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About The Coaching Habit: say Less, Ask More & Change the Way You Lead Forever by Michael Bungay Stanier
Coaching is an important skill for leaders, but often, managers are too busy or overworked to coach their direct reports well. However, author Michael Bungay Stanier argues that coaching can be done in increments of 10 minutes or fewer.
Drawing on years of experience on training managers through his consulting company, Box of Crayons, Bungay Stanier argues that coaching can be a regular, informal part of every day by asking seven essential questions:
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
In 242 easy-to-read pages packed with anecdotes and explanations of the seven essential questions, Bungay Steiner offers a fresh and innovative take on the classic how-to manual. He combines insider information with research based in behavior and neuroscience to provide a new way to coach mentees. The book contains question-and-answer sections that will help readers identify old habits and start new behaviors.
The seven essential questions are also a great tool for sales professionals. They’ll help them get past the five basic objections to a product: no need, no money, no hurry, no desire, no trust. By using the seven questions to uncover what is actually important to a customer, it’s much easier to get to a “yes.”
Our Favorite Part
Each of the seven essential questions has its own chapter. The graphic design, including bulleted lists, pullout quotations, and other visual aids, helps readers to understand the highlights of each question. The book even has spaces and lines for readers to write about their thoughts and the actions they can take to develop the habits Bungay Stanier recommends. At the end of each of the seven chapters is a “Masterclass” section that helps to solidify the points the author made, allowing readers to strengthen their new habits.
Check out this book and tell us what you think. Share with us on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
Learn more about Cydcor, based in Agoura Hills, CA, by visiting our profile on CrunchBase.
About The ONE Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results by Gary Keller
In today’s fast-paced world, people often try to improve every aspect of their lives at once, but usually aren’t as successful as they’d like to be. Author Gary Keller proposes a simple and powerful concept in this book: focusing on what matters most in our personal and work lives first. Most people want fewer distractions, fewer things on their plate, and fewer things to stress them out. The ONE Thing proposes a new way of looking at things we want, and provides an action plan to achieve them.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
This is an excellent read for anyone who enjoys multi-tasking but still feels like they aren’t attaining their goals as fast as they would like to. Focusing on multiple things at one time doesn’t necessarily mean more productivity. To achieve effectiveness, we need to narrow our focus and take things one at a time. The ONE Thing suggests pausing before starting a new project and asking yourself what can be prioritized. This will ultimately make things easier and help you avoid focusing on things that are unnecessary distractions.
Our Favorite Part
Early in the book, Keller outlines six popular beliefs that most people think are the “right way,” but that might be hindering their success: everything matters equally, multitasking is good, success requires a disciplined life, willpower is always on will-call, a balanced life is required, and big is bad. Each belief is thoroughly addressed and shown to be not be as helpful as people think. To achieve success, according to the author, it’s about doing the right thing, not about doing everything right. Finding true success requires less discipline than you think.
Have you found success by focusing on one thing at a time? Be sure to follow Cydcor on LinkedIn for even more tips on finding success.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance
Renowned psychologist Angela Duckworth shows through her own personal history and stories of others that success doesn’t just come from natural talent or people who can help you get where you want to go in your career. Instead, she says, the secret to success is a blend of passion and persistence that she refers to as “grit.”
Duckworth developed this hypothesis through years of teaching and business consulting. She saw that people who found their passion and kept trying were ultimately more successful than those who had a natural talent but lacked the perseverance to follow through.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
Duckworth offers a concrete path to developing grit. It starts with identifying a burning interest, practicing it a lot, developing a sense of higher purpose, and finally, overcoming pessimism by developing what psychologist and author Carol Dweck calls a growth mindset. She tells us that any effort you make counts twice toward your goal.
Some of us come into adulthood already having learned grit through dealing with difficult times and getting through them. But, Duckworth says, grit can be learned regardless of IQ or circumstances, and shows you how you can do it. Anyone can become gritty. By learning grit and making effort to grow your passion, you too can achieve more than you might have thought possible.
