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Crucibles of Leadership: How to Learn from Experience to Become a Great Leader | 
 enlarge | Author: Robert J. Thomas
Publisher: Harvard Business School Press
Category: Book
List Price: $29.95
Buy New: $18.33
You Save: $11.62 (39%)
New (32) Used (6) from $18.33
Avg. Customer Rating:  4 reviews
Sales Rank: 35997
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.3
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6 x 1.1
ISBN: 1591391377
Dewey Decimal Number: 658.4092
EAN: 9781591391371
ASIN: 1591391377
Publication Date: March 24, 2008
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new item. Over 3.5 million customers served. Order now. Selling online since 1995. Order with confidence. Code: B20080725212931T
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Product Description
Experience may be a leader's best teacher--but there's a hitch. Two people can have identical experiences, but one blossoms while the other is depleted. The same can be said for any pair of fired CEOs, unsuccessful political candidates, or rookie supervisors.
In Crucibles of Leadership, Robert J. Thomas concludes that what matters most is what one makes of experience, particularly the traumatic and often unplanned crucible events that challenge one's identity as a leader. What distinguishes leaders who grow through a crucible experience? Their approach to learning. Like accomplished athletes or artists, they practice as strenuously as they perform. And because the line between performance and practice is often hard to discern, they learn how to practice while they perform.
But theirs is no ordinary practice. It's a regimen tailored to individual aspirations, motivations, and learning styles--a Personal Learning Strategy. Building on insightful and moving stories told by accomplished leaders, Thomas offers probing self-assessments and innovative tools designed to help you develop your own Personal Learning Strategy.
Provocative and original, with examples drawn from business and politics as well as from the inner workings of the Mormon Church and the Hell's Angels, Thomas's book will revolutionize the way you think about leadership and learning.
"Robert Thomas's fresh answer to the tired question of whether leaders are born or made takes readers in a new direction: toward understanding the burning challenges and even failures that turn ordinary people into great leaders. This practical book can help men and women from all walks of life rise to their full potential."
-Rosabeth Moss Kanter, Harvard Business School Professor and author of Confidence and America the Principled
"Learning from one's own experiences and from those of others is the Archimedes lever for leadership effectiveness. Crucibles of Leadership unlocks the secrets of learning how to lead--what a gift!"
-Fred Harburg, Former President and CLO, Motorola University and former SVP of Leadership and Learning, Fidelity Investments
"As someone who has participated in the journey of a company that has grown from $4 million to $40 billion, I believe the core premise of this book rings true. The skills derived from facing one's own "crucibles" are powerful tools for growing one's business."
-Brad Anderson, Vice Chairman and CEO, Best Buy Co., Inc.
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| Customer Reviews:
Filling in the Blanks June 28, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
In 2002, Robert Thomas (the author of this book) and Warren Bennis discovered something important about how leaders developed. They had set out to determine the differences and similarities between young leaders (geeks) and older leaders (geezers).
But the key finding of their book, Geeks and Geezers, turned out to be the importance of the defining moments that shape leaders. Thomas and Bennis called those moments "crucibles."
Crucibles are emotionally charged situations that produce great learning and growth in some leaders. This was something a lot of us knew intuitively, but no one had ever stated or supported with research.
Once upon a time we believed that you could learn leadership from books and classes. Then, slowly, it dawned on the leadership development community that you can learn about leadership from a book or in class, but you learn leadership on the job.
Some of us call that the Apprenticeship Model. And the "academy companies" like GE, Pepsico, and P & G have taken to it with gusto. They've made developmental assignments a core part of their leadership development programs.
Robert Thomas decided to dig deeper into the phenomenon of crucibles. This book shares the results of that research. There are four key findings.
Crucibles contain two vital lessons, not just one. The second lesson is how to learn.
Practice can trump talent.
Outstanding leaders devise a strategy for transforming crucibles into learning.
Organizations can grow leaders faster by helping them learn from experience.
The book is divided into three parts. The first, Experience Matters--But Then What? includes the first four chapters. You'll learn about why some people seem to thrive and grow during a crucible experience while others wither.
There's excellent material on how to learn from a crucible experience and turn it to good. This also where you'll learn about the three types of crucibles.
