While there are only a few books dedicated to the subject of Conversational Leadership, there are many related books on topics such as conversation, dialogue, leadership, complexity, and more. These books can provide insights and ideas to enhance the understanding of Conversational Leadership.
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Books I own
25 August, 2025Inheritance: the Evolutionary Origins of the Modern World by Harvey Whitehouse (2025)
We are endowed with an inheritance—a set of ancient biases forged through countless millennia of natural and cultural selection, which shape every facet of our behavior.
This inheritance has taken us to ever greater heights for generations, driving the rise of more sophisticated technologies, more organized religions, and more expansive empires. But now, for the first time, it is failing us. ... Continue reading
27 December, 2023The Concept of Conversation: From Cicero’s Sermo to the Grand Siecle’s Conversation David Randall (2019)
In "The Concept of Conversation," David Randall argues conversation, often overlooked in history, profoundly shaped early modern Europe. He reveals how it transformed from elite philosophical discourse to encompass friendship, salons, the press, and even women's voices. Challenging Habermas's view, Randall sees conversation, not just rational public debate, as central to intellectual ... Continue reading
01 October, 2023★ Future Minds: the Rise of Intelligence From the Big Bang to the End of the Universe by Richard Yonck
In this book, Future Minds, Richard Yonck challenges our assumptions about intelligence — what it is, how it came to exist, and its place in the development of life on Earth and possibly throughout the cosmos.
Taking a Big History perspective — over the 14 billion years from the Big Bang to the present and beyond — he draws on recent developments in physics and complexity theory to ... Continue reading
28 April, 2023Talking Cure: an Essay on the Civilizing Power of Conversation by Paula Marantz Cohen (2023)
In this book, Talking Cure by Paula Marantz Cohen reveals how conversation connects us in ways that social media never can and explains why simply talking to each other freely and without guile may be the cure to what ails our troubled society.
Drawing on her lifelong immersion in literature and culture and her decades of experience as a teacher and critic, Cohen argues that we learn to ... Continue reading
18 April, 2023Confronting Our Freedom: Leading a Culture of Chosen Accountability and Belonging by Peter Block, Peter Koestenbaum (2023)
In this book, Confronting Our Freedom, Peter Block and Peter Koestenbaum deliver an exciting and engaging new take on management and leadership.
Drawing on recent events in the market and in the world, including the Great Resignation, the COVID-19 pandemic, and widespread digital transformation, the authors invite you to reimagine ideas of freedom and accountability in the context of ... Continue reading
06 April, 2023Noise: A Flaw in Human Judgment by Daniel Kahneman, Olivier Sibony, Cass R. Sunstein (2021)
Imagine that two doctors in the same city give different diagnoses to identical patients—or that two judges in the same courthouse give markedly different sentences to people who have committed the same crime. Suppose that different interviewers at the same firm make different decisions about indistinguishable job applicants—or that when a company is handling customer complaints, the ... Continue reading
05 April, 2023The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure by Jonathan Haidt, Greg Lukianoff (2018)
First Amendment expert Greg Lukianoff and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt show how the new problems on campus have their origins in three terrible ideas that have become increasingly woven into American childhood and education: What doesn’t kill you makes you weaker; always trust your feelings; and life is a battle between good people and evil people. These three Great Untruths contradict ... Continue reading
25 March, 2023★ The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion Jonathan Haidt (2013)
In this book, The Righteous Mind, Jonathan Haidt shows how moral judgments arise not from reason but from gut feelings. He shows why liberals, conservatives, and libertarians have such different intuitions about right and wrong, and he shows why each side is actually right about many of its central concerns.
Credit: Amazon
The Righteous Mind animated
The Righteous Mind | Jonathan ... Continue reading
02 December, 2022★ Creating Conversational Leadership by John Hovell
In this book, Creating Conversational Leadership, John Hovell makes the case that our global society needs the new fields of Knowledge Management/Knowledge Services, Organization Development, Diversity & Inclusion, and Conversational Leadership.
These are remarkable tools, management methodologies, and personally rewarding techniques for working professionals, managers, and all levels of ... Continue reading
31 October, 2022★ Conversation: A History of a Declining Art Stephen Miller (2007)
In the book Conversation: A History of a Declining Art, Stephen Miller pursues a lifelong interest in conversation by taking a historical and philosophical view of the subject.
He chronicles the art of conversation in Western civilization from its beginnings in ancient Greece to its apex in eighteenth-century Britain to its current endangered state in America.
