I have clients ask me from time to time for book recommendations. I received a recent inquiry from a very remarkable, up and coming leader I'll call Jane. Jane is a VP with COO aspirations, and she could well achieve that goal through developing her leadership.
We just took her through a thorough review of her personality style assessments (DISC, Values and Personal Talent Skills Inventory) helping her "mine" for her highest-leverage development areas. She took to it like a fish to water and was very open and non-defensive. Most executives seem to want to use such a review to reinforce what they already believe to be true. Not Jane. She was more like a lioness on a hunt.
At the culmination of her assessment review, she asked for a book recommendation based on what we'd seen in her assessments. Jane's assessments showed her skills were already very highly developed. Therefore, my response to her was not a specific leadership skill development recommendation: my recommendation was a foundational one.
I am posting my response to Jane here, because the recommendation applies to all leaders. And my response to her was not just a book recommendation, but also a cursory explanation of why learning to work with our our perception is essential if we are to enter the fires of the leadership forge. I hope you find the explanation useful, and that you consider the reading the recommended book. The timing is great as we enter the new year.
Dear Jane, As Einstein said, 'we can't solve problems at the same level of thinking we used in creating them.' What does that mean, and how does it apply to you and this wonderful question you have about what book to read based on the information we see in your assessments? First, no matter what dimension of leadership you want to shift, a shift in perception will be required if you are to sustain the change. A lot of leaders don't get this: they don't understand why the just can't change a behavior, an approach or add a skill and get the effect they desire. That is logical, right? Yes. And no. It is logical, but the source of our doings is not logical, logic or the mind. For that reason, changing the "doing" without changing the underlying source is temporary at best. What is the source our doing? Who knows? Who can know? But there is a linkage you can work with between the source of your doing and the doing itself. That is your perception. And while we cannot know how perception operates, we can learn to work with it. The advantage to that is that whatever change we want to make in our leadership, it is supported by learning to actively work with our own perception. For the reasons I outline above, the greatest power you can have is the power to shift your own perception. When you do that, four things happen. One, you begin to see that life is not what it appears to be. Two, you see that your own beliefs are assembling your current reality (including the things you want to "fix" or "improve"). Three, you see that there are aspects of life that you have not been aware of and are therefore handicapped. Four, you begin to see that working with your perception has the power to change anything in very specific, tangible and practical ways. That is a more direct, cut to the chase version of what some of the well-known business writers are saying when they, in each their own way, say, "If you want to change the world around you, change your self--it's an inside-out job." They say that, but they skirt around (or don't understand) why. Well, there you have it. My belief is your capacity as a leader and your ability to learn new approaches and apply new tools are all predicated on your capacity to learn to shift your own perception. There are a number of tools you can use to begin to master the art of perception. And there are some good books as well. Most of them are incomplete, most take too long to get to the point, and most do not make the information very actionable. One day I'd like to write a book about that, as there clearly is a needed book on the subject, written for business people. In the meantime, a good book available now on the subject is a recent book called Immunity to Change by Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey. It is on my list of books I recommend because learning to work with perception is foundational for everything else. Thanks for the question. If there is some specific aspect of your leadership you want to shift, I'd be glad to point you toward a specific book for that purpose. But based on what I know about leadership, where I feel you are, and where the organization you are proud to be a part of is at, I'd start with this book. Best, Otis
