Why Leadership Sucks™ Volume 1: Fundamentals of Level 5 Leadership and Servant Leadership

In Why Leadership Sucks, Miles speaks frankly and offers hard-hitting, cold-hard truths behind effective leadership. In short concise chapters, he covers all of the Ten Knowledge Areas of Leadership in a way that I have been struggling to pack into one body of knowledge. Miles captures the essence of leadership including Decisiveness, Sacrifice, Leadership-ettiquette, Risk-reward, Negotiation, Culture and Servant leadership to name a few. His insights are applicable at any level, from home-life [...]

No matter where you are in your career, you always wonder about leadership and its pros and cons, either when you look at your boss spending his hours or when you yourself are hard pressed with any management situation. Author Miles, with his decade worth of working and exploring experience has brought forth a book that’s about to answer Your questions.Why Leadership Sucks, as the name suggests it’s a book on Leadership and life of leaders and thus is The fodder for all wannabee, newbie and [...]

As the title indicates, this book focuses on discussing authentic servant leadership, which as esteemed author Jim Collins designates as Level 5 leadership. The book is composed of four parts. Part 1 and 2, discuss servant leadership. Part 3 discussed humility, which is a key value for authentic leadership. Finally, the last part, part 4 includes common situations through which the previous learnings are applied.Below are key excerpts from the book that I found particularly insightful:1- " Jim C [...]

Miles Smith’s book “Why Leadership Sucks: Fundamentals of Level 5 Leadership and Servant Leadership” is something that should be in the library of anyone involved in small business management. Biblically based, the title belies the underlying premise that to successfully lead, one must be the servant of the organization. Hard work, self-sacrifice and a willingness to assume the most modest roles, is part of Christ’s teaching. And, for one who may be looking for the easy route to success, [...]

This was the first book I've ever read specifically on the subject of leadership and I honestly think it's honesty, accessibility, and practicality make it an ideal book for those with little or much leadership experience. Step by step it takes the reader through the neccessary questions and considerations to build a foundation of good leadership- one based on listening to others and serving those with whom we work. The first three sections of the book discuss these concepts, while the last one [...]

I've seen effective leaders and ineffective leaders. Smith has nailed down many qualities of effective leaders, and explains just why it's so hard to be an effective leader, writing in a style I found easy to read. There is some reference to his Christian faith, which I did not find to be overwhelming here.I'd recommend this book to anyone in a leadership position. For those who are not doing well at it, this will point them in the direction to figure out more effective ways to lead. For those w [...]

A worthwhile read on leadership that takes a slightly different tack than most such books: it emphasizes the crappy side of being a good leader. Anchored in Christian thought, Smith looks at many aspects of leadership and argues that the best leaders have things in mind other than their own happiness. He tends to handle complexity by being wishy-washy ("You should do X. Except, well, there are sometimes when you should do not X") but it wasn't hard to read past that and extract worthwhile lesson [...]

I found a couple really good concepts in Miles's book. The first was requesting our direct reports to review our performance and leadership. What a great way to be vulnerable and deal with true reality! The second was stopping all false apologies. As Miles states, "I'm sorry you feel that way" is no apology at all. In addition to these points, the book is chock-full of many other good principals.I think the book could be improved in a couple areas. To start with, I felt the book tried to cover t [...]

What is leadership? How do we define leadership? What is servant leadership? What are the most effective leadership characteristics? Do you wish your company had a leadership development program, or are you frustrated with organizational leadership? Do you wonder why some leadership styles suck? You are not alone.So why does leadership suck? It sucks because real leadership is hard, requires selfless service, and because the buck stops here. Servant leadership or Level 5 leadership is uncomforta [...]

There are a lot of leadership books out there, a lot of them airport books. You know the kind: you get through check-in, go through security, and there’s a bookshop selling the liquids you couldn’t bring through security, magazines, some popular fiction, a few children’s books and some grown-up looking books on business. Some of them are by recognised management gurus; others aren’t. Some were rushed through the press in the wake of the latest Enron; others were rewritten to remove all p [...]

Pretty good read on servant leadership.Based on Robert Greenleaf's servant leader concept, this text refers to a number of other management and leadership books to exemplify the basic good of giving oneself to one's team. Smith does a good job of highlighting the tough aspects of being a leader, hence the title of the book. For me personally, some chapters served as a stark reminder of what I need to be doing in my own leadership role.There were times, though, when this book fell into the same t [...]

Why does leadership suck? It sucks because real leadership is hard and requires selfless service. It also sucks because the buck stops here, meaning it is ultimately the leader’s responsibility to deal with all of the crap. Lastly, it is easier to be too harsh instead of balancing our hard and soft nature. It requires less effort to “lead” (if you can call it that) in the harsh, dictatorial, selfish way that is so prevalent today. The alternative to selfish “leadership” is servant lead [...]

This was a pretty quick read for me. I'm a super fast, avid reader and I was able to devour this information in just over an hour. However, that won't be the end of it because I am definitely going back with a highlighter and I'm going to make sure I retain every bit of information here. Smith writes in a clean and relatable style that I love. I am a Christian and also a leader type of person, so this definitely resonated with me in many ways, but honestly I think the topics he addresses would b [...]

I registered a book at BookCrossing!BookCrossing/journal/13285277I received a free Audible audiobook in return for a review through LibraryThing's Early Reviewer giveaway.Started off well, but I was somewhat shocked when the author started using verses from the Bible as his references. For people new to management textbooks, this book is probably as easy to read as most, but one issue to these "newbies" is that there isn't any real explanation of levels 1-4 of leadership while the book is about [...]

A very helpful book!Let’s face it, leadership is not for everyone (especially the faint at heart) and it often is not fun. That doesn’t mean that those who are not born leaders can’t learn and develop this skill. This book is applicable to almost everyone, from those seeking a leadership position at work to those who have been unwilling thrust into this position. We could all use some guidance. I particularly liked Part 3 which covers topics like authenticity and humility, two very importa [...]

This was a great book detailing the meaning, purpose, and applications of leaders. I really enjoyed it, and it was a quick read, but full of helpful tips on how to be a better leader in your business or corporation. It goes from general leadership applications down to specific 'what-to-dos'. Although this book was aimed at those already in a leadership position in a company, there are a lot of general life principles that everyone can benefit from. Those already in leadership positions would gre [...]

Having come to the language of servant leadership after many years of work experience and continuing study, I was hoping for useful insight in this area.While there are nice quotes and a flavour of some key features of the experience of leading teams, I didn't think there was enough here to explain why servant leadership was a better approach than alternatives. There is no serious attempt to reflect on the other people-centred approaches to leadership and management and I didn't think it was eno [...]

Overall, solid leadership advice and a good listen - I bought the Audible edition and the narration was good. I knocked a star off my review because I wasn't expecting the book to be written from a Christian faith perspective, so I found it a bit preachy and was somewhat distracted by the biblical quotes sprinkled throughout. If you're a devout Christian, or don't find that perspective in books distracting, consider this a solid 4-star book on leadership.

I thought this leadership book read easier and much more practical then most! A different take on becoming a servant leader that is not always sunshine and roses. Sometimes funny, sometimes witty, but written as easy to take away and become the leader you should try be in every part of your life. Work is all about moving up the ladder as such becoming better leaders as your learn along way.

Some good nuggets.Here and there in this book on leadership. Mostly enjoyed the quotes from Drucker and others in leadership space. I will say I liked that the author vulnerably shared some of his own failures in leadership.

I like reading leadership books. This is the worst one I've ever read. Or rather started reading. I couldn't finish it it was so bad. Lacked insight or any new/inspiring information.