As Harry G. Frankfurt ... Continue reading
23 October, 2022The Journey Beyond Fear: Leverage the Three Pillars of Positivity to Build Your Success John Hagel (2021)
Whether you’re running a business, building a career, raising a family, or attending school, uncertainty has been the name of the game for years―and the feeling reached an all-time high when COVID-19 hit. Even the savviest, smartest, toughest people are understandably feeling enormous pressure and often feeling paralyzed by fear.
The Journey Beyond Fear by John Hagel provides everything ... Continue reading
14 August, 2022Open: How Collaboration and Curiosity Shaped Humankind Johan Norberg
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19 July, 2022The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity by David Graeber and David Wengrow (2022)
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12 July, 2022Think Again: the Power of Knowing What You Don’t Know by Adam Grant (2021)
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01 May, 2022Guns Germs and Steel: A Short History of Everybody for the Last 13,000 Years by Jared Diamond by Jared Diamond (1998)
... Continue reading
01 May, 2022Sway: Unravelling Unconscious Bias by Pragya Agarwal (2021)
... Continue reading
25 March, 2022The Power of Pull: How Small Moves, Smartly Made, Can Set Big Things in Motion by John Hagel, John Seely Brown and Lang Davison (2010)
We live in a world dominated by push.
We learn in an educational system that dictates what we need to know and pushes this knowledge to us for twelve or more years.
We work in companies that forecast demand and then push products to the people and places where demand is expected to materialize.
We consume in forms that are packaged, programmed, and pushed to us based on our expected ... Continue reading
18 February, 2022The Printing Press as an Agent of Change by Elizabeth L. Eisenstein (1980)
In this book, The printing press as an agent of change, Elizabeth Eisenstein conducts an extensive survey of the literature on the three intellectual and social movements of the period 1400–1700: the Italian Renaissance, the Protestant Reformation, and the Scientific Revolution. She also examines the major hypotheses as to their causes and progress and reassesses them in terms of the impact of ... Continue reading
10 January, 2022★ Beyond Knowledge: How Technology Is Driving an Age of Consciousness by William E. Halal (2021)
The Knowledge Age of the past two decades is passing today as the digital revolution and artificial intelligence replace knowledge work.
William Halal’s study of social evolution explains how this marks the passage to a new frontier beyond poorly understood knowledge — an “Age of Consciousness” is here.
But more pandemics, climate change, gross inequality, gridlock, and other ... Continue reading
22 December, 2021★ The Fourth Economy: Inventing Western Civilization by Ron Davison (2011)
The premise of this book, The Fourth Economy by Ron Davison, is that a fourth entrepreneurial economy is emerging. This will be as different from the information economy as the industrial economy before it.
Last century we popularized knowledge work, transforming from an industrial economy dependent on child labor to an information economy dependent on adult education.
This century we will ... Continue reading
30 November, 2021Moral Courage Rushworth M. Kidder (2006)
In this book, Moral Courage, Rushworth Kidder reveals that moral courage is the bridge between talking ethics and doing ethics.
Defining it as a readiness to endure danger for the sake of principle, he explains that the courage to act is found at the intersection of three elements: action based on core values, awareness of the risks, and a willingness to endure necessary hardship.
By ... Continue reading
05 November, 2021Hard to Be Human: Overcoming Our Five Cognitive Design Flaws by Ted Cadsby (2021)
We are oddly paradoxical creatures who long to be happy while creating our own suffering. We replay past anguish, anticipate future distress, and stew in self-righteous anger.
In Hard to Be Human, Ted Cadsby focuses on five cognitive design flaws that foster underthinking and overreacting and reveals powerful strategies to overcome them.
Greedy reductionism
Addiction to certainty
... Continue reading
28 October, 2021Leadership in Complexity and Change: for a World in Constant Motion by Sharon Varney (2021)
In this book, Leadership in Complexity and Change, Sharon Varney draws on complexity science to paint a picture of a world in constant motion, where leadership is enacted in the midst of complexity and continuous change. We must learn to engage with complexity. If not now, when?
Part I of this book brings complexity science to life by considering the practical challenges of complexity and its ... Continue reading
04 October, 2021Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters by Steven Pinker (2021)
Today humanity is reaching new heights of scientific understanding–and also appears to be losing its mind. How can a species that developed vaccines for Covid-19 in less than a year produce so much fake news, medical quackery, and conspiracy theorizing?
