Leadership Memoir

From its creation as a mail-order record company to the literal launch of Virgin Galactic, today Virgin is one of the premier ‘way-of-life’ brands in the world, trusted and enjoyed by many millions of people. In Business Stripped Bare, Sir Richard Branson shares the inside track on his life in business and reveals the incredible truth about his most risky, brilliant and audacious deals.

Saint, slave or scholar? Patrick of Ireland is known as all three, but who is he really? Let K. C. Murdarasi bring to light the real life of this father of the Christian faith. Kidnapped from his home and family as a young boy you would think forgiveness would have been far from his mind.Yet with God's grace Patrick returned to the land of his captivity where he preached the good news of Jesus Christ to slaves and kings alike - and left a legacy of faith that would last for centuries.

In The Millionaire Next Door, best selling author Thomas Stanley identified the millionaires around you. In The Millionaire Mind, he told you how they think. Now, he tells you how to get their business.

In 2001, when Jacqueline Novogratz founded Acumen, a global community of socially and environmentally responsible partners dedicated to changing the way the world tackles poverty, few had heard of impact investing - Acumen’s practice of “doing well by doing good”. Nineteen years later, there’s been a seismic shift in how corporate boards and other stakeholders evaluate businesses: Impact investment is not only morally defensible, but now also economically advantageous, even necessary.

Today everyone - whether they know it or not - is in the emotional transportation business. More and more, success is won by creating compelling stories that have the power to move partners, shareholders, customers, and employees to action. Simply put, if you can’t tell it, you can’t sell it. And this book tells you how to do both. Peter Guber, whose executive and entrepreneurial accomplishments have made him a success in multiple industries, has long relied on purposeful story telling to motivate, win over, shape, engage, and sell.

From 1914 to 1916, Ernest Shackleton and his men survived the wreck of their ship Endurance, crushed in the Antarctic ice, stranded 1,200 miles from civilization with no means of communication and no hope for rescue. When the ice began to break up, Shackleton set out to save them all on his heroic 800-mile-trip across the frigid South Atlantic, in little more than a rowboat.

As an associate of the Gambino family, Ferrante relied on his instincts to pull off some of the biggest heists in US history. By the age of 21, he had netted millions of dollars for his employers. His natural talent for management led Mafia bosses to rely on him. After being arrested and serving an eight-and-a-half-year prison sentence, Ferrante went straight. He realized that the Mob's most valuable business lessons would allow him to survive and thrive in the real world.

Eddie Jones is one of the most successful sports coaches of all time. From coaching three different nations to Rugby World Cup Finals and with a winning record with England of nearly 80 per cent, Eddie Jones knows what it takes to lead and manage high-performance teams. For the first time, Eddie Jones shows just what it takes to be a leader in a high performance and high pressure environment and how these lessons can be applied to every walk of life, from coaching the U9 rugby team to leading a multinational organisation to simply doing your job better.

Stan McChrystal served for 34 years in the US Army, rising from a second lieutenant in the 82nd Airborne Division to a four-star general, in command of all American and coalition forces in Afghanistan. During those years he worked with countless leaders and pondered an ancient question: "What makes a leader great?" He came to realize that there is no simple answer. McChrystal profiles 13 famous leaders from a wide range of eras and fields - from corporate CEOs to politicians and revolutionaries. He uses their stories to explore how leadership works in practice.

In Winners Dream, Bill McDermott - the co-CEO of the world’s largest business software company, SAP - chronicles how relentless optimism, hard work, and disciplined execution embolden people and equip organizations to achieve audacious goals. Growing up in working-class Long Island, a sixteen-year-old Bill traded three hourly wage jobs to buy a small deli, which he ran by instinctively applying ideas that would be the seeds for his future success.

Behind every entrepreneur's success story, there's a never-ending list of gut-wrenching failures, missed opportunities, and jaw-dropping setbacks. Real estate mogul and serial entrepreneur Manny Khoshbin is one of those entrepreneurs with a story of perseverance that will make you believe in the American Dream all over again. Driven: The Never-Give-Up Roadmap to Massive Success goes beyond Manny's personal ride through the entrepreneurial journey to deliver the habits, mindset, and insights aspiring entrepreneurs need to turn dreams into reality.

In 2012, on his third tour of duty in Afghanistan, an improvised explosive device left Dan Crenshaw's right eye destroyed and his left blinded. Only through the careful hand of his surgeons, and what doctors called a miracle, did Crenshaw's left eye recover partial vision. And yet, he persevered, completing two more deployments. Why? There are certain stories we tell ourselves about the hardships we face—we can become paralyzed by adversity or we can adapt and overcome. We can be fragile or we can find our fortitude. Crenshaw delivers a set of lessons to help you do just that.

Hal Moore led his life by a set of principles - a code developed through years of experience, trial-and-error, and the study of leaders of every stripe. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Moore's life touched upon many historical events: the Occupation of Japan, the Korean War, Vietnam, and the refashioning of the US Army into an all-volunteer force. At each juncture, he learned critical lessons and had opportunities to affect change through measured responses.

Arthur M. Blank believes that for good companies, purpose and profit can - and should - go hand in hand. And he should know. Together with cofounder Bernie Marcus, Blank built The Home Depot from an idea and a dream to a $50 billion-dollar company, the leading home improvement retailer in the world. And even while opening a new store every 42 hours, they never lost sight of their commitment to care for their people and communities.

To most Canadians, the Molson name is part of the very fabric of Canada. Since 1786, when John Molson founded his first brewery in Montreal, it has become synonymous with beer, hockey, and philanthropy. Few realize, however, how close the family came in recent years to losing control of the enterprise. Back to Beer...and Hockey offers intimate details of the life and work of Eric Molson, who not only saved the company, but positioned it to thrive as a global brewery into the 21st century.

In April of 2000, Gary Erickson turned down a $120 million offer to buy his thriving company. Today, instead of taking it easy for the rest of his life and enjoying a luxurious retirement, he's working harder than ever. Why would any sane person pass up the financial opportunity of a lifetime?

We long for heroes and have too few. Nelson Mandela, who recently celebrated his 91st birthday, is the closest thing the world has to a secular saint. He liberated a country from a system of violent prejudice and helped unite oppressor and oppressed in a way that had never been done before.

Confronting change is incredibly hard, both organizationally and personally. Yet the pace of change in our world will never be slower than it is right now, says Beth Comstock, the former vice chair and head of marketing and innovation at GE. Imagine It Forward is an inspiring, fresh, candid, and deeply personal audiobook about how to grapple with the challenges to change we face every day. It is a different kind of narrative, a big-picture audiobook that combines Comstock’s personal story in leading change with vital lessons on overcoming the inevitable roadblocks.

Half an audiobook on basketball, half an audiobook on management techniques, The Gold Standard captures Coach K's personal style and approach to getting different (and sometimes difficult) people to work hard and succeed in reaching a common goal. "In all forms of leadership, whether you are a coach, a CEO, or a parent, there are four words that, when said, can bring out the best in your team, your employees, and your family...I believe in you. These four words can mean the difference between a fear of failure and the courage to try".

In Cowgirl Power, advertising CEO and cowgirl Gay Gaddis shares insights and examples for women to lead like fearless, risk-taking cowgirls: enhance and exude confidence, developing personal power on all fronts. As the owner of one of the largest female-owned independent agencies in the U.S. and former chairman of C200, one of the country’s top women’s business organizations, Gay Gaddis knows a thing or two about empowerment. Gay’s secrets of success have roots in the spirited strength of real cowgirls who were fearless risk-takers in everything they did.