Unleashing the Power of Rubber Bands

Back in August I had the privilege to hear Nancy Ortberg speak for the first time at The Gifted to Lead Conference that she was co-hosting with Nancy Beach.  As Nancy O. spoke I found myself scribbling frantically trying to capture all the insightful nuggets she was sharing.  I usually appreciate people who speak fast (like me) but I was rather irritated because I wasn’t getting on paper all these word treasures.

But as it so happens, Nancy’s new book had just released and I raced to the conference store to purchase it.

UnLeashing the Power of Rubber Bands: Lessons in Non-Linear Leadership

I love this book!  The “non-linear” word in the title is key and quite appropriate.  Most leadership material you read is often written pretty systematically, concepts build upon one another and clear steps are directed.  This is not the case with Unleashing the Power of Rubber Bands and it’s quite refreshing.

One of the things that I appreciated about Nancy, both in person and in writing, is her wit and candor.  There’s a bit of a sarcastic undertone throughout the book as she pokes fun of her own missteps as a leader.  Stylistically her work is very conversational and you feel as if you have become friends with the author through the stories she shares.  This book is more inspirational than intellectual, but don’t misunderstand that statement – Nancy is an extremely smart and gifted leader, she just opts to lead and guide us by inspiring rather than just intellectually arguing her points on effective leadership.

The actual subject matter of this book is also quite refreshing.  This quote from the introduction best sums up her approach:

“Great leadership is much more about creating a culture, and cultures transform people in much more profound ways than systems do.  Systems and processes should always support the vision, but they should never be the vision.”

Her focus is on the development of people, so instead of hearing about what you need to do to develop yourself as a leader, Nancy pushes you to breath into the lives you lead by:

• naming someone’s giftedness
• providing hope
• inspiring vision
• acknowledging reality
• giving of yourself
• allowing others to do it their way
• paying attention
• managing tensions
• identifying defining moments

There are so many more nuggets that I would love to share but let me just encourage you to get the book! In fact I’m giving a copy away.

Just comment here and tell me who you are and who you lead and I’ll randomly draw to give a copy away!