In this book Rationality: What It Is, Why It Seems Scarce, Why It Matters, Steven Pinker rejects the cynical cliché that humans are simply ... Continue reading
26 September, 2021★ The Extended Mind: the Power of Thinking Outside the Brain by Annie Murphy Paul (2021)
Over many years of elementary school, high school, and even college and graduate school, we’re never explicitly taught to think outside the brain; we’re not shown how to employ our bodies and spaces and relationships in the service of intelligent thought. Yet this instruction is available if we know where to look; our teachers are the artists and scientists and authors who have figured out ... Continue reading
03 September, 2021The Argument Culture: Stopping America’s War of Words by Deborah Tannen (1999)
In this book, The Argument Culture, Deborah Tannen examines how we communicate in public — in the media, politics, courtrooms, and classrooms — letting us see in a new way forces that have powerfully shaped our lives.
The war on drugs, the battle of the sexes, political turf combat — in the argument culture, war metaphors pervade our talk and influence our thinking.
We approach ... Continue reading
02 September, 2021Red Teaming: How Your Business Can Conquer the Competition by Challenging Everything by Bryce G. Hoffman (2017)
In this book, Red Teaming, Bryce Hoffman shows how the most innovative and disruptive companies, such as Google and Toyota, employ Red Teaming techniques.
A red team is a team that is formed with the objective of subjecting an organization’s plans, programmes, ideas, and assumptions to rigorous analysis and challenge.
He also shows how many high-profile business failures, including those ... Continue reading
27 August, 2021Knowledge Café: Create an Environment for Successful Knowledge Management by Benjamin C. Anyacho
The Knowledge Café by Benjamin Anyacho is a mindset and environment for engaging, discussing, and exchanging knowledge within a group either face to face or virtually. At the café, participants can discuss hard-to-solve project issues or resolve a family or community crisis. This metaphorical town square supports knowledge circulation and rejuvenation and increases its velocity—making it a ... Continue reading
20 July, 2021Curious: the Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends on It by Ian Leslie (2014)
In this book, Curious, Ian Leslie makes a passionate case for the cultivation of our “desire to know.”
Drawing on fascinating research from psychology, economics, education, and business, Ian looks at what feeds curiosity and what starves it and finds surprising answers.
Curiosity is a mental muscle that atrophies without regular exercise and a habit that parents, schools, and ... Continue reading
19 July, 2021Conflicted: Why Arguments Are Tearing Us Apart and How They Can Bring Us Together by Ian Leslie (2021)
In this book, Conflicted, Ian Leslie draws essential lessons on how to disagree well from world-class experts: interrogators, hostage negotiators, divorce mediators, diplomats, and addiction counselors.
It tells inspiring stories of productive disagreements, from the invention of the airplane to the success of The Rolling Stones, and combines them with fascinating insights from the science of ... Continue reading
15 June, 2021The Learning-driven Business: How to Develop an Organizational Learning Ecosystem Alaa Garad and Jeff Gold (2021)
In any kind of organization, learning has become a vital part of the growth and development process, but it only produces effective results if it is pursued strategically and embedded deeply into the culture of the workplace. In recent years, there has been a growing consensus that, for many organizations, learning is their only sustainable competitive advantage – ensuring a committed and ... Continue reading
28 May, 2021Future Search: an Action Guide to Finding Common Ground in Organizations and Communities by Marvin Weisbord
In this book, Future Search, Marvin Weisbord focuses on the evolving future search model.
He goes deeply into the sources and rationale, the experiments with tasks and techniques, and examples of how he and many of his colleagues have employed this model and its variations.
Credit: Amazon ... Continue reading
06 May, 2021★ The Enigma of Reason: A New Theory of Human Understanding by Dan Sperber and Hugo Mercier (2018)
In this book, The Enigma of Reason, Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber argue that reason is not geared to solitary use, to arriving at better beliefs and decisions on our own.
Reason, we are told, is what makes us human, the source of our knowledge and wisdom. If reason is so valuable, why didn't it also evolve in other animals? If reason is that reliable, why do we produce so much thoroughly ... Continue reading
01 May, 2021Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow Yuval Noah Harari (2017)
In this book, Homo Deus, Professor Yuval Noah Harari examines where humankind might be headed. ... Continue reading
16 April, 2021Scout Mindset: Why Some People See Things Clearly and Others Don’t by Julia Galef (2021)
In this book, The Scout Mindset, Julia Galef explains that we see what we want to see when it comes to what we believe. In other words, we have what Julia Galef calls a "soldier" mindset.
