Leadership BS Fixing workplaces and careers one truth at a time

"The leadership industry has failed," charges Stanford Business School professor Pfeffer in this lively critique of a professional discipline driven, according to him, not by wisdom or a desire to foster leadership, but by money. Its precepts, he writes, are "based more on hope than reality, on wishes rather than data, on beliefs instead of science." Pfeffer sets out to help his readers rethink leadership by focusing on the root causes of failures in business leadership. Pfeffer counsels readers to look away from the "inspiration and fables" that glut the market, and to accept that some of those truisms are fallible: authenticity can be overrated, and honesty is not always the best policy for leaders. Pfeffer has taken on an ambitious project, given the uniformity of current thinking on business success, but his bluntness should go a long way toward slaughtering the sacred cows of the leadership industry. This is an entertaining and inspiring read for anyone looking to shake things up at work. Agent: Christy Fletcher, Fletcher & Co. (Sept.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Pfeffer (Thomas D. Dee II Professor of Organizational Behavior, Graduate Sch. of Business, Stanford Univ.; Power) calls out the "leadership industry" for career derailments, toxic workplaces, and leadership that has failed to bring about significant growth in a time when the subject has become a mantra. The chapters highlight some commonly taught elements such as truthfulness, modesty, service, and trustworthiness and then compares them to their opposite. For example, Pfeffer contrasts being modest with narcissism and asks how many people would be hired if they didn't promote themselves as being self-driven, self-made, and valuable as an individual. Specific instances illustrate when the standard wisdom could be reexamined and potentially ignored. This point does seem to contradict the premise of the book as it indicates most people are ignoring conventional wisdom anyway, and the failures have not yet abated. Verdict Anecdotal and lightly investigated evidence hold back much of the book's potential as a solid work of research. Controversial on the topic of business leadership and its future trajectories, this title may be of some value for those studying in that field or in situational ethics.-Mark Hanson, Maranatha Baptist Univ. Lib., Watertown, WI © Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.