Accel5®’s Business Book Summaries of the Month: August 2022Add these summarized business books from Accel5 to your reading list.
August 1, 2022
This month’s collection covers a variety of topics, including business acumen, leadership, management and more, all briefed to be enjoyed in minutes.
Tom Finegan
Summary: Too often, modern businesses place outsized attention on the role of leaders in accomplishing goals, often viewing followers as failed leaders. In Amplifiers, management consultant Tom Finegan advocates for the recognition and development of amplifiers, workers embodying the best traits of followership and leadership who improve the performance of those around them, and improvements to talent scouting efforts that often overlook high potential individuals.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Managing Others
· Leadership Essentials
· Developing Leaders
Everyone Is An “Influencer”: Building A Brand by Engaging the People Who Matter Most
Kelly Keenan
Summary: In Everyone Is an Influencer, Kelly Keenan shares his strategy for culture development marketing and explains how business leaders can share their brand stories most effectively. You’ll learn the elements of a brand celebration and how to validate your brand story. Uncover the core values of your brand so you can celebrate your brand story authentically.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Business Essentials
· Marketing Essentials
Terrence Metz
Summary: In Meetings That Get Results, Terrence Metz guides readers through the necessary actions to run an efficient and effective meeting. By plainly stating the meeting’s purpose, carefully planning the steps needed to reach consensus, removing distractions, and asking the right questions, your team will solve important problems creatively and successfully. Ensure your team’s effectiveness by promoting unity, demanding participation, and allowing for all relevant ideas to be heard and discussed.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Managing Self
· Communicating Effectively
Alex Goldfayn
Summary: Despite the influence of the Internet and social media, proactive calling is still one of the most effective ways to engage prospects and customers. In Pick Up the Phone and Sell, Alex Goldfayn reveals strategies to build relationships, reel in prospects, and increase profits by using the phone. This book is for anyone interested in gaining a competitive edge to immediately increase sales.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Communicating Effectively
· Sales Essentials
Talent, Strategy, Risk: How Investors and Boards Are Redefining TSR
Bill McNabb, Ram Charan, and Dennis Carey
Summary: Talent, strategy and risk capture the work of a company. They’re the functional elements that a board of directors must oversee. In Talent, Strategy, Risk from Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation, Bill McNabb, Ram Charan, and Dennis Carey combine their own executive experience with insight from industry leaders to provide practical advice your company can use to generate long-term, sustainable growth. By redefining the concept of total shareholder return, your company’s board can learn to take the long view and focus on key considerations of talent, strategy, and risk. That shift can help your board successfully resist short-term pressures and focus on issues that will allow your company to thrive.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Business Essentials
· Managing Others
· Business Acumen
· Leadership Essentials
The Good Boss: 9 Ways Every Manager Can Support Women at Work
Kate Eberle Walker
Summary: Women have made significant strides toward fairness and equality in the workplace, but they continue to face demands, pressures, and challenges others don’t experience. Managers who see these challenges and take steps to support and advocate for women can make all the difference in whether they climb to higher rungs of success or stay stuck in unfulfilling roles. In The Good Boss, Kate Eberle Walker outlines specific steps managers everywhere should take to support, mentor, and advocate for their female employees. She provides nine clear-cut rules for getting started.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Business Essentials
· Managing Others
· Coaching & Mentoring
· Diversity
· Management Essentials
Transformational Culture: Develop a People-Centred Organization for Improved Performance
David Liddle
Summary: Assumptions about the role of organizations in employees’ lives and society at large are evolving. New variables like social media, blurred boundaries between work and home, and increasing demand for brands that engage with issues like climate change and social justice have forced companies to reexamine their cultures. In Transformational Culture, David Liddle provides tools organizations of any size can use to embrace these shifts and gain a competitive advantage rooted in sustainability, inclusion, equity and results.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Business Essentials
· Managing Change
· Corporate Culture Development
We the Possibility: Harnessing Public Entrepreneurship to Solve Our Most Urgent Problems
Mitchell Weiss
Summary: In We the Possibility, Mitchell Weiss argues that public leaders need to move on from a government of probability (in which programs or services will “probably” succeed) to one of possibility (where new programs and services might “possibly” succeed). Safe yet mediocre government programs that will probably succeed can’t keep up with the urgent problems of our rapidly changing society. To boost the chances of finding breakout ideas, government needs to cultivate public entrepreneurs—intelligent, humble, and empathetic public servants who think and act like entrepreneurs.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Business Essentials
· Entrepreneurship Mindset
Whenever You’re Ready: How to Compose the Life of Your Dreams
Jeeyoon Kim
Summary: Your life is a symphony. It has movements and expressions that add color, interest, and structure to your journey. It also has intermissions between those movements that give you space to breathe, pause, and reflect. If you’re like acclaimed pianist Jeeyoon Kim, you may have sheet music and piano keys you can rely on to guide you forward, but even if your journey is markedly different, you can learn from her approaches to finding calmness, confidence, and courage to master your performance. Her book Whenever You’re Ready reveals her master strategies.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Managing Others
· Managing Performance
Peter Bregman
Summary: Leaders often find themselves at the intersection of two conflicting truths: (1) You’re the only person whose actions you have the power to change, and (2) your success as a leader depends on your ability to change other people for the better. In You Can Change Other People, Peter Bregman and Howie Jacobson, PhD, describe a four-step process to help you inspire change in others, beginning with understanding why people resist self-improvement in the first place.
For those looking to improve upon these competencies:
· Managing Others
· Leadership Essentials
· Influencing Others
