The Year’s Most Popular Books from Thinkers360 Thought Leaders (1H’22)

This book provides an insight into the basics of network security, describes the conception of SASE and sheds light on how these types of based approaches work in practice – far removed from marketing promises. For IT managers, those responsible for IT security in companies or dedicated administrators, this book provides the basic knowledge to approach the problem, develop your own concepts or have competent discussions with suitable providers.

By analyzing the conditions and stages of success, but also the sources of failure, this book offers a grid of actions to systemically transform organizations and extract all the promised value from technology, data, and artificial intelligence.

In Digital Trailblazer: Essential Lessons to Jumpstart Transformation and Accelerate Your Technology Leadership, Isaac Sacolick, a technology leadership expert and a former CIO and CTO, delivers a hands-on guide to help technology and business professionals at all stages of their careers acquire the skills necessary to drive transformative change. With an eye-opening collection of stories and more than 50 lessons, Sacolick gives readers a view into what goes on behind-the-scenes in leading digital transformations.

In Step into the Metaverse: How the Immersive Internet Will Unlock a Trillion-Dollar Social Economy, future tech strategist, entrepreneur, and thought leader Dr. Mark van Rijmenam delivers a startlingly insightful discussion about how the world as we know it will fundamentally change as the physical and the digital worlds merge into the metaverse, impacting the everyday experiences of people, companies, and societies. The author maps out the extraordinary opportunities and challenges facing business leaders, consumers, regulators, policymakers, and other metaverse stakeholders trying to navigate the future of the Internet.

Cybersecurity Career Guide unlocks your pathway to becoming a great security practitioner. You’ll learn how to reliably enter the security field and quickly grow into your new career, following clear, practical advice that’s based on research and interviews with hundreds of hiring managers. Practical self-analysis exercises identify gaps in your resume, what makes you valuable to an employer, and what you want out of your career in cyber. You’ll assess the benefits of all major professional qualifications, and get practical advice on relationship building with mentors.

Dr. Katsarou-Makin explores the team-to-trust and trust-to-team relations between executives and their associates – pertaining to the familial relations between these members and their unconventional codes of conduct. Under this umbrella of governance, directors, leaders and corporate gatekeepers operate in teams that are selected and trusted through unorthodox relations which must now come to light. Upon entry, Maria seeks to explore how these teams operate through a collective consensus of trust, the values this trust demands, the actions it produces and the failures it can cause.

www.amazon.co.uk | June 02, 2022 | Book | Maria Katsarou-Makin Psy.D. CPsychol, HCPC Registered, PCC

The project management knowledge area of cost management is concerned with estimating, budgeting, and controlling the budget to stay within the approved expenditures for a project. While it may appear simple, identifying all project costs is perhaps the most challenging task for a project manager and team. In addition to the basic costs of resources, additional charges may stem from economic conditions, equipment operating expenses, loan and bond repayments, and various other expenses. Plus, project practitioners must be flexible to meet all organizational policies and norms.

32 Authors have been invited by Corey to share their stories. Imagine, Chicken Soup for the Soul combined with TEDx – that’s what this book is all about. In this book. These authors share their life stories relating to either their business, life or universe. These are true life stories of people who have lived through their journeys to make a difference to others.

The Consortium Model is a paradigm shift, utilizing the creative genius of the employees to create and maintain new and different revenue streams without the pressure of goals and timelines. In this model, the company Vision becomes achievable and measurable. People who believe, achieve. People who achieve with a shared vision create greatness for the benefit of all.

The book outlines the various personality traits that we need to equip ourselves with in order to successfully navigate through the disruption and be able to Bounce Back. These personality traits have been identified after carefully studying the lives of various people who have been faced with extreme situations in their lives and have successfully managed to come out winners giving us all required motivation, energy, positivity and belief that we too can Bounce Back if we are able to put our efforts in the right direction.

Leadership of Change® Volume 7 is a change management sponsorship book that outlines what should be done to successfully implement organisational change to ensure a return on investment, improve employee change adoption, and achieve sustainable change. Successful change implementation is unlikely without an effective and proactive sponsor, backed by an aligned leadership team with change leadership skills and knowledge.

Culture studies in international business are passing through difficult times of scrutiny and critique. This is due to the fact that the paradigms, approaches, and methods used so far to study culture have been limited in their scope. For several decades now, approaches that consider national cultures and geo-ethnic origins of interacting individuals have dominated management literature.

