By Jess Lancaster & Scott Schmerer

Welcome technology leaders to 2020 and the new decade, or “Tech-ade” as we’d like to call it! Start the new decade off right by downloading some new knowledge and growing into the best leader you can be. One great way to level up your leadership skill is reading new books and applying what you learn from them. 

We often read books, both individually and as a part of book clubs, to grow personally and professionally. Even if you are not managing people you will benefit from the wisdom and tools from books on our must-read list. These books will enable you to engage in more productive conversations, improve team motivation, share candid feedback, lead with vulnerability, and set goals more effectively.

We consider these books to be transformative in upskilling our ability to lead ourselves and others. So, let’s get rolling on our five must-read books for the new “Tech-ade.”

Crucial Conversations 

By Patterson, Grenny, McMillan, Switzler

Crucial Conversations tackles the space between opposing opinions, strong emotions, and high stakes. While people often avoid discussions deemed challenging or difficult this book speaks to facing the fears and engaging with tools to navigate those conversations effectively. Learn to start with your heart, clearly state your path, explore others’ paths, and move to a place of action. Try reading Crucial Conversations as part of a book club and practice what you read with others!  

Primed to Perform

By Lindsay McGregor and Neel Doshi

Primed to Perform centers on the value of highly motivated employees as well as offering a way to put a number to how motivated you and your team are via their Total Motivation formula. The positive factors that make up the formula are: Play (how enjoyable is your work to you), Purpose (how well your work aligns with your personal values), and Potential (how valuable do you see this work to your future). The negative factors that decrease the score are: Emotional Pressure (are you trying hard at work to avoid disappointing someone), Economic Pressure (how much does your livelihood depend on getting rewards), and Inertia (how much are you just doing that work because that is what you were doing the day before). Primed to Perform helps you find ways to increase the positive motivators for your team and to reduce or avoid creating demotivating factors in the workplace.

Radical Candor

By Kim Scott

Sharing candid feedback with those around you is challenging – for both the one sharing and recipient. Radical Candor  truly challenges the way you think about feedback and Scott’s four quadrant diagram ensures the concepts in the book stick very well. Learn how important it is to “care personally” and “challenge directly” when you want your feedback to be heard by the person with whom you are sharing it. If you believe impactful feedback is critical to being an effective leader, Scott’s approach is worth a read.

Dare to Lead

By Brené Brown

In Dare to Lead, Brené explains how strong leadership requires healthy vulnerability to be shared at work. She shows the importance of being introspective and understanding your own personal values. Aligning those values with the work you do and your environment help build you as a leader. At the same time, she brings an important focus to emotions in the workplace and why great leaders will create psychological safety within their teams. Reading Dare to Lead is a great way to understand the destructive power of shame in a team’s morale and productivity.

Your Best Year Ever

By Michael Hyatt

Goal setting is a challenge for many people. In Your Best Year Ever, Hyatt breaks down the process for setting goals by exploring the beliefs that are holding you back, thinking backwards to the past, and designing your future. His focus on finding your “Why” helps the reader anchor “What” they want to do to a broader purpose. This book includes practical tools, such as achievement and habit goal templates, and a life score assessment to determine areas in life where you see yourself doing well and where you need improvement. Start the year off right by planning your best year ever!

Scott Schmerer joined TechSmith as a Software Engineer in 2005. In the time since, he has written code on many of TechSmith’s product development teams, including Snagit, Camtasia, Morae, Fuse, and TechSmith Cloud. That experience and the challenge of helping teams improve interpersonally and technically have led him to serve teams as a Development Manager. These days Scott is spending his time driving his team’s psychological safety and focusing on automated testing.

Jess Lancaster is the QA Manager at TechSmith, the makers of Snagit, Camtasia, and other visual communication software applications. With more than twenty years of information systems and software consulting experience, Jess has been a consultant, test lead, and test manager with government, financial, insurance, and commercial software organizations. A frequent meetup and conference speaker, Jess is the Co-founder of the Lansing Area Software Testers meetup. He has also helped grow the next generation of software testers by creating and teaching software testing courses at Lansing Community College.