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Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader Hardcover – February 10, 2015
Herminia Ibarra (Author) Find all the books, read about the author, and more. See search results for this author |
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Enhance your purchase
Redefine your job in order to make more strategic contributions
Diversify your network so that you connect to, and learn from, a bigger range of stakeholders
Become more playful with your self-concept, allowing your familiarand possibly outdatedleadership style to evolve
Ibarra turns the usual think first and then act” philosophy on its head by arguing that doing these three things will help you learn through action and will increase what she calls your outsightthe valuable external perspective you gain from direct experiences and experimentation. As opposed to insight, outsight will then help change the way you think as a leader: about what kind of work is important; how you should invest your time; why and which relationships matter in informing and supporting your leadership; and, ultimately, who you want to become.
Packed with self-assessments and practical advice to help define your most pressing leadership challenges, this book will help you devise a plan of action to become a better leader and move your career to the next level. It’s time to learn by doing.
- Print length200 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherHarvard Business Review Press
- Publication dateFebruary 10, 2015
- Dimensions6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches
- ISBN-109781422184127
- ISBN-13978-1422184127
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Editorial Reviews
Review
"Such a clearly written and empowering book, that does so much more than the title suggests (which is quite a lot!) This book has really helped re-energise me as a person, as well as look at our agency and my role--now I focus on the business and not the work. I appreciate it's a bit out of place from the rest of the selection, so see it as an update on where we're at now as people and as a business. The music is still there, the art is still there, and the inspiration is still there." -- Dan Moore, managing director, It's Nice That
2016 Axiom Business Book Silver Award in LEADERSHIP[One] of my favourite business books Ibarra, an Insead professor, points out that the best way to learn how to be a leader is to lead She includes great advice about networking, authenticity and storytelling, areas that in other hands can seem like hopeless fads.” Financial Times
Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader serves as a thoroughly original, practical guide to becoming a better leader.” TD magazine (Association for Talent Development)
Packed with self-assessments and a huge amount of practical advice this book will help you to devise a plan of action to become a better leader and bring your career to the next level. One of the best self-improvement and leadership books now around.” Andreas von der Heydt, Head of Kindle Content at Amazon, Germany
Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader, another of my favourite business books of 2015...an action-packed guide to the leadership transition” Andrew Hill, Financial Times
The opposite of a traditional guidebook, the book will inspire you to achieve success and satisfaction in a fast-evolving workplace.” Business Insider
Looking at the flood of new publications on the theme of leadership, the question arises if they are actually of any use to the reader. The book Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader by INSEAD Professor Herminia Ibarra is unquestionably an exception. Based on a solid academic basis, it delivers concrete assistance for the first time takeover of a leadership role .” Personalwirtschaft magazine
According to Ibarra, building a more diverse network can deliver flashes of 'outsight', which in turn can help us redefine what we do and who we are. Her book provides a lot of sound practical advice to get you started.” Mind Tools (mindtools.com)
Received wisdom dictates thinking should come before acting...But Herminia Ibarra doesn’t have much time for received wisdom. In her provocative and essential new book, Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader, Ibarra flips the status quo on its head. The only way to become a leader, she states, is to start acting like one.” HR Magazine
This highly unconventional management book is based on [Ibarra's] years of teaching at the highest level and researching how managers 'step up' to leadership.” Developing Leaders
Against the current of advice to be authentic and transparent, a great scholar examines the dangers of being true to yourself an important book.” Adam Grant, as seen on LinkedIn
an excellent, insightful and thoughtful book for leaders of any tenure to consider as they seek out new ways to redefine (and arguably refine) their leadership abilities.” Dan Pontefract, Forbes
Concise, direct, and possessing a certain flair, Ibarra’s new book (her second) is a projection of her personality.” strategy+business magazine
4 must-read IT leadership books” CIO Magazine
a terrific book by one of Insead's most famous professors... It will surely become a benchmark for other management and practical 'how-to' books.” Julia Hobsbawm, professor of networking, and founder of Editorial Intelligence (As seen in Management Today)
a huge amount of practical advice in it, and the argument quickly becomes persuasive after the first few pages. Well worth the time.” Business Traveller (businesstraveller.com)
Herminia Ibarra's latest offeringAct Like a Leader, Think Like a Leaderis a breath of fresh air, standing out from the crowd because it actually addresses a common failing in management, while offering an actionable solution.” Engineering and Technology Magazine, The Institution of Engineering and Technology
a fantastic exercise for all of us who are constantly learning and growing into being the best leaders we can be.” Small Business Trends (smallbiztrends.com)
If you feel you've done enough thinking about leadership, or perhaps feel you can't afford the time it would take, this book will help you identify ways to leap in.” Amy Lindgren, Twin Cities Business
ADVANCE PRAISE for Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader:
Joe Kaeser, CEO, Siemens AG
Herminia Ibarra’s insightful new book is an inspirational read for everyone who has a passion for leading and developing people. In times of rapid change, her profound research and hands-on approach of transforming by doing’ is broadening horizons.”
Susan P. Peters, Senior Vice President, Human Resources, GE
In this provocative new book, Herminia Ibarra takes into account the high-velocity, shape-shifting context that we all live in and offers an action-oriented, practical playbook on leadership, identity, and change. It is a must-read for the contemporary leader.”
Marshall Goldsmith, author of New York Times and global best seller What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
