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Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership: How to Make a Difference Regardless of Your Title, Role, or Authority
Learn how you can tackle everyday leadership challenges regardless of your title, position, or authority with this insightful resource A book about leadership for people who are not in formal or hierarchical leadership positions, Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership provides readers with a comprehensive and practical approach to addressing leadership challenges, no matter the setting or circumstance. Esteemed scholars and sought-after consultants Jim Kouzes and Barry Posner adapt their trademark The Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership ® framework to today’s more horizontal workplace, showing people that leadership is not about where you are in the organization; it’s about how you behave and what you do. Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership draws on the authors’ deep well of research and practical experience to cover key This book is perfectly applicable and accessible for anyone who wants to improve their own leadership potential and who isn’t yet in an official leadership role. Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership offers authoritative new insights, original case studies and examples, and practical guidance for those individuals who want to make a difference. You supply the will, and this book will supply the way.
240 pages, Hardcover
Published January 20, 2021
86 people are currently reading
238 people want to read
About the author
James M. Kouzes
304 books96 followersJim Kouzes has been thinking about leadership ever since he was one of only a dozen Eagle Scouts to be selected to serve in John F. Kennedy's honor guard when Kennedy was inaugurated President of the United States. Kennedy's inaugural call to action -- "Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country." -- inspired Jim to join the Peace Corps, and he taught school in Turkey for two years. That experience made Jim realize that he wanted a career that offered two things: the chance to teach and the opportunity to serve. It was in his first job back in the U.S. training community action agency managers that Jim found his calling, and he has devoted his life to leadership development ever since.
Jim Kouzes is the coauthor with Barry Z. Posner of the award-winning and best-selling book, The Leadership Challenge, with over 3.0 million copies in print. He's a Fellow of the Doerr Institute for New Leaders at Rice University and also served as the Dean's Executive Fellow of Leadership, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University. Jim and Barry have coauthored many bestselling leadership books including A Leader's Legacy, Encouraging the Heart, The Truth About Leadership, and Credibility. They are also the developers of The Leadership Practices Inventory—the bestselling off-the-shelf leadership assessment in the world. Their books are extensively researched-based, and over 500 doctoral dissertations and academic studies have been based on their original work.
Not only is Jim a highly regarded leadership scholar, The Wall Street Journal cited Jim as one of the twelve best executive educators in the U.S. He is the 2010 recipient of the Thought Leadership Award from the Instructional Systems Association, listed as one of HR Magazine’s Most Influential International Thinkers, named one of the Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior by Trust Across America, and ranked by Leadership Excellence magazine as one of the Top 100 Thought Leaders. Jim was presented with the Golden Gavel, the highest honor awarded by Toastmasters International, and he and Barry are also the recipients of the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) Distinguished Contribution to Workplace Learning and Performance Award, presented in recognition of their extensive body of work and the significant impact they have had on learning and performance in the workplace.
Jim Kouzes is the coauthor with Barry Z. Posner of the award-winning and best-selling book, The Leadership Challenge, with over 3.0 million copies in print. He's a Fellow of the Doerr Institute for New Leaders at Rice University and also served as the Dean's Executive Fellow of Leadership, Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University. Jim and Barry have coauthored many bestselling leadership books including A Leader's Legacy, Encouraging the Heart, The Truth About Leadership, and Credibility. They are also the developers of The Leadership Practices Inventory—the bestselling off-the-shelf leadership assessment in the world. Their books are extensively researched-based, and over 500 doctoral dissertations and academic studies have been based on their original work.
Not only is Jim a highly regarded leadership scholar, The Wall Street Journal cited Jim as one of the twelve best executive educators in the U.S. He is the 2010 recipient of the Thought Leadership Award from the Instructional Systems Association, listed as one of HR Magazine’s Most Influential International Thinkers, named one of the Top 100 Thought Leaders in Trustworthy Business Behavior by Trust Across America, and ranked by Leadership Excellence magazine as one of the Top 100 Thought Leaders. Jim was presented with the Golden Gavel, the highest honor awarded by Toastmasters International, and he and Barry are also the recipients of the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) Distinguished Contribution to Workplace Learning and Performance Award, presented in recognition of their extensive body of work and the significant impact they have had on learning and performance in the workplace.
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
December 6, 2023
It's got a few handfuls of good ideas and concepts, but it suffers from repetitiveness. That, and the flat writing that accompanies it. Because of that, it's not quite as inspirational as it could be.
It's just okay, so it gets 2 stars from me.
It's just okay, so it gets 2 stars from me.
