Managing Up: How to Move Up, Win at Work, and Succeed with Any Type of Boss by Mary Abbajay is a comprehensive guide that offers practical strategies for effectively managing the boss-employee relationship and advancing in your career. Abbajay provides insights, tools, and techniques for navigating various types of bosses, building strong relationships, and achieving success in the workplace.
Mind Over Mood by Dennis Greenberger and Christine A. Padesky is a groundbreaking self-help book that empowers readers to take control of their emotions by changing the way they think. Rooted in Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), the book offers practical tools and techniques to identify, challenge, and reframe negative thought patterns that contribute to emotional distress. It is structured as a workbook, allowing readers to engage with exercises and activities that promote lasting emotional change.
In Verbal Judo: The Gentle Art of Persuasion, George J. Thompson, a former police officer and martial artist, introduces a communication method designed to defuse conflict, improve persuasion, and handle difficult conversations with tact and effectiveness. The book provides strategies for using language to maintain control in tense situations while fostering cooperation and mutual respect. Thompson's approach is based on the idea that words, like martial arts, can be used to redirect aggression and turn conflicts into productive exchanges.
"The Coaching Habit: Say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever" by Michael Bungay Stanier is a practical guide to coaching that emphasizes the importance of asking powerful questions and listening deeply. The author provides a set of seven essential coaching questions that can be used in a variety of coaching situations to help explore goals and achieve results.
Douglas E. Noll’s book De-Escalate: How to Calm an Angry Person in 90 Seconds or Less provides a step-by-step guide to managing conflict and defusing anger in tense situations. The book is grounded in neuroscience and communication techniques that help readers turn hostility into calm, productive conversations. Noll argues that traditional conflict resolution methods often fail because they do not address the underlying emotional needs of an angry person. Instead, he introduces a counterintuitive but highly effective method: affective labelling, or the practice of acknowledging and verbalising the emotions of the upset individual.
Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Life by Marshall B. Rosenberg is a transformative guide to improving communication and fostering meaningful relationships. At its core, the book introduces the Nonviolent Communication (NVC) framework, which emphasises empathy, compassion, and clarity to resolve conflicts, build connections, and communicate effectively without causing harm.