Act Like a Leader, Think Like a Leader

Most leadership training, coaching and self-help books promote a fallacy: To change and improve as a person and a leader, you must study your innermost self. Herminia Ibarra – not just a leadership professor, but the Charles Handy Visiting Professor of Organizational Behavior at the London Business School and the Cora Chaired Professor of Leadership and Learning at INSEAD – strongly disagrees. In this thoughtful, well-researched motivational text, she presents research to support the idea that self-examination leads to paralysis and that the way to become a leader is to lead.

In times of transition and uncertainty, thinking and introspection should follow action and experimentation – not vice versa.Herminia Ibarra

The more you look inward, she says, the less likely you are to change. Change springs from action. Change from the inside out is an illusion, she explains, so try to change from the outside in. Unlike introspection, moving ahead inspires new thinking and learning for organizations and people. And, the more you act, the more your self-knowledge grows.