Our Favorite Part
In Grit, Duckworth shares specific examples of people who exhibited grit in their own lives—whether those people are West Point cadets going through grueling initiation rituals, a young national spelling bee champion, or teachers working in some of the toughest schools in the country. By sharing these real-life examples, Duckworth shows us how her formula of passion, practice, and persistence can lead to success.
Check out this book and let us know what you think. Share with us on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol S. Dweck
Stanford University psychologist Carol S. Dweck, Ph.D., did decades of research on gifted children and adults and discovered a simple but groundbreaking idea: the power of mindset. A mindset is either fixed or growth-oriented; if you have a fixed mindset, you believe you have certain innate talents or weaknesses that can’t be changed. On the other hand, if you have a growth mindset, you believe that abilities can be developed through learning and hard work.
Mindset shows how to use a growth mindset to foster great accomplishments in yourself and in your direct reports.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
It gives you the opportunity to explore your own mindset: Do you have a fixed mindset or a growth mindset? It also gives you the tools to adopt a growth mindset and avoid the trap of a “false growth mindset.”
Mindset can also help you understand that you’re not necessarily born with certain talents, but they can be learned. Do you think you’re naturally bad at math? Maybe you’ve been told that so many times you believe it. The truth is that it’s possible to learn and excel at any task if you take the time to develop your skills.
A growth mindset can also help you love what you do, increase your sense of success and fulfillment, and even improve your relationships with other people, whether those individuals are your colleagues, your friends, or your family.
Our Favorite Part
In this new edition of Mindset, Dweck introduces the “false growth mindset” and guides people toward adopting a deeper, truer growth mindset. Cydcor encourages its employees to adopt a growth mindset and break out of self-limiting thought patterns.
This is a great read for managers and mentors because it expands the mindset concept beyond the individual to corporate culture and other groups. This crucial update will help supervisors to motivate those they lead, and to transform their lives at work and at home.
Mindset is well organized and easy to read. It’s serious but provides practical information on how to cultivate a growth mindset.
Our team members are continually reminded to improve their professional development and keep growing. Learn how you can join the Cydcor team on CareerBuilder!
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Co-Active Leadership: Five Ways to Lead by Karen and Henry Kimsey-House
Karen and Henry Kimsey-House, authors of Co-Active Coaching: Changing Business, Transforming Lives, bring their co-active model to leadership development. Their five-dimensional approach recognizes that leadership needs to be fluid and flexible, and that current top-down, one-dimensional models are outdated.
The Kimsey-House duo coined the term “co-active” to describe three elements interacting together: According to the book, “co” represents the relational and receptive aspects of leadership; “active” represents the action-oriented aspects; and the hyphen shows the connection between those aspects.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
In just 128 pages, Co-Active Leadership packs a lot of great content into an easy-to-read format. The authors list five leadership dimensions, describing each one and how it relates to the co-active model. They also give tips on how aspiring leaders can best use the various leadership styles to accomplish their goals.
This book not only guides readers into becoming transformational leaders from the inside out, it helps them to understand how the co-active model of leadership is a perfect fit for today’s collaboration-oriented and egalitarian work environment.
Our Favorite Part
Co-Active Leadership’s primary premise is that anyone can be a leader. Cydcor also believes that everyone has the capacity to lead. This book encourages readers to think about their actions throughout the day and recognize that almost all of them are manifestations of one of the five dimensions of leadership—the Leader Within, the Leader Behind, the Leader in Front, the Leader Beside, and the Leader in the Field.
Each of the dimensions is defined and illustrated in its own chapter so readers can gain a full understanding of their preferred leadership style and what they can do to grow in their own capacity for multi-dimensional leadership.
