Well-Being at Stanford: Leadership and career
Recommended reading across wellness topics selected by Stanford's Vaden Health Center Well-Being staff.
Leadership and career
Dare to Lead by Brené Brown
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Brené Brown has taught us what it means to dare greatly, rise strong, and brave the wilderness. Now, based on new research conducted with leaders, change makers, and culture shifters, she's showing us how to put those ideas into practice so we can step up and lead. Look for Brené Brown's new podcast, Dare to Lead, as well as her ongoing podcast Unlocking Us! NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY BLOOMBERG Leadership is not about titles, status, and wielding power. A leader is anyone who takes responsibility for recognizing the potential in people and ideas, and has the courage to develop that potential. When we dare to lead, we don't pretend to have the right answers; we stay curious and ask the right questions. We don't see power as finite and hoard it; we know that power becomes infinite when we share it with others. We don't avoid difficult conversations and situations; we lean into vulnerability when it's necessary to do good work. But daring leadership in a culture defined by scarcity, fear, and uncertainty requires skill-building around traits that are deeply and uniquely human. The irony is that we're choosing not to invest in developing the hearts and minds of leaders at the exact same time as we're scrambling to figure out what we have to offer that machines and AI can't do better and faster. What can we do better? Empathy, connection, and courage, to start. Four-time #1 New York Times bestselling author Brené Brown has spent the past two decades studying the emotions and experiences that give meaning to our lives, and the past seven years working with transformative leaders and teams spanning the globe. She found that leaders in organizations ranging from small entrepreneurial startups and family-owned businesses to nonprofits, civic organizations, and Fortune 50 companies all ask the same question: How do you cultivate braver, more daring leaders, and how do you embed the value of courage in your culture? In this new book, Brown uses research, stories, and examples to answer these questions in the no-BS style that millions of readers have come to expect and love. Brown writes, "One of the most important findings of my career is that daring leadership is a collection of four skill sets that are 100 percent teachable, observable, and measurable. It's learning and unlearning that requires brave work, tough conversations, and showing up with your whole heart. Easy? No. Because choosing courage over comfort is not always our default. Worth it? Always. We want to be brave with our lives and our work. It's why we're here." Whether you've read Daring Greatly and Rising Strong or you're new to Brené Brown's work, this book is for anyone who wants to step up and into brave leadership.Daring Greatly by Brené Brown
Researcher and speaker Dr. Brene Brown offers an all-embracing new philosophy that provides encouragement to dare greatly: to embrace vulnerability and imperfection, to live wholeheartedly and to courageously engage in life, whatever it brings. Dr. Brown challenges preconceived ideas about vulnerability. Based on twelve years of research, she argues that vulnerability is not weakness, but rather the clearest path to courage, engagement and meaningful connection.Designing Your Life by Bill Burnett; Dave Evans
#1 New York Times Bestseller At last, a book that shows you how to build--design--a life you can thrive in, at any age or stage Designers create worlds and solve problems using design thinking. Look around your office or home--at the tablet or smartphone you may be holding or the chair you are sitting in. Everything in our lives was designed by someone. And every design starts with a problem that a designer or team of designers seeks to solve. In this book, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans show us how design thinking can help us create a life that is both meaningful and fulfilling, regardless of who or where we are, what we do or have done for a living, or how young or old we are. The same design thinking responsible for amazing technology, products, and spaces can be used to design and build your career and your life, a life of fulfillment and joy, constantly creative and productive, one that always holds the possibility of surprise. "Designing Your Life walks readers through the process of building a satisfying, meaningful life by approaching the challenge the way a designer would. Experimentation. Wayfinding. Prototyping. Constant iteration. You should read the book. Everyone else will." --Daniel Pink, bestselling author of Drive "This [is] the career book of the next decade and . . . the go-to book that is read as a rite of passage whenever someone is ready to create a life they love." --David Kelley, Founder of IDEO "An empowering book based on their popular class of the same name at Stanford University . . . Perhaps the book's most important lesson is that the only failure is settling for a life that makes one unhappy. With useful fact-finding exercises, an empathetic tone, and sensible advice, this book will easily earn a place among career-finding classics." --Publishers WeeklyThe Ethical Sellout by Lily Zheng; Inge Hansen
We all fear selling out. Yet we all face situations that test our ideals and values with no clear right answer. In a world where compromise is an essential aspect of life, authors Lily Zheng and Inge Hansen make the bold claim that everyone sells out--and that the real challenge lies in doing so ethically. Zheng and Hansen share stories from a diversity of people who have found their own answers to this dilemma and offer new ways to think about marginalization, privilege, and self-interest. From these stories, they pull out teachable skills for taking the step from selling out to selling out ethically. The Ethical Sellout is for all those committed to maintaining their integrity in a messy world.Quiet by Susan Cain
Publication Date: 2012-01-24NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * Experience the book that started the Quiet Movement "A smart, lively book about the value of silence and solitude."--Daniel Gilbert, author of Stumbling on Happiness NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY People * O: The Oprah Magazine * Christian Science Monitor * Inc. * Library Journal * Kirkus Reviews At least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who prefer listening to speaking; who innovate and create but dislike self-promotion; who favor working on their own over working in teams. It is to introverts--Rosa Parks, Chopin, Dr. Seuss, Steve Wozniak--that we owe many of the great contributions to society. In Quiet, Susan Cain argues that we dramatically undervalue introverts and shows how much we lose in doing so. She charts the rise of the Extrovert Ideal throughout the twentieth century and explores how deeply it has come to permeate our culture. She also introduces us to successful introverts--from a witty, high-octane public speaker who recharges in solitude after his talks, to a record-breaking salesman who quietly taps into the power of questions. Passionately argued, superbly researched, and filled with indelible stories of real people, Quiet has the power to permanently change how we see introverts and, equally important, how they see themselves.Rising strong by Brené Brown
"The physics of vulnerability is simple: If we are brave enough often enough, we will fall. The author of the #1 New York Times bestsellers Daring Greatly and The Gifts of Imperfection tells us what it takes to get back up, and how owning our stories of disappointment, failure, and heartbreak gives us the power to write a daring new ending. Struggle, Brene Brown writes, can be our greatest call to courage, and rising strong our clearest path to a wholehearted life"-- Provided by publisher.
"With her 2010 TED talk on the power of vulnerability (over 18 million views), her bestselling books on the transformative gifts of shame and vulnerability, and her inspiring call for wholehearted living, Brene Brown has changed the cultural conversation. Her work has been embraced by Oprah Winfrey and corporate leaders alike making her a highly sought after public speaker. For Brene, the conversation about vulnerability and shame naturally evolves into a discussion of bravery--its origins, its catalysts, its chemistry. How we are brave. What constitutes bravery. What activates the impulse to be brave. And how to recognize where our own "hero's journey" begins--in the depths of failure, disappointment, heartbreak, and grief--and how, once we grapple with our story, we are able to rise from those depths and determine how we want our story will end"
- Gender
- Leadership and career
- Mental health
- Mindfulness and meditation
- Physical health
- Relationships
- Black Futures / Black Liberation
Well-Being at the Library
Stanford Libraries is proud to support the Well-Being at Stanford program which aims to empower individuals and communities to flourish through education, connection and positive culture change. Use the red menu to browse print and e-book titles available at the Libraries. Click on a book's title to view the SearchWorks catalog to access or request the items.
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