Leaders are readers. Reading helps you discover ideas to try and expand your mental models. In this post, I point you to reviews of recent business books. You’ll find pointers to reviews of Win from Within: Build Organizational Culture For Competitive Advantage, The Strategic Leader’s Roadmap: 6 Steps for Integrating Leadership and Strategy, Rituals Roadmap: The Human Way to Transform Everyday Routines into Workplace Magic, Own Your Morning: Reset Your A.M. Routine To Unlock Your Potential, and The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical. There’s also a pointer to Michael McKinney’s preview of leadership books scheduled for release in January 2022.

From HBS Working Knowledge: What It Takes to Build an Organizational Culture That Wins

“There’s a feeling among many business leaders that culture is both everything and nothing. That it’s squishy and can’t be quantified. That it’s nice to have until something more urgent gets in the way [read: all the time]. Author James L. Heskett systematically takes apart those beliefs in his book, Win from Within: Build Organizational Culture For Competitive Advantage, which is a how-to roadmap for improving an organization’s culture.”

From Wharton: Layered Leadership and Apple’s Rise to the Top

“In their book The Strategic Leader’s Roadmap, Revised and Updated Edition: 6 Steps for Integrating Leadership and Strategy, Wharton management professors Harbir Singh and Michael Useem draw on one-on-one interviews and their own research to take readers into the offices — and mindsets — of some of today’s foremost strategic leaders. In the following excerpt adapted from the book, Singh and Useem explore key steps in the development of the iPhone’s virtual keyboard to show how a “layered leadership” approach has contributed to Apple’s success.”

From Charter: How to use rituals to connect with work and retain colleagues

“Erica Keswin, a workplace strategist and executive coach, has investigated how companies use rituals and found that they can significantly boost collaboration and productivity. Earlier this year, Keswin published Rituals Roadmap, and since the pandemic started has been checking in with companies to see how their rituals have evolved. We spoke with her this week about what has worked for them, and what leaders should be doing now. Here is a transcript of our conversation, edited for clarity.”

From Gretchen Rubin: Liz Plosser: “In Many Cases, Some Sleep and Fresh Perspective Will Re-Set Your Emotional State.”

“Liz Plosser is the Editor-in-Chief of Women’s Health magazine and also served as Deputy Editor of SELF and helped earn Cosmopolitan its first-ever national magazine award. Her first book just hit the shelves: Own Your Morning: Reset Your A.M. Routine To Unlock Your Potential (Amazon, Bookshop). In it, she argues that your morning routine should reflect what matters most to you.”

From Skip Prichard: Why the Best Strategies Blend the Digital and Physical

“In The Brains and Brawn Company: How Leading Organizations Blend the Best of Digital and Physical, Siegel brings the digital innovation conversation back down to earth. He shows that, while important, digital is only part of the answer?and it’s never the only answer. The vast majority of successful leaders from both incumbents and disruptors focus as much on things like logistics, manufacturing, and distribution as they do on digital innovation. In fact, many established companies are successfully countering young upstarts in other creative ways, and many new organizations are learning from their older brethren.”

From Michael McKinney: First Look: Leadership Books for January 2022

“Here’s a look at some of the best leadership books to be released in January 2022. Be sure to check out the other great titles being offered this month.”

Reading recommendations are a regular feature of this blog. Want more recommendations about what to read? Monday is “Book Day.” Come back for book reviews, reading lists and other reading-related posts.