Check out this book and let us know what you think. Share with us on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise
How do you become an expert in something? Many people believe true expertise relies on innate talent, but in Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise, authors Anders Ericsson and Robert Pool dispel that myth with compelling research. Instead, they postulate that the potential for excellence exists within most of us. We simply have to nurture and grow that expertise.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
Cydcor believes in a “work hard, play hard” culture, and this book perfectly demonstrates the stellar results possible if you put in the work. Ericsson and Pool discuss the “10,000 hour rule,” or the idea that anyone who puts in enough “deliberate practice” can become an expert on any given subject.
The 10,000 hour rule is not a new topic – it’s one that has been brought up by writer Malcolm Gladwell in his book Outliers. Ericsson and Pool’s book stresses that this kind of deliberate practice, especially if aided by an expert, can help people master simpler tasks and situations and ultimately gain a better understanding of the subject or craft as a whole.
Cydcor’s Favorite Part
Peak: Secrets from the New Science of Expertise not only encourages readers to put in the necessary hours to become masters of their field, but it also emphasizes the importance of setting stretch goals. Cydcor encourages its employees to constantly be learning, growing, and improving—and that makes having a vision for the future imperative.
On top of being chock-full of practical advice (with studies and evidence to support), the book is also well written and easy to digest, making it a must-have for anyone who wants to be a better learner.
Check out this book and let us know what you think! Share with us on Cydcor’s Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Strength Based Leadership: Great Leaders, Teams, and Why People Follow
Nearly a decade ago, researchers at Gallup concluded a 30-year study of leadership strengths. Over the course of the project, researchers examined over 1 million work teams, supervised over 20,000 interviews with leaders, and spoke with over 10,000 followers about who the most important leaders in their lives were.
Strength Based Leadership is the interpretation of that information by best-selling author Tom Rath and prominent leadership consultant Barry Conchie. In the book, Rath and Conchie identify strategies that will allow you to find and develop the strengths to improve your ability to lead.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
The authors thoughtfully interpret the data Gallup assembled over decades, using their insights to craft a guide that teaches readers to discover and develop leadership abilities.
Some experts might suggest imitating the leadership style of someone famous, but Gallup’s research proves that approach simply doesn’t work for long. Instead, readers are encouraged to be themselves and engage these three key findings from Gallup’s research in a personal and authentic way:
1. The most effective leaders are always investing in strengths.
2. The most effective leaders surround themselves with the right people and then maximize their team.
3. The most effective leaders understand their followers’ needs.
Cydcor recommends this book because it helps guide readers toward becoming a successful leader in a way that builds on their own unique strengths.
Our Favorite Part
Our favorite part of Strength-Based Leadership is that it provides a practical approach to building leadership skills. The Gallup researchers identified 34 leadership strengths. For each one of those strengths they suggest two or three ways to use them at work and in your personal life.
The authors connect the results of the Gallup study with strategies used by real-world leaders. They provide real-world examples to teach readers to continually develop their strength-based leadership skills. These lessons also improve organization and management skills.
Interviews with Wendy Kopp, founder and CEO of Teach for America; Simon Cooper, President of the Ritz-Carlton; and Brad Anderson, Chief Executive Office of Best Buy, provide practical insights into the leadership process that readers can apply to their professional development.
So, check out this book and let us know what you think. Share with us on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges by Amy Cuddy
Author Amy Cuddy came to the world’s attention in 2012, when her TED Talk on body language garnered over 27 million views online. Cuddy is a social psychologist and teaches business administration at Harvard Business School. In her new book, Presence: Bringing Your Boldest Self to Your Biggest Challenges, Cuddy explains that presence “is the state of feeling connected with our own thoughts, values, abilities, and emotions, so that we can better connect with the thoughts, values, abilities, and emotions of others.”
Presence is a powerful guide that teaches us how to identify and work in harmony with our true selves in order to make a bigger impact on the world.