Disruptive change can throw everything into chaos unless leaders and teams have the skills to lead confidently through it. How do you lead complex change without burning out, disconnecting or losing your team? Drawing on numerous interviews with leaders from all walks of life demonstrating leadership in action, this new edition of the classic book on leadership and uncertainty has been revised and updated for the post-pandemic age.

This book examines the development of play skills and schemas to support children with learning differences and physical disabilities in learning to play. It highlights the need for appropriate playground equipment in all school settings that educate children with physical disabilities and sensory needs to ensure equal opportunities for outdoor play.

In A Runner’s High, Karnazes chronicles his return to the Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run in his mid-fifties after first completing the race decades ago. The Western States, infamous for its rugged terrain and extreme temperatures, becomes the most demanding competition of his life, a physical and emotional reckoning and a battle to stay true to one’s purpose.

The book provides tools, frameworks, templates, and visualizations that can be easily understood and applied. These can all be used by executives looking for a new way of measuring corporate performance in a world where accounting-recognized assets are becoming commodities, by investors seeking better ways of looking at a company’s growth potential, and by managers who need to valuate innovation product teams using more than just financial indicators.

Digital for Good looks at everything from how banking plays a role in the climate emergency through to the FinTech world using technology to overcome issues of inequality and inclusion. The themes of the book include questioning the purpose of banking, and whether it is socially useful; how purpose can impact a bank’s role in the climate emergency; the way in which we can use finance to do good for society and the planet; the latest developments in cryptocurrencies; and more.

HR for Hybrid Working covers everything that people professionals need to succeed in a hybrid working model and manage the transition to this new way of working. It shows why and how contractual documents, policies, pay and reward terms need to change, how to manage changing employee expectations and how to assess and communicate to staff what work can be done partially remotely and manage the impact on company culture. There is also insight on how to adapt learning and development (L&D) and wellbeing activities to ensure they support employee development.

www.amazon.com | June 28, 2022 | Book | Gary Cookson

The IDEA Mindset provides clear step-by-step guidance that will take you from being successful to being significant. With its emphasis on authenticity, it also teaches us how we can lead with kindness, humility and compassion. This is truly a book that feels like a cheerleader when your career goals seem crazy or out of reach.

High achievers share the same four attributes: intrinsic motivation, perseverance, strong foundation, constantly learning through informal means. The key to their success is that they do all four of these things at the same time. Based on research and in-person interviews with astronauts, Nobel Prize winners, and Olympic champions, The Success Factor outlines the approach that individuals aspiring to improve their performance can adopt.

‘Circular Economy’ is currently a buzzword among economists and environmentalists. There are growing instances of natural fury due to an unprecedented acceleration in the rate of climate change. The need to arrest this rate of change is felt like never before.
The key to achieve this is to reinvent our economic models and align them to the environmental cause. And while it is a benign goal to achieve, it cannot be done unless there is a substantial incentive for every stakeholder in the ecosystem.

This book will revolutionise your team’s performance and your life. In these turbulent times, how do we create a supportive, productive and healthy team environment? That wonderful space where everyone works together, with high enthusiasm – solving problems, making fast decisions, achieving goals and collaborating with ease.

Unlock unlimited growth potential for your business using your biggest advocates: your customers. Being a truly customer-centric organization goes beyond just having a customer success function. This book talks about some strategies that will help you adopt a company-wide customer-first mindset to fuel your growth.

Business as usual? Established organizations are being disrupted as nimble upstarts cross long-established competitive moats with increasing ease. The status quo needs to be blown up. In Organizational Velocity, veteran UPS executive Alan Amling distills five years of research and three decades on the front lines of Corporate America to reveal a fundamental truth.

Many organisations fail to achieve the vast untapped value available to them. Unseen opportunities can skyrocket revenue and profits but are tragically never realised. Income from Outcomes putsthe key to unlocking that potential directly at your fingertips. You will have the power to propel your company to amazing new heights. At the highest level, it’s not complex. The book provides a roadmap for following an outcome-based approach. It enables your business customers to thrive whilst increasing your company’s revenue and bottom line.

