The Boldly Inclusive Leader: Transform Your Workplace (and the World) by Valuing the Differences Within

by Minette Norman

Overview

To create cultures where diverse teams flourish, we need boldly inclusive leaders.

Organizations have made public commitments to diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, yet their leaders rarely have the skills to lead inclusively. Leadership consultant and former Silicon Valley executive Minette Norman is committed to changing that by sharing some of the most important things she's discovered over the decades she spent in the corporate world, such as

- every human being needs to feel they belong,

- teams thrive when everyone feels safe enough to share their unique ideas and experiences,

- innovation is a group activity,

- empathy and compassion are leadership superpowers, and

- leaders set the tone by what they say, do, reward, and tolerate.

This is not a book about quick fixes or paying lip service to the hot topic of inclusion. This is for leaders who want to boldly transform the workplace and are willing to leave their comfort zones. As a leader, you will learn to maximize your team's potential and appreciate that inclusive leadership is an ongoing journey. As Minette shows, there is no flipping a switch or a neat, three-step formula. Inclusive leadership takes commitment and practice, but the rewards are enormous.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781632999993
Publisher:	River Grove Books
Publication date:	02/11/2025
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.46(d)

About the Author

Minette Norman is an inclusive leadership consultant and keynote speaker who spent the first thirty years of her professional career in the software industry. What she ultimately discovered was that she was far more interested in human interaction and workplace culture than technology. She also recognized how rare it is for leaders to foster an environment that leverages everyone’s talents, ideas, and diverse viewpoints. Starting her own consulting practice was prompted by her desire to help as many organizations as possible embrace a model of inclusive leadership with a strong foundation of psychological safety.
     A highly sought-after speaker, Minette has inspired audiences around the world to challenge the status quo and embrace a new model of leadership focused on human connection, empathy, and curiosity. Minette’s professional recognition includes being named one of the “Most Influential Women in Bay Area Business” in 2017 by the San Francisco Business Times and as “Business Role Model of the Year” in the 2018 Women in IT/Silicon Valley Awards.
     With Dr. Karolin Helbig, Minette has coauthored a book about psychological safety for leaders, The Psychological Safety Playbook: Lead More Powerfully by Being More Human.
     Minette lives in Marin County in the San Francisco Bay Area with her husband. She is an avid hiker, knitter, and reader.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Minette Norman has written the definitive book that approaches leadership as a fundamentally human act. Brimming with practical advice, positive energy, and necessary lessons in empathy, The Boldly Inclusive Leader will help anyone become a better leader in work and life.”
–David Sax, best-selling author of The Future Is Analog

“Through powerful stories and a compelling call-to-action, Minette Norman has written the must-read book on inclusive leadership. Every manager, leader, and executive needs to read this book and put its lessons into practice.”
—Frances X. Frei, Harvard Business School professor, coauthor of Unleashed

“Like Minette, I had a moment in my career when I felt my company was telling me to ‘sit down and shut up.’ If you’re a leader who wants to hire the best people for the job and then inspire them to do their best work rather than silencing them, Minette outlines the steps you can take. A labor of love!”
—Kim Scott, best-selling author of Just Work and Radical Candor

“Written with true heart, compassion, and authenticity, and filled with real-world examples, Minette Norman’s wisdom shines through as she shares with us all the ways in which we can be more human, inclusive leaders. This book is a must-read for people who want to lead effectively in the twenty-first century.”
—Maria Giudice, executive coach, coauthor of Changemakers and Rise of the DEO

“Unlock the secrets of inclusive leadership with The Boldly Inclusive Leader—a book that will give you the tools to be a fervent challenger of the status quo and a true leader of change.”
—Jay Van Bavel, author of The Power of Us: Harnessing Our Shared Identities to Improve Performance, Increase Cooperation, and Promote Social Harmony; professor, New York University

“Amid a sea of DEI books that drone on with the same, tired conceptual frameworks, this is a gem of hope. Norman has masterfully gone beyond the conceptual and created a realistic and actionable blueprint every leader can employ in their day-to-day leadership practice. The Boldly Inclusive Leader shares ten transformative steps that move inclusive leadership from a theory into a thoughtful, disciplined practice that will create an immediate difference in who we are as leaders and how we lead. If you are ready to take your leadership to the next level, you need this book.”  
-Cindy Solomon, founder and CEO, the Courageous Leadership Institute

“This book is a powerful call to action for leaders to cast aside invulnerability—and connect with people on an essential human level. Full of meaningful prompts, stories, and tips, Minette Norman shows all of us that becoming an inclusive leader doesn’t need to be an overwhelming proposition. Small, consistent changes can make a big difference.”
—Selena Rezvani, author of Pushback and The Next Generation of Women Leaders; columnist for NBC’s Know Your Value

“In The Boldly Inclusive Leader, Minette Norman models the very humility and empathy she describes in inclusive leaders. Weaving together the research on inclusive leadership and her personal moments of success and growth as a leader in prominent tech organizations, Norman teaches us how to be the manager, mentor, and ally we need and want to be. In most practical terms, too, she shares with us what we can ask and do as daily practice to embody the inclusive leader. Eminently useful and inspirational, The Boldly Inclusive Leader is an essential guide for any leader of diverse teams.”
–Julie des Jardins, PhD, senior consultant at Paradigm, author of American Queenmaker and The Madame Curie Complex

“It’s easy to say that we need more inclusivity at work. It’s also easy to point fingers at where it needs to be better, and it’s even easy to say, ‘I want to be more inclusive as I lead.’ I think the reason we have so few truly inclusive leaders is because it’s hard, or at least it looks hard to deliver with consistency. Complete with daily practices, Minette’s book beautifully cracks the code and lays out a step-by-step path for this previously complicated or seemingly unnavigable journey. This is a book that I energetically recommend for the executive trying to understand their role in this everchanging leadership landscape, or the trainers, coaches, and leader-developers out there who are tasked with supporting our leaders to think differently and be better.”
–Hal Adler, CEO, Leadership Landing

 

Editorial Reviews

2024-05-09
Leadership consultant and speaker Norman offers a book of practical tips and stories about inclusivity and how to employ it as a business leader.

Over a 30-year career in the software industry, the author has learned a lot about leadership, and this book’s 10 chapters each tackle a subject with advice on how to take inclusive leadership from theory to practice by setting the proper tone, getting comfortable with discomfort (“Your first step could be to try to understand what is making you so uncomfortable. One obvious reason is realizing that you are not an expert in diversity, equity, and inclusion”), learning to listen, building trust, employing empathy and compassion, welcoming all voices, embracing differences, running inclusive meetings, mentoring (“To what degree am I willing to learn from others, rather than being the expert leader?”), and being bold. All are important topics for leaders seeking to embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion, and the author presents each in an engaging format, using stories from her career, research she’s done along the way, accounts of real-life applications, and, at the end of each chapter, daily and weekly exercises on the topic at hand, as well as self-reflective questions. The book combines the practices and questions into a single list at the end of the book, too—a small but thoughtful addition that makes the material easily accessible. Indeed, the book’s overall structure is inviting and easy to follow, and chapters can valuably be read in order or separately, although the chapters do effectively build upon one another when read in sequence. Norman’s prose style is easygoing, with reader-friendly elements including pull quotes on many pages for easy access (such as “You show up as an inclusive leader every day, not just when it’s convenient”). Norman’s anecdotes from her own executive career are pertinent and engaging.

A book that offers a pleasing and effective mix of psychology, experience-based wisdom, and helpful advice to create a happier and more productive workplace.

Kirkus Reviews