Leadership by Proxy” by Poonam Barua is a pioneering book that lays an archival milestone for creating a “brave new mindset” in corporate India and businesses worldwide -- that will genuinely embrace “balanced leadership” as a true goal of corporate enterprise, validate and verify equal opportunity with meritocracy, respect inclusive growth for women who form 50% of the world population, and best practices in the workplace that will reject homogenous all-male corporate leadership as a fundamental economic function – to bring optimum rewards of diversity to business growth and societal progress. The book is a steady and seminal personal narrative – with compelling corporate anecdotes and case studies – that provide a multi-faceted kaleidascope of how the women of corporate India have been progressively finding their voices in an unequal corporate world, collectively redefining gender-sensitive leadership, and aspiring for board positions – in hallways that have kept the women out of decision-making for over 100 years. The book is recommended reading for all business leaders, professionals, academics, acitivists, ngo's, women and men– who are looking for insights, perspectives, and roadmaps to build a vibrant common future – where differences are respected, and conservative leadership paradigms are re-defined by real-time changing, dynamic and vibrant stakeholders. “Its my time now !

The paths that leaders walk significantly influence their success, offering differential opportunities and challenges. While conventional wisdom suggests that leadership styles and approaches may be equally effective across all situations, more recent research demonstrates the importance of employing strategies more specifically aligned with the context. This book offers critical insights and strategies, currently missing from the repertoire of leaders and their supporters, for managing across six distinct paths into leadership positions: promoted, hired, elected, appointed, founded, and family legacy. It illustrates lessons drawn from within and across paths, presented through themes, quotes, and stories drawn from interviews with over 60 successful leaders (executives, politicians, entrepreneurs, and more). While it is evident that these paths differ, those who study, hire, mentor, and coach leaders rarely consider the distinctions, nor suggest what may be learned across the paths. The emerging leaders, HR professionals, researchers, and coaches among the book’s readers will learn not only from those who have walked one particular path, but also from the experiences of those trekking in other directions. Most leaders will cross from one path to another over the course of their career. Some executives interviewed for the book worked their way up the ladder in one company, only to be recruited to fill a C-suite position in another company. Others were appointed to high-level government positions after stints as elected officials. The authors identify major distinctions when moving across the six paths. By reading this book, leaders and those who support them will develop greater self-awareness about each path so they can better leverage and manage their new challenges and opportunities from the first day in their new leadership position.

Most of us can recall a time when we pretended to be sick to reap the benefits that go along with illness. By playing sick, we gained sympathy, care, and attention, and were excused from our responsibilities. Though doing so on occasion is considered normal, there are those who carry their deceptions to the extreme. In this book, Dr. Marc Feldman describes people’s strange motivations to fabricate or induce illness or injury to satisfy deep emotional needs. Doctors, family members, and friends are lured into a costly, frustrating, and potentially deadly web of deceit. From the mother who shaves her child’s head and tells her community he has cancer, to the co-worker who suffers from a string of incomprehensible "tragedies," to the false epilepsy victim who monopolizes her online support group, "disease forgery" is ever-present in the media and in many people’s lives. In Dying to be Ill: True Stories of Medical Deception, Dr. Feldman, with the assistance of Gregory Yates, has chronicled this fascinating world as well as the paths to healing. With insight developed from 25 years of hands-on experience, Dying to be Ill is sure to stand as a classic in the field.

Successful change in the public sector can be supported or hindered by political and administrative leadership, individual and group motivation, and the public’s perception of the effectiveness of public officials and government structures. But do the very characteristics of public sector organizations present obstacles to successful transformative change? This book assesses the current state of the literature on leadership and change in government and public policy, and introduces the reader to innovative new ways to demonstrate leadership in times of change. Contributions from accomplished scholars in the field cover the traditional public administration areas of performance and management, as well as the diversity of issues that surround public leadership and change, both domestic and global. Chapters on public sector innovation, performance leadership, governance networks, complexity in disaster management, change initiatives in educational systems and local government, citizen advisory bodies, and gender and race equality, to name but a few, provide important case studies throughout the volume. Leadership and Change in Public Sector Organizations will be required reading for upper level undergraduate and graduate courses in public administration/management, leadership, and public policy analysis.

The legitimate use of force is generally presumed to be the realm of the state. However, the flourishing role of the private sector in security over the last twenty years has brought this into question. In this book Deborah Avant examines the privatization of security and its impact on the control of force. She describes the growth of private security companies, explains how the industry works, and describes its range of customers – including states, non-government organisations and commercial transnational corporations. She charts the inevitable trade-offs that the market for force imposes on the states, firms and people wishing to control it, suggests a new way to think about the control of force, and offers a model of institutional analysis that draws on both economic and sociological reasoning. The book contains case studies drawn from the US and Europe as well as Africa and the Middle East.