Book Review 2023.01: Inside-Out Leadership by Rajiv Vij, Penguin Viking, 2021, 2023, 219 pages, Hard bound, ₹699
Gifted this book last Friday afternoon, I completed reading it in the next four days. It is a testimony to the quality of this book rather than my reading abilities, for flipping though it on the commute back home on the metro got me hooked to completing it in one go.
Contrary to leadership books that are anectodical and biographic in nature, this book is conceptual identifying common pitfalls of leaders, by outlining the underlying beliefs and providing a step-by-step process to overcoming the drawback. Identifying 16 insights for being a successful leader, this book lays out the context in which the missing trait is felt, the reason for its absence and in simple four to five steps method to cultivate and incorporate it in our lifestyle.
The underlying premise that a leader only reflects what the individual is, has significant value for the reader to practice the ideas in this book as it will improve not just their professional life but also their personal and social life. In particular I found the concepts of listening at three distinct levels, defining junior, middle and senior management by what they do of managing tasks, processes and people respectively, and establishing the link between beliefs and thoughts to be valuable for me to prepare an implementation plan starting today.
Despite being a book rich in wisdom, it is instructive and illustrative at the same time, free flowing and easy to read packed in bit sized chapters of a dozen pages making it an easy read. I wish I had read this book in the first ten years of my career, for it would not only have given me the context to understand the challenges I faced but also the knowledge and the process to change for better, both as a leader and a person in social and family life. But as they say, better late than never.
I strongly recommend this book to all corporate executives, especially those who are leading teams not just to help them perform better, but to become better individuals and connect with themselves, their teams, friends and family. Happy reading.
