A readable and compassionate series of encouragements for ambitious leaders.
A guide offers managers and executives advice on how to assess and improve their leadership skills.
In short chapters that begin with literary quotations and conclude with carefully worded prompts for either discussion or introspection, Hassenstab’s book provides a series of reflections on how leaders in all capacities can heighten the empathy and effectiveness they use in shaping policy and delivering direction. The world needs the light of such leadership, he asserts. Companies require leaders “driven to empower the human spirit in their teams to have a passion for getting great results to help drive the success of their organization.” He looks at various elements of leadership using a combination of personal experiences and Christian-themed ruminations. The author’s insights and suggestions are suffused from start to finish with a wonderfully communicative sense of Christian optimism. Despite the leadership emphasis of his book, he reminds his readers at every turn that careers and businesses are not the be-all and end-all of life. Gently but firmly, he tells his overworked readers that “your job should not be the only or even the primary source of pride, happiness, and the legacy you want to build.” Those readers should smile but be wary because sometimes this very optimism overcomes Hassenstab’s common sense and hard-won experience. One of his interaction prompts stands as an example: “What landmines have you buried in your organization?” he asks at one point. “Meaning, what are the unwritten policies, values, and rules you have created? If you say you have none, think again—harder.” He must understand what his readers already know: that the leaders who make the land mines almost never acknowledge them—and so this and other tips should be regarded with a bit of caution. But in general, the author’s lucid observations are refreshing reminders to leaders to work on brightening their lights and refining their management techniques.
A readable and compassionate series of encouragements for ambitious leaders.Pub Date: Feb. 12, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-09-807739-6
Page Count: 128
Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our...
A psychologist and Nobel Prize winner summarizes and synthesizes the recent decades of research on intuition and systematic thinking.
The author of several scholarly texts, Kahneman (Emeritus Psychology and Public Affairs/Princeton Univ.) now offers general readers not just the findings of psychological research but also a better understanding of how research questions arise and how scholars systematically frame and answer them. He begins with the distinction between System 1 and System 2 mental operations, the former referring to quick, automatic thought, the latter to more effortful, overt thinking. We rely heavily, writes, on System 1, resorting to the higher-energy System 2 only when we need or want to. Kahneman continually refers to System 2 as “lazy”: We don’t want to think rigorously about something. The author then explores the nuances of our two-system minds, showing how they perform in various situations. Psychological experiments have repeatedly revealed that our intuitions are generally wrong, that our assessments are based on biases and that our System 1 hates doubt and despises ambiguity. Kahneman largely avoids jargon; when he does use some (“heuristics,” for example), he argues that such terms really ought to join our everyday vocabulary. He reviews many fundamental concepts in psychology and statistics (regression to the mean, the narrative fallacy, the optimistic bias), showing how they relate to his overall concerns about how we think and why we make the decisions that we do. Some of the later chapters (dealing with risk-taking and statistics and probabilities) are denser than others (some readers may resent such demands on System 2!), but the passages that deal with the economic and political implications of the research are gripping.
Striking research showing the immense complexity of ordinary thought and revealing the identities of the gatekeepers in our minds.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-374-27563-1
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Sept. 3, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2011
BOOK REVIEW
IN THE NEWS
IN THE NEWS
A passionate and accessible guide to humanizing the workplace.
Helbig and Norman present a game plan for making leadership more responsively human.
In this expanded update to The Psychological Safety Playbook: Lead More Powerfully by Being More Human (2023), the authors provide “practical strategies for responding to resistance, sparking change, embodying the change we want to see, and moving forward deliberately,” specifically in a business setting. They suggest ways to encourage what they call “changemakers” through the use of five key “plays” from their playbook: Communicate Courageously, Master the Art of Listening, Manage Your Reactions (“shift from automatic reaction to conscious response to stay better connected to yourself and others”), Embrace Risk and Failure, and Design Inclusive Rituals. The goal is to ensure that organizational cultures promote psychological safety, guided by leaders who “walk the talk” by emphasizing their own humanity at every turn. (“We must be the first to share our own failures with our teams, which will start to make it possible for others to do the same.”) This call for example-setting is sounded throughout the book as Helbig and Norman urge their target audience (leaders and would-be leaders) to go beyond mere instruction and instead embody the qualities they want to see in their subordinates, such as continuous learning, active curiosity, and self-reflection. Each chapter includes a detailed “Recommended Reading” section and text with extensive numbered and bulleted points formatted to make the core concepts more immediately digestible. The authors effectively employ clear and empathetic prose to assure readers that psychological safety is slow to build and quick to break, observing that such safety requires steady attention and delivers outsize payoffs as a result. They refreshingly ground a great deal of the material in psychology and neuroscience, pointing out, for instance, that research has demonstrated that the parasympathetic nervous system responds to honest appreciation, which improves creative thinking. Some wistful readers might consider some of the authors’ suggestions beyond the reach of their own organizations, as when group facilitators are advised to “gently intervene when someone dominates the conversation,” but hope springs eternal.
A passionate and accessible guide to humanizing the workplace.Pub Date: May 19, 2026
ISBN: 9798993550503
Page Count: 170
Publisher: Crazy Idea Press
Review Posted Online: April 23, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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