Why Cydcor Recommends This Book
We recommend this book because Cuddy encourages us to embrace our personal qualities and abilities and let them manifest in the world around us. Presence empowers the reader to become an authentic, yet commanding, force in the world. You will learn how to command respect from your colleagues and inspire them to do and be more. You will also discover how to release any anxiety when facing challenges, and gain clarity and poise.
Our Favorite Part
In this book, Cuddy teaches us to activate our presence and consciously inhabit our bodies through power posing. She cites tests between two different groups, and talks about the results of enacting two sets of poses. She mentions how after only two minutes, the group of posers assigned with physically expanding themselves showed elevated levels of testosterone. They also showed decreased levels of cortisol, which has been linked to increased levels of stress.
We particularly liked Cuddy’s reminder to pay attention to our presence and her warning not to take anything for granted:
“Taking control of your body language is not just about posing in a powerful way. It’s also about the fact that we pose in a powerless way much more often than we think—and we need to change that.”
Have you used power-posing to improve your presence at work? We want to know the power poses that worked for you. Share your experience on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Outliers: The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell
What makes high achievers different from you or me? Malcolm Gladwell answers that question with his book, Outliers. Many overachievers believe in one of the core concepts in the book: the “10,000-hour rule.” Gladwell suggests that to be the best at something, you need to study it for 10,000 hours. In this book, he finds the outliers—men and women who do things that are out of the ordinary.
Outliers is a good read because of Gladwell’s fascination with psychology, law, statistics, and sociology. His colorful writing provides a powerful and personal analysis of why some people become outliers and some don’t. Despite its quirky characters and lofty critiques, you’ll find echoes of your life in his writing.
Like Gladwell, at Cydcor, we encourage our employees and sales associates to set challenging goals that inspire achievement. We provide determined individuals opportunities to excel, work hard, and build successful careers.
Why Cydcor Reviews Recommends This Book:
Gladwell worked as a journalist at the Washington Post and as a writer for the New Yorker magazine. Instead of writing simple biographies of successful people, he investigates the communities where these exceptional people developed. He also examines the cultures that influenced them during their formative years and up to today.
Gladwell is passionate about social sciences and statistics. This interest led him to figure out why Canada’s star hockey players are consistently born in January, February, and March. But Gladwell isn’t just revealing cold facts and figures. He uses the book to examine his own life as an outlier.
Cydcor recommends this book because the author provides profoundly inspirational insights into how ordinary men and women achieve greatness. Gladwell suggests that everyone who is exceptional at something—like sales—has practiced for about 10,000 hours. Gladwell’s theory endorses Cydcor’s belief that professional achievement, recognition, and advancement is available for anyone who works hard and pursues each opportunity they find.
Our Favorite Part
Our favorite part of Outliers is Gladwell’s talent for revealing the unique twists and turns that influence someone’s life. For example, when Bill Gates was in the eighth grade, the mothers’ group at his school used the proceeds of their annual bake sale to purchase a personal computer for the students.
No software was available for the computer, so Gates learned how to program it by punching holes into computer cards—a very outdated practice today. After many hours of hard work, he got the computer to work. By the time he was a sophomore in high school, Gates had exhausted his school’s computer resources and sought further instruction at the University of Washington, where he met his future business partner, Paul Allen. Gates certainly had a gift for computing, but ultimately his achievements were powered by his 10,000 hours of hard work.
If we follow Gates’ example, if we pay attention and begin to see obstacles as opportunities, we will improve our chances for success.
As you read this book, you may remember the lessons you learned from teachers and mentors who taught you how to overcome obstacles. This book reminds us that the opportunity to succeed is always present; you just need to have a positive outlook and the determination to meet each challenge. You may not become a billionaire after reading Outliers, but your personal and professional life will become rich with possibility.