From tribalism and wishful thinking to rationalizing in our personal lives and everything in between, we are driven to defend the ideas we most want to believe — and shoot down those we don't.
But if we ... Continue reading
12 March, 2021The Empathic Civilization: the Race to Global Consciousness in a World in Crisis Jeremy Rifkin (2010)
In this book The Empathic Civilization, Jeremy Rifkin tells the story of the extension of human empathy from the rise of the first great theological civilizations, to the ideological age that dominated the 18th and 19th centuries, the psychological era that characterized much of the 20th century and the emerging dramaturgical period of the 21st century.
Credit: Adapted from Amazon
The ... Continue reading
06 March, 2021Enlightenment 2.0: Restoring Sanity to Our Politics, Our Economy, and Our Lives by Joseph Heath (2014)
In the book Enlightenment 2.0, Joseph Heath outlines a program for a second Enlightenment. The answer, he argues, lies in a new "slow politics."
It takes as its point of departure recent psychological and philosophical research that identifies the social and environmental preconditions for the exercise of rational thought.
It is impossible to restore sanity merely by being sane and trying ... Continue reading
11 February, 2021Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language by Robin Dunbar (1996)
In this book Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language, psychologist Robin Dunbar looks at gossip as an instrument of social order and cohesion — much like the endless grooming with which our primate cousins tend to their social relationships. ... Continue reading
03 February, 2021★ Liars and Outliers: Enabling the Trust That Society Needs to Thrive by Bruce Schneier (2012)
In the book, Liars and Outliers, Bruce Schneier examines the role of trust in enabling healthy, functioning societies. Schneier argues that some level of trust is essential for large-scale social coordination and cooperation. Without trust, societies cannot thrive, and individuals are forced to avoid interactions or spend heavily on protection from abuse and cheating.
The book explores how ... Continue reading
01 January, 2020Authentic Conversations: Moving From Manipulation to Truth and Commitment by James Showkeir
... Continue reading
20 October, 2020Cynefin – Weaving Sense-making Into the Fabric of Our World by Dave Snowden & friends (2020)
This book Cynefin - Weaving Sense-Making into the Fabric of Our World chronicles the origin story and historical evolution of the Cynefin Framework, including personal vignettes where network members share how it has impacted their lives, and reflections by practitioners on how they have applied it across many diverse contexts.
... Continue reading
12 October, 2020Connected: the Amazing Power of Social Networks and How They Shape Our Lives by Nicholas A. Christakis
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22 September, 2020Sensemaking: What Makes Human Intelligence Essential in the Age of the Algorithm by Christian Madsbjerg
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26 August, 2020Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg
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08 August, 2020Dominion: the Making of the Western Mind Tom Holland
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08 August, 2020Speak Up: Say What Needs to Be Said and Hear What Needs to Be Heard by Megan Reitz and John Higgins (2019)
Our day-to-day conversations define how we see ourselves and how we’re seen. The choices we make about what to say and who to say it to are decisive factors in whether we get promoted, or side-lined. Whether we steer clear of trouble or find ourselves in it up to our necks. With daily scandals hitting the headlines and the continuous need to innovate to survive, creating a more honest, open, ... Continue reading
14 July, 2020★ How to Have Impossible Conversations: A Very Practical Guide by Peter Boghossian and James Lindsay (2019)
In our current political climate, it seems impossible to have a civil conversation with someone who has a different opinion. Dialogue is shut down when perspectives clash. Heated debates on Facebook and Twitter often lead to shaming, hindering any possibility of productive discourse.
In this book, How to Have Impossible Conversations, Peter Boghossian and James Lindsay describe the process of ... Continue reading
03 June, 2020Agenda for a New Economy: From Phantom Wealth to Real Wealth by David Korten (2010)
In this book, Agenda for a New Economy, David Korten has fleshed out his vision of the alternative to the corporate Wall Street economy: a Main Street economy based on locally owned, community-oriented “living enterprises” whose success is measured as much by their positive impact on people and the environment as by their positive balance sheet.
We will lose nothing in the process because, ... Continue reading
01 March, 2020The Madness of Crowds: Gender, Race and Identity by Douglas Murray (2019)
In this book The Madness of Crowds, Douglas Murray examines the 21st century’s most divisive issues: sexuality, gender, technology, and race.
He reveals the new culture wars playing out in our workplaces, universities, schools, and homes in the names of social justice, identity politics, and 'intersectionality'.
