Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting Out of the Box

Since it’s original publication nine years ago, Leadership and Self-Deception has become an international word-of-mouth phenomenon. Rather than tapering off, it has sold more copies each year since 2004 than it did in any of the first four years after publication. The book’s central insight—that the key to leadership lays not in what we do, but in who we are—has proved to have powerful resonances not only for organizational leadership, but in readers’ personal lives as well. Leadership and Self-Deception uses an entertaining story about an executive facing challenges at work and at home to expose the precise psychological processes that conceal our true motivations and intentions from us and trap us in a “box” of endless self-justification. Most importantly, the book shows us the way out.

This new edition has been revised throughout to make the story more readable and compelling. And drawing on the extensive correspondence they’re received over the years the authors have added a section that outlines the many ways that readers have been using Leadership and Self-Deception, focusing on five specific areas: hiring, teambuilding, conflict resolution, accountability, and personal growth and development.

Leadership and Self-Deception uses an entertaining story about an executive facing challenges at work and at home to expose the precise psychological processes that conceal our true motivations and intentions from us and trap us in a “box” of endless self-justification. Most importantly, the book shows us the way out. The book’s central insight—that the key to leadership lays not in what we do, but in who we are—has proved to have powerful resonances not only for organizational leadership, but in readers’ personal lives as well.

This new edition has been revised throughout to make the story more readable and compelling. And drawing on the extensive correspondence they’re received over the years the authors have added a section that outlines the many ways that readers have been using this book.

Arbinger is a worldwide institute that helps organizations, families, individuals, and communities solve the problems created by self-deception. The Institute is led internationally by Jim Ferrell, Duane Boyce, Paul Smith, and Terry Warner. Local managing directors guide Arbinger's work in territories around the world. Headquartered in Woods Cross, Utah, Arbinger has international operations in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Israel, India, Singapore, Australia, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Mexico, Canada and Bermuda.

Contents

Preface    vii

Part I    Self-Deception and the “Box”

    1    Bud    3

    2    A Problem    7

    3    Self-Deception    10

    4    The Problem beneath Other Problems    17

    5    Beneath Effective Leadership    21

    6    The Deep Choice That Determines Influence    31

    7    People or Objects    41

    8    Doubt    49

Part II    How We Get in the Box

    9    Kate    59

    10    Questions    61

    11    Self-Betrayal    64

    12    Characteristics of Self-Betrayal    72

    13    Life in the Box    81

    14    Collusion    91

    15    Box Focus    104

    16    Box Problems    108

Part III    How We Get Out of the Box

    17    Lou    117

    18    Leadership in the Box    121

    19    Toward Being Out of the Box    126

    20    Dead Ends    129

    21    The Way Out    140

    22    Leadership Out of the Box    149

    23    Birth of a Leader    159

    24    Another Chance    163

    Index        172

About THE ARBINGER INSTITUTE    169

How to Use LEADERSHIP AND SELF-DECEPTION    169

Share Your Story    169