Books on Leadership and Transformation are a great source of insights and research on improving leadership abilities will be particularly valuable to anyone interested in continually transforming and growing. The following books are some of the best out there.

Why Audio Books?
It’s hard to find time to read. However, commuting, working out, doing chores, … create opportunity to absorb audio. With time, it’s possible to consume at higher speeds. Consider that reading at 3x to 4x speeds on an hour’s commute each way provides for the equivalent of 6-8 hours of learning each workday. Also, this nourishes human transformation to keep pace with our changing world.

Top Books on Leadership and Transformation

Starting here with key books on Leadership and Transformation that I’ve consumed.
Hover over the book image to see a brief synopsis of the relevance to Human Transformation.

Tom Siebel offers a broad yet penetrating examination of the new technologies that are disrupting business and government – and how organizations can harness them to transform into digital enterprises. He also warns of extinction of those that don’t keep up.	Carol Dweck describes how to instill a Growth Mindset which thrives on challenges, learning from failures and being inspired by models of success. Our Mindsset shapes our goals and attitude toward work ultimately predicting whether or not we will fulfill our potential.	John Dickson addresses the power of humility – being open to accepting that our current beliefs and approaches may need revisiting is crucial in a rapidly evolving world.	Liz Wiseman describes a leadership style that creates a space to leverage and amplify the intelligence, energy, and capability from teams. These Multipliers create environments that encourage new ideas and approaches that can enable change and growth.	Ken Blanchard speaks to effective change and situational management for creating high-performing organizations.
Bill Campbell was instrumental in the growth of Google, Apple, Intuit and many others leaving behind a legacy of growing companies, successful people, respect, and love. Strong leaders creating healthy environments are essential to embracing and thriving in a changing world.	Edgar and Peter Schein are proponents of consulting that’s not about delivering solutions but rather enabling leaders to evolve. In a complex world, leadership must rely on high levels of trust throughout the organization to be agile and course correct quickly.	Jocko Willink and Leif Babin go beyond their first book Extreme Leadership to introduce a Dichotomy of Leadership enabling leaders to also be good followers to find the solutions that best fit the situation.	Kim Scott describes how Caring Personally while Challenging Directly brings out the best. Leaders often think Radical Candor is needed for low performers, but to succeed in a rapidly changing world, its important to radically challenge top performers in ways that motivate them. .	Simon Sinek describes how leaders who’ve had the greatest influence in the world are different in how they think, act, and communicate the same way. Focusing on the why behind our objectives frees us to embrace new approaches to achieving them in changing world.
Karen and Henry Kimsey-House released and updated edition that goes even further in providing methods and approaches that leaders can apply in helping individuals, teams and organizations discover and embrace transformation.	John Doerr, a legendary venture capitalist reveals how the goal-setting system of Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) has helped tech giants from Intel to Google achieve explosive growth – and how it can help any organization thrive. Focus on what matters is crucial in navigating transformations.	Robert Kegan and Lisa Laskow Lahey open with a recent study showed that when doctors tell heart patients they will die if they don’t change their habits, only one in seven follow through successfully. This immunity to change can be crippling in the Age of Digital Transformation.	Marshall Goldsmith and Mark Reiter remind us the ways of thinking and doing things that have brought us success in the past. Goldsmith provides a systematic approach to helping executives achieve the positive change in behavior needed in the Age of Digital Transformation.	Tom Kelley and Jonathan Littman, in their classic book, remind us how to observe people and discover what challenges they face and explore which innovations can best meet their needs in a world where needs and solutions are constantly changing.

Tom Siebel’s: 6 Must-Read Books for CEOs in the New Digital Age

James Gleick takes you back to the beginnings of information theory, putting todays innovations into historical context.

Walter Isaacson takes you from Ada Lovelace / Charles Babbage in the 19th century to the iPhone / the internet enabling you to consider digital transformation as a natural.

Pedro Domingos presents an evolution of the underlying theory and promise of AI in the context of high school statistics, math, and logic courses.

Viktor Mayer-Schönberger and Kenneth Cukier enable thinking about big data in a practical manner devoid of spectacle, hype, or extravaganza.

Ajay Agrawal, Joshua Gans, and Avi Goldfarb offer a down-to-earth discussion of AI and the problems it can really address.

Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee offer a visionary work that addresses the art of the possible.

I’ve often said when you hold a book in one hand, you should hold a mirror in the other. It may help you consider how the material applies to you. If a well researched and written book doesn’t evoke a conscious change in you, then you may find transformation and growth to be a challenge.

If you know of books of this nature, please feel free to leave your recommendations in the comments so that I might benefit and also share further with others.

Books on Leadership

I prefer hearing the author in their own voice with full depth explore their topic; however, not everyone’s curiosity or commute allows them the time to consume books the way I do. The books and specific subject matter of the authors above can often also be found represented in content on the authors’ websites, in TED talks, in blog posts, etc. If you have other books on Leadership and Transformation that you recommend, please drop me a line.

Spirit Guides

The books below are on “spiritual” leadership and/or they may serve to help leaders ground themselves.

Miscellaneous

While note directly on leadership, the books below to help to expand the mind and make for leaders of more diverse makeup.

Queue of Books on Leadership