Herminia Ibarra has created a valuable and successful model for helping forward-thinking professionals move up the corporate ladder.”
Linda A. Hill, Wallace Brett Donham Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School; coauthor of Being the Boss: The 3 Imperatives for Becoming a Great Leader
Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader provides insightful and practical advice about how to do the hardest thing of allchange ourselves.”
Charlotte Beers, former CEO, Ogilvy & Mather; former Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, US Department of State
In order to be a better leader, you need to act first, then think.’ Read this book to find out what a most original thinker, Herminia Ibarra, has in mind.”
Paul Polman, CEO, Unilever
This intelligent and thought-provoking book is for those who really want to make a differencethose willing to act their way into leadership situations they might previously have thought themselves out of.”
Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Harvard Business School Professor; best-selling author of Confidence and SuperCorp
Herminia Ibarra clears the myths about leadership with her fresh, profound, yet down-to-earth book about the importance of action over introspection. She’s the perfect coach, showing aspiring leaders how to get over themselves and see the world around them. Her stories and tools make this a must-read for blossoming as a leader.”
About the Author
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Product details
- ASIN : 1422184129
- Publisher : Harvard Business Review Press; 1st edition (February 10, 2015)
- Language : English
- Hardcover : 200 pages
- ISBN-10 : 9781422184127
- ISBN-13 : 978-1422184127
- Item Weight : 16 ounces
- Dimensions : 6.5 x 1 x 9.5 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #83,281 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- Customer Reviews:
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Reviewed in the United States on June 15, 2019
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Fortunately, there are several good books out there to help you. I think of them as books about “shedding your old self and moving up.” Two of the best of those are Scott Eblin’s The Next Level and Marshall Goldsmith’s What Got You Here Won’t Get You There. Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader is part of that group, but different and distinctive.
Herminia Ibarra says that her book is about the process of learning to be a leader. It’s not so much about what kind of leader you should want to be. It’s about the process of becoming.
The Basic Premise
Most of the standard advice about how you grow into something new and learn new roles is that you start from the inside. Writers tell you to look for insight into what you are like and what you are good at. Then you should decide what you want to become. Ibarra goes back to Aristotle to recommend coming from a very different place.
“Aristotle observed that people become virtuous by acting virtuous: if you do good, you’ll be good. His insight has been confirmed in a wealth of social psychology research showing that people change their minds by first changing their behavior. Simply put, change happens from the outside in, not from the inside out.”
Instead of insight she labels what you’ll find starting from the outside as “outsight.” It’s what makes Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader, distinctive and effective. There are three sources of “outsight.” There are new ways of doing your work. There are new relationships that create a new network. And there are new ways of connecting to and engaging people.
As I read it, I found that the process she outlines gave me different perspectives on a number of issues. It was powerful. The book is divided into five chapters, each with a specific topic and advice.
Chapter Overviews
Chapter 1 lays the groundwork for the rest of the book and outlines what Ibarra calls her “outsight” principle. She says that if you want to step into leadership, you have to learn to act like a leader. Because who you are today is a product of your past experiences and successes, it is hard for you to think your way into acting in the new ways you need to act. So, act first and learn from what happens.
Chapter 2 is titled “Redefine Your Job.” Ibarra talks about the competency traps that we fall into when we do more and more of the things that we are good at, get praised for, and are comfortable doing. When we fall into competency traps, we miss out on opportunities to learn to do other things that are also important and that may be more important in a new situation.
Chapter 3 is about networking. This isn’t the “networking” from self-help books. It’s networks as social organizations. You need to expand your network outside your current job and team, and perhaps company. You need to bring in other people who can help you make the transitions you want to make and share wisdom with you, because they’ve already been to the places you want to go.
The problem with trying new things, with learning by doing and creating a new kind of you is that it often feels false. So in Chapter 4, Ibarra suggests you should be more playful with yourself. What she does in this chapter is give you ways to try on new behaviors without threatening your authentic self and to develop an authentic self that fits your new situation as well as your nature.
Chapter 5 is about managing the stepping-up process. The big insight here is that stepping up to play a bigger leadership role isn’t something that you do once and then are done with. It’s a process. It takes a while. And if you understand it that way, you can keep working at it and keep developing.
A Very Well Written Book
There’s a lot of good material in this book, and it’s also very well done. There are lots of good references to studies and research, so if you want to know “why” or “what science says” this is an excellent book for you. Ibarra uses helpful sidebars and chapter summaries to make key points. I particularly like the way that she has learned from teaching MBA students. That gives her a range of examples that will be familiar to most readers.
Bottom Line
If you are in the midst of growing into a new leadership role, or if you are thinking about expanding your leadership influence, Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader by Herminia Ibarra is a great book for you.
This review appeared first on my Three Star Leadership blog.
I have not read the book as that I am busy with "The Dip" however, whether I like it or not, I will definitely learn many things from this book. A lot of my friends and family have recommended this book to me and I am happy to have the opportunity to read it.

By T-Man on June 15, 2019
I have not read the book as that I am busy with "The Dip" however, whether I like it or not, I will definitely learn many things from this book. A lot of my friends and family have recommended this book to me and I am happy to have the opportunity to read it.

Top reviews from other countries





Should be required reading for anyone in business