demographics survey. Findings of the research concluded with the following points, as trust is a growing factor in leadership and junior officers leaving the Air Force, there is a relationship between trust and commitment. There is also a strong relationship between commitment and intent of junior officers leaving the Air Force. Finally, trust was the primary variable in this study and it was found that with an increase of trust in leadership, there is a decrease of junior officers leaving the Air Force.

Leadership coaching has become vitally important to today?s most successful businesses. The Art and Practice of Leadership Coaching is a landmark resource that presents a variety of perspectives and best practices from today?s top executive coaches. It provides valuable guidance on exactly what the best coaches are now doing to get the most out of leaders, for now and into the future. Revealing core philosophies, critical capabilities, and the secrets of coaching success, this one-of-a-kind guide includes essays from fifty top coaches, including Ken Blanchard and Frances Hesselbein. Packed with cutting-edge ideas and proven best practices, this is the definitive source of information for anyone dealing with coaching.

How leaders can take the moral risks necessary to create “masterpieces”—admirable, distinctive, and high-achieving businesses that create meaningful lives for customers, employees, and themselves. In Leadership as Masterpiece Creation, Charles Spinosa, Matthew Hancocks, and Haridimos Tsoukas show how the humanities can help leaders create profitable, masterpiece organizations. Such organizations, they assert, are ones that possess the emotional and moral sensibilities of an artist, the wisdom of a statesperson, and the technical know-how of commerce. The authors draw on the works of Nietzsche, Heidegger, Bernard Williams, Shakespeare, and Machiavelli to conceptualize moral risk-taking, and then on the actions of Churchill, Madam C. J. Walker, Anita Roddick, Jeff Bezos, and others to show how the humanities can help create admirable businesses today. As management consultants and educators steeped in the humanities themselves, the authors discuss their experiences helping business leaders achieve successful masterpieces that bring good lives to many. After describing our contemporary business environment and examples of leaders who have created masterpiece organizations, the book turns to the basic skills of masterpiece creation: managing moods, building trust, listening for difference, and speaking truth to power. Then come the senior skills: moral risk-taking and creating a masterpiece organizational culture, strategy, and leadership style. Last, the authors explain why their leaders build an economy of gratitude. A culturally ambitious and refreshing read, Leadership as Masterpiece Creation is an invaluable volume for leaders of every stripe who wish to act daily with moral imagination.

Apostle Jean Saflo passion is for believers to know that their 'everyday' life in the Marketplace is a place for the expression of their God given gifts for true Kingdom Principles and Transformation. As Christians we all have important giftings and callings. All of us are called to Influence the world around us and especially the Marketplace. This book, Towards Kingdom Leadership, boldly gives very practical tools, keys, techniques and principles for becoming Leaders that create significance. Significance in all our areas or spheres of Influence.

It is a familiar experience. A congregation that had been growing in numbers and spiritual vitality reaches a plateau and then begins to decline. Most of the time, the plateau occurs long before the church arrives at the optimum number of members it hoped to attract. What has happened here? Why does growth slow down, stop, and then decline? The real question to ask, says Bob Whitesel, is why the church grew in the first place. Most of the time young, growing churches make a series of decisions based not upon careful planning and analysis, but rather upon necessity and intuition. Thus these decisions are not planned strategies, but strategies that often occur by accident, owing their genesis to circumstance. These unplanned strategic decisions are driven not by knowledge, but often simply by the church's environment. When that growth slows, these same churches begin to engage in more careful planning. The problem is that this planning so often ignores the considerations and decisions that led to the church's growth to begin with. The result is stagnation and eventual decline. In the plain, direct style that is his hallmark, Whitesel lays out where churches go wrong in their planning for growth and how they can correct themselves. He does so by looking at three related phenomena: first, the factors that cause initial growth; second, the erroneous decisions that lead to getting stuck on the plateau; and finally, corrective steps that churches can take to regain growth and vitality.

What makes some leaders so effective when the stakes are high, while others fall short? Why are some able to not only survive but to lead their organizations to new heights even in risky, fast-changing times? The answer is succinct but multi-layered: such leaders display courage, judgment, and fortitude. High-stakes leadership does not require unnatural powers, nor is it predicated on a dangerous situation. The three signature character traits can be cultivated by anyone at any level in any organization, big or small. Organizational and leadership consultant Constance Dierickx describes high-stakes leadership in a simple, three-part model that illuminates the mindsets, strategies, and tactics leaders must draw upon to make tough decisions, take an unpopular stand, or ignore convention, providing real-world examples across a range of sectors and industries. Dierickx developed her model of high-stakes leadership to help her clients—executives at organizations ranging from start-ups to nonprofits to large, global companies—better define what they need to bring strategy to life. This, she found, is the great gulf in business, the vast space between idea and results. High-Stakes Leadership helps leaders sharpen their ability to: act decisively, with clarity and focus test ideas using reason, and course correct as needed be resolute and inspire others to continue, even in the face of challenges Leading requires the courage to make conscious decisions about what to do, the judgment to separate information from short-term trends, and the fortitude to remain true to oneself and one’s mission. When leaders do these things, they also become teachers, leading their teams by example, often without realizing it. The essential aspects of good leadership endure even as the environment and tactics change. Indeed, courage, judgment, and fortitude are not merely tools for survival, they are the means by which we sculpt the future.