In part two, Crafting a Personal Learning Strategy, Thomas gets down to the business of teaching us how to learn to be better leaders. The idea is to learn the basic lessons from an experience that you can pass on to others. There are several self-assessments for you to use.
There's another finding here that's very powerful. For leaders, as for other practitioners of a performing art, learning and doing are often one and the same. While you are doing, you are learning. And you learn by performing.
The final major section of the book, The Big Picture, lays out the lessons that organizations can learn from this research when they put together their own leadership development programs.
This is an excellent book. It brings together a number of insights that seem obvious once you've heard them, but that still make you say, "Yes!! That's exactly it!"
Buried in here is a finding that I think is a "missing link" in leadership development. It's the idea that learning and doing are often the same activity for leaders and others who practice performing arts.
If you are a leader, this book will show you how to learn from your experience and get the most value and growth from it. If you are responsible for leadership development for others, you'll learn how to use the natural way that people learn to lead as a core of your program.
Techniques and achievements of successful leaders around the world May 8, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
CRUCIBLES OF LEADERSHIP: HOW TO LEARN FROM EXPERIENCE TO BECOME A GREAT LEADER provides keys to understanding leadership qualities and practices, through finding meaning in adversity and using such experiences to improve and change performance. The techniques and achievements of successful leaders around the world are profiled in stories of leadership ranging from the business world to political and religious circles. An outstanding survey.
Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch
 Experiences can transform April 4, 2008
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
Recently I read a book called Crucibles of Leadership - how to learn from experience to become a great leader by Robert J. Thomas. I found the title to be interesting and when I did an informal poll, most people did not know what a crucible was. (It is a vessel that is used by chemists. Originally in medieval days it was used by alchemists (people trying to make gold out of base metals.)) People's definitions were from being a bowl to a religious symbol.
One troubling thing about the title is that alchemist were never successful so does this mean that these crucibles of leadership won't work?
The gist of the thesis is that often it takes a transformative occurrence to transform a leader who in turns transforms a company.
According to Warren Bennis in the Forward of the book:
This invaluable book reminds us that talent is only the beginning of greatness, that leading and learning are inextricably linked, and that the crucibles that break some people can give rise to serial leaders and learners as well.
Three qualities, in particular, stood out as common to outstanding leaders, young and old:
Adaptive capacity is the ability to learn - about yourself, about the world around you, about what it takes to adjust to, and to make, change.
Engaging others through shared meaning is teaching and, in turn, listening - being an interactive leader, one who can enlist as well as command, and one who is capable of mobilizing the best in people through shared vision.
Integrity is about knowing what you stand for - possessing a strong moral compass - and having the courage of your convictions; it is a process of self-knowledge that provides a core identity and a spine that remains strong even when circumstances demand that you adapt. Integrity is what keeps the leader from becoming a hollow dissembler of a leaf in the wind.
Often a crucible was not just the experience but people gained insight into how they learned.
I liked the short clip about Sydney Harman (founder of Harman-Kardon) who spoke about how his daily journalling gave him insights into what was on his mind.
Surgeon Atul Gawand underscores the central role of practice: People often assume that you have to have great hands to become a surgeon, but it's not true. It is practice that builds skill. I know I need to practice more on those things I which to excel in.
I liked how positive the book was. Even bad experiences can lead to greatness and learning. I liked the books focus on learning and change. It meshes with my belief that as long as I can learn, adapt, change and grow, I can succeed. It is growth that is one of my primary drivers.
Interesting book.
Fills a Huge Gap in the Literature March 23, 2008
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
Robert Thomas' new book The Crucibles of Leadership is probably one of the most important books on leadership development written in the past several years. We have known for decades that a huge percentage of leadership learning comes from challenging and varied experiences (see The Lessons of Experience, by Lombardo et al). However, there has been virtually no work done on HOW people learn from those experiences. That is a key issue, as some people learn a great deal from those varied and challenging experiences, while others do not.
Robert Thomas has addressed this key gap in the literature on leadership by shining a light into the black box of what he calls "crucible" experiences. After interviewing close to 200 highly effective leaders, Thomas found several key patterns to how they had learned to lead from challenging experiences that had made them stretch. The common denominator he found is that they all had a personal learning strategy that enabled them to systematically learn from challenging experiences. He then walks the reader through a reflective process the leads to the development of a personal learning strategy. Extremely useful and actionable.
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