Harvard Business Review Articles

Following are the most popular articles on leadership that have been published in the Harvard Business Review. All articles are available for individual purchase from the Harvard Business Review. To subscribe to the Harvard Business Review go to http://hbr.harvardbusiness.org. With a current subscription you can access these and other articles on leadership and related topics.

1.  Building a Leadership Brand by Dave Ulrich, Norm Smallwood

Publication Date: July, 2007

You want your leaders to be the kind of people who embody the promises your company makes to its customers. To build this capability, follow these five principles.

2.  Developing Your Leadership Pipeline by Jay Conger, Robert M. Fulmer

Publication Date: December, 2003

Succession planning and leadership development ought to be two sides of the same coin. So why do many companies manage them as if they had nothing to do with each other?

3.  Discovering Your Authentic Leadership by William W. George, Peter Sims, Andrew N.

McLean, David Mayer, Diana Mayer

Publication Date: February, 2007

We all have the capacity to inspire and empower others. But we must first be willing to devote ourselves to our personal growth and development as leaders.

4.  Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis by Ronald Heifetz, Alexander Grashow, Marty Linsky

Publication Date: July, 2009

When the economy recovers, things won’t return to normal—and a different mode of leadership will be required.

5.  Leadership in Literature: A conversation with Business Ethicist Joseph L. Badaracco, Jr. by Joseph L. Badaracco Jr.

Publication Date: March, 2006

Pragmatic and powerful insights into leadership can be found in the works of Sophocles, Shakespeare, Conrad, and others. But you’ve got to know where to look and how to understand what they’re saying.

6.  Leadership in Your Midst: Tapping the Hidden Strengths of Minority Executives by Sylvia Ann Hewlett, Carolyn Buck Luce, Cornel West

Publication Date: November, 2005

Minority professionals often hold leadership roles outside work, serving as pillars of their communities and churches and doing more than their share of mentoring. It’s time their employers took notice of these invisible lives and saw them as sources of strength.

7.  Leadership Lessons from Abraham Lincoln: A Conversation with Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin by Doris Kearns Goodwin, Diane Coutu

Publication Date: April, 2009

In January 2008, CBS anchor Katie Couric asked then-candidate Barack Obama what single book, apart from the Bible, he would bring with him to the White House. He cited Team of Rivals, Doris Kearns.

8.  Leadership’s Online Labs by Byron Reeves, Thomas W. Malone, Tony O Driscoll

Publication Date: May, 2008

Tens of millions of people are honing their leadership skills in multiplayer online games. The tools and techniques they’re using will change how leaders function tomorrow—and could make them more effective today.

9.  Leadership Run Amok: The Destructive Potential of Overachievers by Scott W. Spreier,

Mary H. Fontaine, Ruth L. Malloy

Publication Date: June, 2006

If you believe too many executives think, “It’s all about me,” you’re right: Research shows that an ethos celebrating individual achievement has been shoving aside other motivations, such as the drive to empower people, that are essential for successful leadership.

10.  Leadership That Gets Results by Daniel Goleman

Publication Date: March, 2000

New research suggests that the most effective executives use a collection of distinct leadership styles—each in the right measure, at just the right time. Such flexibility is tough to put into action, but it pays off in performance. And better yet, it can be learned.

11.  Leadersip Under Fire by Dov Frohman

Publication Date: December, 2006

It may seem irresponsible to think about business in the middle of war. But your leadership is really tested only when you come under attack.

12.  Level 5 Leadership: The Triumph of Humility and Fierce Resolve (HBR Classic)

by Jim Collins

Publication Date: July, 2005

What catapults a company from merely good to truly great? A five-year research project searched for the answer to that question, and its discoveries ought to change the way we think about leadership.

13.  Managing Authenticity: The Paradox of Great Leadership by Rob Goffee, Gareth Jones

Publication Date: December, 2005

To attract followers, a leader has to be many things to many people. The trick is to pull that off while remaining true to yourself.

14.  Moments of Greatness: Entering the Fundamental State of Leadership by Robert

E.Quinn

Publication Date: July, 2005

Leaders are at the top of their game when they act from their deepest values and instincts. Usually they tap into these fundamental qualities during a crisis, but it’s possible to do so anytime—in the right frame of mind.

15.  Primal Leadership: The Hidden Driver of Great Performance by Daniel Goleman,

Richard Boyatzi, Annie McKee

Publication Date: December, 2001

We’ve known for years that emotional intelligence improves results—often by an order of magnitude. Now, new research shows that a leader’s mood plays a key role in that dynamic—a discovery that should redefine what leaders do first and best.

16.  Putting Leadership Back into Strategy by Cynthia A. Montgomery

Publication Date: January, 2008

A CEO must be the steward of a living strategy that defines what the firm is and what it will become.

17.  Regional Strategies for Global Leadership by Pankaj Ghemawat

Publication Date: December, 2005

It’s often a mistake to set out to create a worldwide strategy. Better results come from strong regional strategies, brought together into a global whole.

18.  Seven Transformations of Leadership by David Rooke, William R. Torbert

Publication Date: April, 2005

Leaders are made, not born, and how they develop is critical for organizational change.

19.  Social Intelligence and the Biology of Leadership by Daniel Goleman, Richard

Boyatzis

Publication Date: September, 2008

New studies of the brain show that leaders can improve group performance by understanding the biology of empathy.

20.  Timeless Leadership: A Conversation with David McCullough by David McCullough,

Bronwyn Fryer

Publication Date: March, 2008

The great leadership lessons don’t change.

21.  Tipping Point Leadership by W. Chan Kim, Renee A. Mauborgne

Publication Date: April, 2003

How can you catapult your organization to high performance when time and money are scarce? Police chief Bill Bratton has pulled that off again and again. Here’s what it takes.

22.  Women and the Labyrinth of Leadership by Alice H. Eagly, Linda L. Carli

Publication Date: September, 2007

When you put all the pieces together, a new picture emerges for why women don’t make it into the C-suite. It’s not the glass ceiling, but the sum of many obstacles along the way.

23.  Work of Leadership (HBR Classic) by Ronald A. Heifetz, Donald L. Laurie

Publication Date: December, 2001

Followers want comfort, stability, and solutions from their leaders. But that’s babysitting. Real leaders ask hard questions and knock people out of their comfort zones. Then they manage the resulting distress.

24.  Zeitgeist Leadership by Anthony J. Mayo, Nitin Nohria

Publication Date: October, 2005

The best leaders have an almost uncanny ability to understand the context they live in—and to seize the opportunities their times present. A look at U.S. business history shows how they do it.