Book: Leading Without Power by Max De Pree

I saw this recommended when I searched for Mo Gawdat's books. There was an excellent piece on his happiness project in Waitrose magazine, of all things.

I read about 70 pages of his Scary Smart before it got samey, so back to the library it went. Subsequently, I had already reserved his ‘That Little Voice in your Head’ and didn’t even get past the first 2 pages before it was returned the next day. I realised he is writing from elevated status as a millionaire, from which point it’s ever so slightly easier to find happiness. It's slightly different for me and so far away from the charity sector in which I work.

So, in the middle of all this thought, I was so enthralled with the recommendation that I immediately bought Leading Without Power. It turns out it’s an old, out-of-print book from the 1990s.

What I liked

The phrase vital organisation vs corporate organisation, because I so detest the phrase not-for-profit, which is also littered throughout.

The quote from Martin Luther King, ‘Negative peace which is the absence of tension and positive peace which is the presence of justice. A closed organisation is a tragedy. An open one holds enormous promise.

Sight or vision. Only with vision can we begin to see things the way they can be.

What made this every so slightly right-wing are the constant quotes from the bible, which, after the first half a dozen, don’t sit well with this atheist. And the privileged right-wing view of Aren't we brilliant for taking a risk and going to Africa to reach the m to read or to farm?

This feels dated and couldn't be written today, whereas my all-time favourite, Dale Carnegie’s How To Win Friends and Influence People, could. I endlessly recommend it as a reference point for how we can all do better.