Who are the outliers that influenced your career path? Let us know about the men and women who inspire you to succeed. Share your ideas on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About Getting There: A Book of Mentors by Gillian Zoe Segal
What makes a good mentor? In Getting There: A Book of Mentors, Gillian Zoe Segal interviews thirty leaders in their fields to provide tips and tricks on how they were able to make it to the top. These potential role models describe hurdles they had to overcome in life, setbacks they had to handle, and the lessons they learned even in their lowest moments. The mentors give practical career advice as well as wisdom they’ve acquired over the years. Getting There is the perfect read for anyone attentively focused on their future or facing challenges in getting to the next level in their career. Finding success is never easy, but a great mentor can make the path toward achievement easier to navigate.
Cydcor decided to review this book after discovering an excellent Forbes.com article on door-to-door selling as the first step to billions.
Why Cydcor Reviews Recommends This Book:
Segal interviews people from many different fields: art, politics, science, and business. Each mentor walks the reader through their journey of making it big, explaining that the path isn’t always easy. Failures happen and difficulties arise, but it’s not impossible to outlast these complications. Almost all of the mentors in this book have experienced a moment that let them transcend these challenges.
This isn’t a book filled with research or studies. Instead, it offers narratives that put an emphasis on being human, and how that allows people to face anything. The advice the book Getting There offers is top quality, from real people who started out ordinary and became extraordinary. Although these people may all be from different fields, the advice is still sound and applicable for anyone looking to make something of themselves. It’s truly a great and inspirational read.
Our Favorite Part
Of all the different mentors interviewed in the book, John Paul DeJoria (co-owner of Patron Spirits and Paul Mitchell US), Sara Blakely (owner of @SPANX), , and worldwide recognized artist Jeff Koons have the most insights applicable to the business and sales industries. All three began their careers as door-to-door salespeople, and that experience made an impact that affected them permanently. Like the rest of the book, these chapters feel like an intimate one-on-one talk where wisdom is easily absorbed. The struggles these mentors faced can help shed light on many of the challenges everyone faces while trying to build a successful professional life.
What do you look for in a mentor? Tell us about the qualities you value when searching for a role model. Share a photo on Instagram and follow us @Cydcor
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.
About The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo
Marie Kondo is a cleaning consultant from Japan. Her best-selling guide to organizing, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up, is the result of years of study and experimentation. Kondo discovered her passion for tidying up when she was a child. Her book describes an early fascination with finding ways to create order out of chaos. Like Kondo, Cydcor believes that a well-organized workplace inspires creativity and increases productivity—and Kondo is a great teacher of these values.
Kondo’s descriptions of her struggles and successes have an emotional punch. Her writing reveals a universal truth: most of us have a clutter problem at work and at home. And it can’t be solved with a conventional cleaning strategy. Why should you read this book? It’s simple—Kondo’s solution to your clutter problem is permanent.
Why Cydcor Reviews Recommends This Book:
Kondo provides a simple solution to improve the quality of your work life and home life. If you carefully follow her instructions, you have a chance of finally getting your life in order. Kondo is determined to get you to try her life-changing magic. Her process is simple, and the detailed instructions she provides are easy to understand. The author writes with conviction, and just like Cydcor, she provides solutions that work.
Our Favorite Part:
Kondo insists that you tidy by category. Start with your papers and move on to supplies and then your files until you’ve gone through everything. Our favorite part of Kondo’s technique is that it requires no special tools. There is only one simple rule to follow: once you start tidying up, don’t stop until you’ve gone through all of your possessions. Unwanted items go into trash bags to be donated, recycled, or discarded. In just under 200 pages, Kondo shares her simple secret; the life-changing magic of tidying up allows us to find joy at work and at home, pure and simple.
Do you need to get control of the clutter that’s getting in your way? Let us know your favorite tips for staying organized. Share your ideas on Twitter and follow us @Cydcor.
We are Cydcor, the recognized leader in outsourced sales services. From our humble beginnings as an independent sales company based in Canada to garnering a reputation as the global leader in outsourced sales, Cydcor has come a long way. We’ve done this by having exceptional sales professionals and providing our clients with proven sales and marketing strategies that get results.