12 min read
8 chapters
Creativity, Inc.
Ed Catmull · 2014
Pixar's co-founder reveals that protecting creativity isn't about hiring geniuses, it's about relentlessly hunting the hidden forces that quietly kill original work.
Leadership books
Managing people, building culture, and running a team that tells you the truth.
The shelf
Every title below carries a note on why it earns its place. Read or listen to any of them in the Clif app.
9 min read
8 chapters
Dare to Lead
Brené Brown · 2018
A research-based modern bestseller on leading with courage, vulnerability, and trust.
11 min read
9 chapters
Delivering Happiness
Tony Hsieh · 2010
The rare business memoir that treats culture and customer service not as soft perks but as the actual engine of a billion-dollar company, and then dares to ask what all that money was for.
11 min read
8 chapters
Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
Larry Bossidy & Ram Charan · 2002
The book that named the real reason strategies fail, not bad ideas, but leaders who treat "getting it done" as beneath them.
11 min read
10 chapters
Extreme Ownership
Jocko Willink and Leif Babin · 2015
Navy SEAL leadership principles turned into a bestselling, action-oriented playbook for taking full responsibility.
9 min read
8 chapters
First, Break All the Rules
Marcus Buckingham and Curt Coffman · 1999
Gallup's landmark research on what the world's greatest managers do differently.
11 min read
8 chapters
Good to Great
Jim Collins · 2001
Iconic research on what separates great companies, centered on Level 5 leadership and disciplined teams.
11 min read
9 chapters
High Output Management
Andrew S. Grove · 1983
The original operating manual for managers, written by the Intel CEO who treated management as a measurable production process, not an art.
11 min read
8 chapters
It's Your Ship
Captain D. Michael Abrashoff · 2002
A Navy captain took command of a demoralized warship and, without new people or budget, made it the best in the fleet by handing ownership to the crew, proof that culture, not authority, wins.
10 min read
9 chapters
Leaders Eat Last
Simon Sinek · 2014
A modern bestseller on why great leaders create a 'circle of safety' so teams perform at their best.
10 min read
8 chapters
Leadership and Self-Deception
The Arbinger Institute · 2000
A popular parable on how self-deception undermines leadership and how to get 'out of the box.'
12 min read
9 chapters
Leadership Is Language
L. David Marquet · 2020
The words leaders reach for by default were engineered for a factory floor a century ago; this book rewires them for a world where thinking, not just doing, is the actual work.
12 min read
8 chapters
Leadership on the Line
Ronald A. Heifetz & Marty Linsky · 2002
It tells the truth most leadership books dodge, that exercising real leadership gets people to want you gone, and then teaches you how to survive the danger without losing your soul.
11 min read
9 chapters
Leadership: In Turbulent Times
Doris Kearns Goodwin · 2018
Four presidents, four crises, one question that outlasts them all: is a great leader born, or forged in the fire of their worst day?
11 min read
8 chapters
Leading Change
John P. Kotter · 1996
The definitive playbook on why most transformations fail, and the eight sequential, non-skippable steps that make change actually stick.
10 min read
10 chapters
Lean In
Sheryl Sandberg · 2013
Landmark bestseller on women advancing in the workplace and claiming their seat at the table.
11 min read
8 chapters
Legacy
James Kerr · 2013
Fifteen lessons from the world's most successful sports team, all built on one radical idea: that character, humility, and a culture worth belonging to beat talent every time.
10 min read
9 chapters
Measure What Matters
John Doerr · 2018
The definitive guide to OKRs, the goal-setting system used by Google and top companies.
9 min read
8 chapters
Multipliers
Liz Wiseman · 2010
Shows how the best leaders multiply the capability of their people rather than diminish it.
11 min read
9 chapters
No Rules Rules
Reed Hastings & Erin Meyer · 2020
The rare management book that tells you its own recipe won't work unless you follow the steps in order, and warns you not to copy the perks without the culture.
13 min read
10 chapters
On Becoming a Leader
Warren Bennis · 1989
A foundational classic on the inner journey of becoming an authentic, self-aware leader.
10 min read
9 chapters
Primal Leadership
Daniel Goleman, Richard Boyatzis, Annie McKee · 2002
The seminal work applying emotional intelligence to leadership styles and team climate.
8 min read
7 chapters
Radical Candor
Kim Scott · 2017
A modern bestseller giving managers a concrete framework for caring personally while challenging directly.
11 min read
8 chapters
Remote Work Revolution
Tsedal Neeley · 2021
A Harvard Business School expert turns remote work from a pandemic scramble into a deliberate discipline anyone can master.
9 min read
9 chapters
Start with Why
Simon Sinek · 2009
Explains how the best leaders inspire action by starting with purpose, a hugely popular leadership idea.