The dramatic increase in minority- and female-owned companies continues to transform the business world while setting standards for those who follow. Thriving as a Minority-Owned Business in Corporate America offers you a comprehensive guide to current practical knowledge of minority business development, from grants and loans to market building. This book demonstrates how you can use specific laws, institutions, and new technologies to set up and steer your business to success.

Pivot to Clarity is your guide to being clear, so that your bold vision and strategy can be brilliantly executed. Lori has coached, consulted and trained hundreds of leaders around the world to achieve their objectives and generate extraordinary momentum. She speaks globally on catalyzing momentum, leading, pivoting, and workplace culture change.

For some of us this is easy, to speak out, take risks, stand at the leading edge of change. For most of us, we need a nudge. So, this is a great book to get you started on your path to being GUTSY! You’ll learn to Observe and Understand behaviors that have stood in the way of true collaboration, and Transform into the world of outstanding partnership. 

The greatest challenge of any startup and growth company is the transition from an early stage startup to a robust organization complete with a driving culture, contemporary leadership, organizational infrastructure and twenty-first-century operating methodologies. Ralf Specht provides inspiration, wisdom, and learnings gleaned from his role and experience in creating and scaling Spark 44, a Jaguar Land Rover joint venture, from concept to an award- winning global marketing communications company with well over a thousand employees in 18 countries in a few short years.

Through research and interviews with some of the world’s most successful individuals, Take Massive Action shows you how leaders across many different industries approach taking action in their own ways, to guarantee their success and generate momentum. Learn how to take more action towards your goals, build new strategies that will help you gain momentum, and think outside of your professional comfort zone.

Just like the saying ‘we are the decisions we make’, the very existence of an organization depends on the decisions its leaders make! Decision-making is not just a process. It is an interplay among competitive strategies, processes, design, values and culture. Narrating the experiences of industry decision-makers, the book demonstrates that organizational decision-making is about making tough choices―navigating through a minefield of biases and execution issues.

Are you winning the game of business? Has your business plateaued, or are you feeling stuck? Play the Game outlines 18 strategies from game-changing leaders and disruptors on how to break the cycle that stunts your business growth.

www.amazon.co.uk | January 19, 2022 | eBook | Adam Strong

In this e-book thought leader & leadership expert, Patrick McKenna shares valuable knowledge, research results, and practical insights about ‘how law firms will benefit from Industry Specialization’.

Sometimes, that promising lead turns out to be a bust. That first date doesn’t lead to a second. The sales pitch fails to land the client. But what if they could? What if you knew the steps to “set up” each conversation to increase the likelihood that you connect, engage and win? Welcome to Speak Easy. Unlike prohibition-era speakeasies―underground bars with secret knocks, where people spoke quietly to avoid detection―there’s no bathtub gin here. But inside these covers you’ll find some of the best-kept secrets of elite interviewers and conversationalists.

www.amazon.com | September 27, 2022 | Book | Lou Diamond, CSP

In The Human Side of Digital Business Transformation, veteran emerging technology expert Kamales Lardi delivers an essential and practical exploration of the real-world implementation of digital transformation. The book teaches readers how to drive digital business transformation success by addressing a key element – the people side of transformation. This includes managing internal stakeholders, such as leadership teams and employees, as well as external stakeholders, such as customer, partners and supplier.

Written by bestselling author Tom Davenport and Deloitte’s Nitin Mittal, All-In on AI looks at artificial intelligence at its most extreme—from established companies like Anthem, Ping An, Airbus, and Capital One. The book also features lessons from startups and tech firms, but the focus is on how existing firms can transform themselves.

In this groundbreaking new book, organizational psychologist and executive coach Gena Cox shows you how to lead an inclusive organization, from the top down, and to seek solutions to the racially-based discontent that pervades many employees’ experiences. Drawing on psychological science, corporate leaders, diversity, equity, and inclusion (DE&I), and her own experience in corporate America, Cox explains how to reframe the conversation, so you can more effectively guide the rest of the leaders in your organization.

Infertility Saved My Life: Healing PCOS From The Inside Out exposes the raw teaching moments of Sarah Willoughby’s journey to self-love through Polycystic Ovary Syndrome and secondary infertility. Within Infertility Saved My Life, Sarah Willoughby addresses the challenges and heartbreak she experienced while becoming a mum to three amazing children. She writes about her multiple miscarriages, as well as the trauma she endured, so that anyone still on their journey to parenthood can feel less alone in their loss and grief.