Credit: Amazon ... Continue reading
24 January, 2020Thinking, Fast and Slow Daniel Kahneman (2012)
... Continue reading
17 January, 2020Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind Yuval Noah Harari (2015)
In this book, Sapiens, Professor Yuval Noah Harari spans the whole of human history, from the very first humans to walk the earth to the radical — and sometimes devastating — breakthroughs of the Cognitive, Agricultural, and Scientific Revolutions.
Drawing on insights from biology, anthropology, paleontology, and economics, and incorporating full-color illustrations throughout the text, he ... Continue reading
01 January, 2020God: A Human History of Religion by Reza Aslan (2018)
In the book God: A Human History by Reza Aslan, readers are taken on a captivating and ambitious exploration of how humanity has envisioned and understood the concept of God throughout history. Aslan delves into the deep-rooted human tendency to anthropomorphize the divine, demonstrating how people have projected their own characteristics, emotions, desires, and even flaws onto their idea of ... Continue reading
12 December, 2019Rebel Ideas: the Power of Diverse Thinking Matthew Syed (2019)
In this book, Rebel Ideas, Matthew Syed examines the power of cognitive diversity — the ability to think differently about the world around us. He explains how to harness our unique perspectives, pool our collective intelligence, and tackle the greatest challenges of our age — from climate change to terrorism. ... Continue reading
10 December, 2019Obliquity By John Kay (2010)
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11 September, 2019Enlightenment Now: the Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress by Steven Pinker (2019)
In this book Enlightenment Now, cognitive scientist Steven Pinker assesses the human condition in the third millennium and urges us to step back from the gory headlines and prophecies of doom, which play to our psychological biases.
Instead, follow the data: In seventy-five graphs, Pinker shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise, not just in ... Continue reading
22 August, 2019★ Closing the Mind Gap: Making Smarter Decisions in a Hypercomplex World by Ted Cadsby (2014)
We have always struggled as human beings. But our struggle today is exacerbated by a gap between the increasingly complicated world we have created and the default ways we think about it. Twenty-first-century challenges are qualitatively different from those that generations of our ancestors faced, yet our thinking has not evolved to keep pace. We need to catch up. To make smarter decisions — ... Continue reading
01 May, 2018★ Dialogic Organization Development: the Theory and Practice of Transformational Change by Gervase R. Bushe, Robert J. Marshak (2015)
First Int'l Conference on Dialogic Organization Development | Gervase Bushe & Robert Marshak ... Continue reading
25 April, 201812 Rules for Life: an Antidote to Chaos by Jordan B Peterson (2018)
In this book, 12 Rules for Life, Jordan Peterson provides twelve profound and practical principles for how to live a meaningful life, from setting your house in order before criticizing others to comparing yourself to who you were yesterday, not someone else today. ... Continue reading
02 September, 2016Deschooling Society by Ivan Illich (2000)
Deschooling Society by Ivan Illich, first published in 1971 and reissued in 2000, is a seminal critique of the modern education system. Illich argues that institutionalized schooling is counterproductive to genuine learning and perpetuates social inequalities. Here are the key points of his argument:
1. Critique of Institutionalized Education
Illich contends that schools have become ... Continue reading
15 September, 2015★ Community: the Structure of Belonging by Peter Block (2018)
As a response to the increasing violence in our culture, the widening ideological divides, and the growing gap in economic well-being, there is greater awareness that a deeper sense of community is desperately needed. But even as we acknowledge the need to build community, the dominant on-the-ground practices about how to engage people, civically and organizationally, remain essentially ... Continue reading
10 March, 2005The Springboard: How Storytelling Ignites Action in Knowledge-era Organizations Steve Denning (2000)
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24 November, 1999Awareness: the Perils and Opportunities of Reality by Anthony De Mello (1992)
In this book, Awareness, Anthony de Mello, uses humor, compassion, and insight to help us understand the importance of "awareness" in understanding ourselves and the world around us.
Awareness tackles life's big questions — love, anger and fear, change, suffering, happiness, and loss. ... Continue reading
21 August, 1991Global Mind Change by Willis Harman (1990)
In this book, Global Mind Change, Willis Harman elucidates that revolutions are generally thought of as large-scale, bloody upheavals involving whole countries and societies. But there are quieter revolutions that begin in the individual mind and create the kind of change that may be even more significant. By deliberately changing their internal image of reality, people are transforming the ... Continue reading
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