11 min read
9 chapters
Switch
Chip Heath & Dan Heath · 2010
It reframes every stuck change, personal or organizational, as a fight between a rational Rider and an emotional Elephant, and hands you a nine-step playbook to get both moving the same way.
11 min read
9 chapters
The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership
John C. Maxwell · 1998
Distills leadership into 21 timeless laws you can actually practice, turning a fuzzy idea into a learnable, daily discipline.
11 min read
8 chapters
The 4 Disciplines of Execution
Chris McChesney, Sean Covey & Jim Huling · 2012
Strategy isn't the hard part, getting a team to actually do the important thing while the daily whirlwind screams for attention is, and this is the operating system that wins that fight.
11 min read
8 chapters
The 5 Levels of Leadership
John C. Maxwell · 2011
It turns "leadership" from a vague trait into a five-rung staircase you can actually locate yourself on and climb, one relationship and one result at a time.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Advantage
Patrick Lencioni · 2012
It argues the biggest, most overlooked edge in business isn't being smarter than rivals but being healthier, and lays out exactly how any leadership team builds that health.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Art of Gathering
Priya Parker · 2018
Proof that the gap between a forgettable event and a transformative one has almost nothing to do with the food, the venue, or the flowers, and everything to do with whether the host had the courage to decide why everyone is really there.
8 min read
9 chapters
The Coaching Habit
Michael Bungay Stanier · 2016
A bestselling, highly practical guide to leading through coaching questions instead of advice.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Culture Code
Daniel Coyle · 2018
The rare culture book that treats belonging, trust, and purpose as skills you can practice on Monday morning, not personality traits you're stuck with.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Dichotomy of Leadership
Jocko Willink & Leif Babin · 2018
The Navy SEAL officers behind Extreme Ownership reveal that great leadership isn't a fixed set of traits but a constant balancing act between opposing forces, and the best leaders know exactly when to lean which way.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Fearless Organization
Amy C. Edmondson · 2018
The definitive book on psychological safety, the single factor Google found separates its best teams, and the reason smart organizations keep walking off cliffs in silence.
12 min read
9 chapters
The Fifth Discipline
Peter M. Senge · 1990
The book that made "systems thinking" and the "learning organization" part of management's vocabulary, and still the sharpest cure for firefighting the same problems forever.
7 min read
8 chapters
The Five Dysfunctions of a Team
Patrick Lencioni · 2002
The definitive, highly actionable model for diagnosing and fixing team dysfunction.
10 min read
8 chapters
The Ideal Team Player
Patrick Lencioni · 2016
A deceptively simple lens, humble, hungry, and people-smart, that turns "good team player" from a vague compliment into three traits you can actually interview for, coach, and fire for.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Infinite Game
Simon Sinek · 2019
Most leaders play to win a game that has no finish line, and that single misunderstanding quietly wrecks companies, cultures, and careers.
9 min read
8 chapters
The Leadership Challenge
James M. Kouzes and Barry Z. Posner · 1987
The classic evidence-based model of the five practices of exemplary leadership.
11 min read
10 chapters
The Making of a Manager
Julie Zhuo · 2019
A practical, popular field guide for first-time managers learning to lead people.
11 min read
8 chapters
The Score Takes Care of Itself
Bill Walsh (with Steve Jamison and Craig Walsh) · 2009
The Hall-of-Fame coach who turned the NFL's worst team into a dynasty proves that if you obsess over the standard of behavior instead of the scoreboard, winning becomes the byproduct.
11 min read
9 chapters
The Speed of Trust
Stephen M.R. Covey (with Rebecca R. Merrill) · 2006
Reframes trust from a soft social virtue into a hard, measurable economic driver that either taxes or accelerates everything you do.
10 min read
9 chapters
Tribes
Seth Godin · 2008
A short, influential book on how anyone can lead by rallying a community around an idea.
11 min read
8 chapters
Trillion Dollar Coach
Eric Schmidt, Jonathan Rosenberg & Alan Eagle · 2019
The secret operating manual of the football coach who quietly mentored Silicon Valley's most powerful leaders, and proved that caring hard is a management skill.
10 min read
8 chapters
Turn the Ship Around!
L. David Marquet · 2012
A gripping case study of turning followers into leaders by pushing authority downward.
11 min read
8 chapters
Who: The A Method for Hiring
Geoff Smart & Randy Street · 2008
The most important business decision you make isn't "what", it's "who," and this book turns hiring from a gut-feel gamble into a disciplined, high-hit-rate method.
11 min read
9 chapters
Winning
Jack Welch (with Suzy Welch) · 2005
The distilled operating manual from GE's most famous CEO, built on brutal candor, ruthless differentiation, and hiring for the 4 E's.
12 min read
8 chapters
Work Rules!
Laszlo Bock · 2015
Google's former head of People Operations opens the company's playbook to prove that treating employees with radical trust and hard data isn't soft idealism, it's the highest-return management strategy there is.
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