March 3, 2025
It's a little repetitive, so honestly more 4.5/5. But content is top notch. It is full of data driven analysis that prompts "common sense" healthy leadership philosophy. If you want practical ways to adjust or grow in leadership, this is ideal. Short and to the point (175 pages, could probably be done in 150 pages) and helpful.
August 18, 2021
As the book says. “You supply the will, and this book will supply the way.” I’ve been following the author’s teachings for several decades now and this book complements the wonderful book and classic, The Leadership Challenge. In Everyday People, Extraordinary Leadership they adapt their trademark Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership® framework to today’s more horizontal workplace, showing people that leadership is not about where you are in the organization; it’s about how you behave and what you do. My favorite take-aways include:
- Titles are granted, but being a leader is something that you earn, and you earn it not by your place in the organization but by how you behave.
- Leadership is a relationship between those who aspire to lead and those who choose to follow; there must be a human connection. Credibility is the foundation of leadership.
The 5 Practices of Exemplary Leadership are:
1. Model the Way. Exemplary leaders know that if they want to earn the respect of the people around them and achieve the highest standards, they must be models of the behavior they expect of others. Before you can be a leader of others, you need to know clearly who you are and what your core values are. Once you know that, then you can give your voice to those values and feel comfortable sharing them with others. People expect their leaders to speak out on matters of values and conscience. Leadership is values in action. How you spend your time is the most precise indicator of what’s important to you. What you spend your time paying attention to, working on, and with whom you spend it speak volumes to others about what your actual priorities are compared to what you might say you care about. Turn critical incidents into teachable moments. Tell stories to reinforce values and connect with actions. Ask purposeful questions - Well-phrased questions present opportunities to teach and reinforce shared values of the organization. The key to asking good leadership questions is to first think about the “quest” in your question: Where do you want to take this person (or group, unit, organization) with your question? What value or values are you trying to reinforce with your questions? What beliefs, perspectives, and principles do you want people to be thinking about?
2. Inspire a Shared Vision. People describe their Personal-Best Leadership Experiences as times when they imagined exciting and meaningful futures for themselves and others. Clarify your vision and get others on board by listening deeply, discovering a common purpose, and taking pride in being unique. You have to engage the people you are involved with and work with in conversations about their lives, about their own hopes and dreams, and how they can see these realized by sharing and participating in the vision. Creating a common vision is about developing a shared sense of destiny. It’s about enrolling others so that they can see how their own interests and aspirations are aligned with the vision and can thereby become mobilized to commit their individual energies to its realization.
3. Challenge the Process. Challenge is the crucible for greatness. It provides the context in which adversity and vision interact to provide for the creation of something new. Change for the sake of something better; making the current situation better demands change. Be willing to experiment and take risks; make it safe (create “psychological safety”) to take risks; make small wins work (The incremental change process has been called “small wins,” and each success builds people’s commitment to a course of action. Small wins form a consistent pattern of accomplishment. A series of small wins contributes to constructing a stable foundation on which bigger risks can be taken.); learn from mistakes (Change and leadership involve taking risks, and with any uncertain action, there are always, at a minimum, mistakes made, set-backs experienced, and, worse yet, failures. When you engage in something new and different, you make a lot of mistakes. Everyone does. That’s what experimentation is all about.); be resilient or exhibit grit (Grit is an individual’s ability to maintain passion and perseverance for a purpose despite a lack of positive feedback. What’s critical is how you respond to and cope with the inevitable mistakes, setbacks, and failures).
4. Enable Others to Act. Leaders know they can’t do it alone. Grand dreams don’t become significant realities through the actions of a single person. Without trust, you cannot lead. Individuals who are unable to trust others fail to become leaders precisely because they can’t stand being dependent on the words and work of others. The feeling of “we” cannot happen without trust. Showing concern for others is one of the clearest and most unambiguous signals of your trustworthiness. When others know you will put their interests ahead of your own, they won’t hesitate to trust you. However, this is something people need to see in your actions—actions such as listening, paying attention to their ideas and concerns, helping them solve their problems, and being open to their influence. When you show your openness to their ideas and your interest in their concerns, people will be more open to yours. It is paradoxical, but the most effective leaders are those who give their power away to others. That is, they make those around them feel strong and capable. They listen to and credit others’ ideas, and they make sure that people do not feel left out of the loop when it comes to important decisions. They help their colleagues take ownership and feel a sense of responsibility for achievements. They enhance the competence and self-confidence of those around them. Provide choices (freedom is the ability to make choices) and foster personal responsibility and accountability.
5. Encourage the Heart. Genuine acts of caring, whether exhibited in dramatic gestures or simple actions, uplift people’s spirits and keep them motivated. It is part of a leader’s job to recognize contributions by showing appreciation for individual excellence. Adopt a winning attitude and expect the best out of people. Create a spirit of community; Human beings are social animals—hardwired to connect with others. People are meant to do things together, to form communities, and in this way demonstrate a common bond. When social connections are strong and numerous, there’s more trust, reciprocity, information flow, collective action, happiness, and greater prosperity. Supportive relationships at work—relationships characterized by a genuine belief in and advocacy for the interests of others—are critically important to maintaining personal and organizational vitality.
The book concludes with a critical statement: Leadership development is self-development. Leadership is fundamentally about your relationships, your credibility, and what you do. Leadership has everything to do about how you behave.
The 5 fundamentals for learning leadership are: Believe you can, Aspire to excel, Challenge yourself, Engage support, and Practice deliberately.
- Titles are granted, but being a leader is something that you earn, and you earn it not by your place in the organization but by how you behave.
- Leadership is a relationship between those who aspire to lead and those who choose to follow; there must be a human connection. Credibility is the foundation of leadership.
The 5 Practices of Exemplary Leadership are:
1. Model the Way. Exemplary leaders know that if they want to earn the respect of the people around them and achieve the highest standards, they must be models of the behavior they expect of others. Before you can be a leader of others, you need to know clearly who you are and what your core values are. Once you know that, then you can give your voice to those values and feel comfortable sharing them with others. People expect their leaders to speak out on matters of values and conscience. Leadership is values in action. How you spend your time is the most precise indicator of what’s important to you. What you spend your time paying attention to, working on, and with whom you spend it speak volumes to others about what your actual priorities are compared to what you might say you care about. Turn critical incidents into teachable moments. Tell stories to reinforce values and connect with actions. Ask purposeful questions - Well-phrased questions present opportunities to teach and reinforce shared values of the organization. The key to asking good leadership questions is to first think about the “quest” in your question: Where do you want to take this person (or group, unit, organization) with your question? What value or values are you trying to reinforce with your questions? What beliefs, perspectives, and principles do you want people to be thinking about?
2. Inspire a Shared Vision. People describe their Personal-Best Leadership Experiences as times when they imagined exciting and meaningful futures for themselves and others. Clarify your vision and get others on board by listening deeply, discovering a common purpose, and taking pride in being unique. You have to engage the people you are involved with and work with in conversations about their lives, about their own hopes and dreams, and how they can see these realized by sharing and participating in the vision. Creating a common vision is about developing a shared sense of destiny. It’s about enrolling others so that they can see how their own interests and aspirations are aligned with the vision and can thereby become mobilized to commit their individual energies to its realization.
3. Challenge the Process. Challenge is the crucible for greatness. It provides the context in which adversity and vision interact to provide for the creation of something new. Change for the sake of something better; making the current situation better demands change. Be willing to experiment and take risks; make it safe (create “psychological safety”) to take risks; make small wins work (The incremental change process has been called “small wins,” and each success builds people’s commitment to a course of action. Small wins form a consistent pattern of accomplishment. A series of small wins contributes to constructing a stable foundation on which bigger risks can be taken.); learn from mistakes (Change and leadership involve taking risks, and with any uncertain action, there are always, at a minimum, mistakes made, set-backs experienced, and, worse yet, failures. When you engage in something new and different, you make a lot of mistakes. Everyone does. That’s what experimentation is all about.); be resilient or exhibit grit (Grit is an individual’s ability to maintain passion and perseverance for a purpose despite a lack of positive feedback. What’s critical is how you respond to and cope with the inevitable mistakes, setbacks, and failures).
4. Enable Others to Act. Leaders know they can’t do it alone. Grand dreams don’t become significant realities through the actions of a single person. Without trust, you cannot lead. Individuals who are unable to trust others fail to become leaders precisely because they can’t stand being dependent on the words and work of others. The feeling of “we” cannot happen without trust. Showing concern for others is one of the clearest and most unambiguous signals of your trustworthiness. When others know you will put their interests ahead of your own, they won’t hesitate to trust you. However, this is something people need to see in your actions—actions such as listening, paying attention to their ideas and concerns, helping them solve their problems, and being open to their influence. When you show your openness to their ideas and your interest in their concerns, people will be more open to yours. It is paradoxical, but the most effective leaders are those who give their power away to others. That is, they make those around them feel strong and capable. They listen to and credit others’ ideas, and they make sure that people do not feel left out of the loop when it comes to important decisions. They help their colleagues take ownership and feel a sense of responsibility for achievements. They enhance the competence and self-confidence of those around them. Provide choices (freedom is the ability to make choices) and foster personal responsibility and accountability.
5. Encourage the Heart. Genuine acts of caring, whether exhibited in dramatic gestures or simple actions, uplift people’s spirits and keep them motivated. It is part of a leader’s job to recognize contributions by showing appreciation for individual excellence. Adopt a winning attitude and expect the best out of people. Create a spirit of community; Human beings are social animals—hardwired to connect with others. People are meant to do things together, to form communities, and in this way demonstrate a common bond. When social connections are strong and numerous, there’s more trust, reciprocity, information flow, collective action, happiness, and greater prosperity. Supportive relationships at work—relationships characterized by a genuine belief in and advocacy for the interests of others—are critically important to maintaining personal and organizational vitality.
The book concludes with a critical statement: Leadership development is self-development. Leadership is fundamentally about your relationships, your credibility, and what you do. Leadership has everything to do about how you behave.
The 5 fundamentals for learning leadership are: Believe you can, Aspire to excel, Challenge yourself, Engage support, and Practice deliberately.
December 15, 2022
Solid, moving ideas but seriously stale and repetitive writing.
March 6, 2024
This book was pretty good. It does an excellent job tying together empirics and narratives. I’ve personally used many of their strategies to great success. Their thesis is certainly true: anyone can be a great leader using certain practices. Ultimately, caring for others and a belief in yourself and something greater is key to all great things.
May 11, 2024
This book was required reading for my GENE 402 class. This book helped me to see that everyone has the innate skills to be a leader. However, not everyone shows the qualities of a good leader. Even fewer those of a great leader. Kouzes and Posner don't just state facts and figures like boring stereo instructions, they sprinkle in real-life stories of everyday leaders and things they have done to be known as good or great leaders.
September 20, 2022
Everyone is born a leader. One does not need to be a CEO, business owner or an important person to exhibit leadership traits. Authors provide very good examples of ordinary people showing leadership in their day to day lives. They walk us through different leadership traits and how one can lead in each of these dimensions by following few fundamental guidelines.
August 13, 2024
This is a really helpful book for those beginning their leadership journey and for those teaching about leadership. The authors provide descriptions of what makes a leader using data through studies they conducted and they provide essential characteristics, values and traits a leader can develop to become a leader in the eyes of others.
July 9, 2021
Great advice and the concepts outlined in this book are very useful and make you start thinking. However, there is a lot of repetition and the same concepts are repeated over and over again using different words, hence only 4 stars.
October 7, 2021
i’m not usually a “self help book” kind of person, but i really appreciate show current this was in regard to the pandemic and a lot of the unrest in our country right now. i feel like i’m going to be able to adapt a lot from this book into my own life.
February 4, 2023
A great book on transformational leadership. If you're not familiar with Kouzes and Posner, you definitely need to read this book! if you're already familiar with their work and previous reads, this is a good revisit.
November 29, 2023
Was an assigned reading, but I honestly really enjoyed going through it every week! Got some good tidbits of information from it, as well as a neat little five-step leadership framework to refer to and evaluate myself with. Good read!
May 5, 2024
A very accessible book about a dense subject, with specific, actionable steps on how to implement its principles. One of the better sets of readings I had to read for my leadership class in graduate school. Recommend.
July 22, 2024
I really liked that this book was based on different studies. I also found this book easy to read and very tangible. I would highly recommend it if you're looking for ways to become a better leader. The ideas within this book are achievable for anyone.
January 1, 2025
This book was different from most leadership books, because the stories aren't all about famous people and companies doing grand things. That makes it a little boring, but it's nice to be reminded of the simple things we can do to be good leaders.
March 8, 2021
Excellent advice on being a leader every day and in every circumstance.
December 10, 2021
Practical learning is the most effective. There is no substitute for experience.
January 16, 2022
I thought there were good reminders of things we may already know to be true.
April 2, 2022
This book was a nice condensed version of the Leadership Challenge. It could probably have used a bit mor editing but I still enjoyed this new take on the 5 practices of exemplary leaders.
November 10, 2022
I actually really appreciated the insight of this. I found a lot of good suggestions and guidance for leadership.
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April 13, 2023It states that leadership is not for few people, it's everybody's cup of tea. If you are following certain paths you will be a leader.
February 6, 2024
Kind of manipulative. Had to read for school
March 22, 2024
Very repetitive messages, not a huge fan tbh
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews