Blog Archives
Leadership Mindset
Adventures in Leadership offers reflections on leadership based on outdoor misadventures, near misses, and hard-won moments of perspective. Why was this an important book for you to write?
It was important for me to write Adventures in Leadership because the most meaningful leadership lessons I’ve learned didn’t come from a conference room; they came from real experiences, often in moments where things didn’t go as planned.
Over the years, I realized those moments, missteps, pressure, and uncertainty had more to teach than any formal training ever could. And if I could capture those lessons in a way that was honest and relatable, I believed it could help other leaders navigate their own challenges a little more effectively.
At its core, I wanted to show that leadership isn’t about titles or ego. It’s about how you show up for people, especially when things get hard. And if sharing my experiences helps someone lead with a little more humility, awareness, or intention, then the book did exactly what I hoped it would.
Many chapters end with clear takeaways—how important was it for you to keep the lessons practical and actionable?
That was incredibly important to me. I didn’t want to write a book that just sounded good; I wanted to write one that people could actually use.
There’s no shortage of leadership content out there, but a lot of it lives in theory. My goal was to bridge that gap between insight and action. After each chapter, I wanted the reader to walk away with something they could apply immediately, whether that’s a shift in mindset, a better conversation, or a small change in how they lead their team.
Because to me, leadership only really matters if it shows up in how you operate day to day. If someone can read a chapter and then go lead a little more effectively that same week, that’s where the real value is.
Was there a particular experience—like getting off trail or a near miss—that changed your leadership mindset the most?
There are a few moments that stand out, things like a river rescue or a near miss on Half Dome, but honestly, it wasn’t any single experience that changed my leadership mindset. It was the accumulation of those moments over time.
What I started to realize is that, in both the outdoors and leadership, things rarely go perfectly. People make mistakes, plans change, and pressure shows up when you least expect it. And instead of seeing that as something to eliminate, I began to see it as something to lead through.
That shift carried over into how I led my teams. I wanted people to feel like they could be human, that they didn’t have to be perfect to be valuable. Because when people feel trusted, supported, and appreciated for what they bring to the table, they perform better, they grow faster, and they show up more fully.
So those experiences didn’t change me overnight, but they reshaped how I define what good leadership actually looks like.
If readers remember only one lesson from Adventures in Leadership, what do you hope it is?
If there’s one thing I hope readers take away, it’s that leadership isn’t about a title or being perfect, it’s about how you show up for people.
The most meaningful leadership happens in real moments, when things are messy, when there’s pressure, when someone needs support. That’s where trust is built, and that human connection, especially through adversity, is what people actually remember.
If someone walks away understanding that they can lead right where they are, by being present, by being real, and by valuing the people around them, then that’s the lesson that matters most.
Author Links: GoodReads | Amazon
After more than two decades leading teams in the corporate world, Brent Witthuhn discovered something unexpected: the moments that shaped him most as a leader didn’t come from strategy meetings or spreadsheets; they came from the outdoors.
From getting lost on remote trails…
To pushing through exhaustion, uncertainty, and failure…
To learning firsthand what it really means to lead when things don’t go according to plan…
Adventures in Leadership is a collection of real stories from the trail, each paired with a powerful, practical leadership lesson you can apply immediately in your life and work.
Inside, you’ll discover how to:
Stay calm and lead through uncertainty
Take ownership when things go wrong
Build trust and support within a team
Adapt when the plan falls apart
Grow through both success and failure
Written in a clear, relatable style, this book feels less like a lecture and more like sitting around a campfire, hearing stories that stick with you long after they’re told.
Whether you’re a seasoned leader, an aspiring professional, or simply someone looking to grow, Adventures in Leadership will challenge you to think differently about leadership, and remind you that the best lessons are often learned when you step off the beaten path.
Adventures in Leadership
Adventures in Leadership is a short, clear-eyed book of leadership reflections built from outdoor misadventures, near misses, and hard-won moments of perspective. Brent Witthuhn structures it as a series of trail stories that turn into leadership lessons, so a wrong turn on the Buffalo River Trail becomes a meditation on admitting you’re off course, a freezing night in the Ozarks becomes an argument for preparing beyond best-case scenarios, and a tense river rescue becomes a case for calm, immediate action when someone is in real trouble. The governing idea is simple and sincere: leadership is less about authority than responsibility, less about appearing strong than staying present, steady, and useful when conditions turn.
What I liked most is that the book’s moral vision is earnest without feeling cynical or slick. Witthuhn returns again and again to humility, care, and attentiveness, and while those aren’t radical ideas, he gives them enough lived texture that they land. I found myself responding especially to the chapters where he resists the fantasy of the infallible leader. The scene where he realizes he’s wandered onto the Old River Trail, the Half Dome descent where a dehydrated hiker has to be helped down, and the story of trying to help novice backpackers without taking over all work because they expose the small vanities that leadership can hide inside. He’s at his strongest when he lets embarrassment, fatigue, and uncertainty stay on the page. Those moments give the book its credibility, and they also make it warmer than a standard business parable.
The writing has an easy, quotable cadence, and many chapters end with clean takeaways. The book has a predictable rhythm: vivid outdoor setup, distilled lesson, and practical challenge. That rhythm makes the book accessible. Some insights are genuinely sharp, especially the warning against reacting to imagined threats instead of facts, or the chapter on sunk cost disguised as commitment when the river was clearly signaling danger. I admired the plainspoken conviction of the book. It’s not trying to impress me with theory. It’s trying to tell the truth as the author has learned it, and that honesty carries real weight.
Adventures in Leadership is less a grand argument than a companionable field guide to character. It doesn’t pretend leadership can be mastered once and for all. Instead, it makes a modest, sturdy case that people remember who stayed calm, who shared the load, who told the truth when the map no longer matched the trail. I’d recommend it to new managers, team leads, mentors, coaches, and really anyone who prefers leadership writing with dirt under its nails and a little weather in its voice. It left me with the sense that the author means what he says, and that, in a book like this, matters a great deal.
Pages:75 | ASIN : B0GDJF3Q6V
Storytelling for Leadership & Influence
Jeff Evans’s Storytelling for Leadership & Influence is, at heart, a leadership book about how people make meaning under pressure. Using episodes from his own life, from a teenage moment in a television studio to Reagan-era campaign work, a presidential motorcade, ministry, collapse, reinvention, and a late return to wonder, he argues that leadership is less about raw authority than about framing reality so other people can move with clarity, trust, and purpose. The book is organized deliberately, moving from outward-facing lessons on clarity, precision, and narrative into more interior territory involving failure, identity, purpose, and restoration, with each section built around story, reflection, and practical application.
What I admired most is that Evans understands something many leadership writers don’t: ideas land harder when they arrive wearing a lived scene. The book’s best passages have real cinematic charge. I kept thinking of the Diag rally, where a handful of students with Reagan signs alter the emotional center of a carefully staged Mondale event, and of the motorcade sequence, where a briefing room full of plain instructions turns into a lasting meditation on how “the hidden formation makes everything possible.” Those moments aren’t just anecdotes; they are the principles. Evans is especially good at noticing atmosphere, posture, pacing, and the way meaning gathers before anyone speaks. That gives the prose texture and lift.
The book’s central ideas about clarity, precision, and narrative aren’t radically new, but Evans gives them moral weight by tying them to character rather than technique. His point that people don’t merely hear leaders, they read them through preparation, steadiness, and follow-through, comes through vividly in the Marine One material, where precision itself becomes a kind of silent language. And I liked that the book doesn’t stay in the safer register of public communication. It turns inward and insists that leadership frays when the private story and the public one split apart. That gives the later sections on collapse, repositioning, and restoration a deeper pulse. My hesitation is that readers who don’t share Evans’s political or faith sensibilities may occasionally feel the book narrowing around his worldview. Still, even when I didn’t fully share the frame, I respected the seriousness with which he asks what story a person is living, and whether that story can actually bear the weight placed on it.
I came away thinking this is a thoughtful, earnest, unusually personal leadership book that succeeds because it refuses to separate influence from integrity. It has a storyteller’s eye, a strategist’s instinct for framing, and, beneath both, a genuine preoccupation with steadiness, purpose, and earned trust. I never doubted the book’s sincerity or its hard-won intelligence. I’d recommend it especially to leaders, communicators, pastors, campaign people, founders, and anyone trying to guide others through ambiguity without becoming performative about it. It’s a book for readers who care not just about how to speak, but about how to stand.
Pages: 214 | ASIN : B0GDQDYLJ9
Brave and Afraid
In Charismatic Presence, you offer actionable advice for becoming a more effective and authentic public speaker. Why was this an important book for you to write?
After over two decades working with professionals from across diverse industries– IT, Financial Services, Medical, Entrepreneurial–it felt like it was high time that I synthesized and put into writing the foundational principles I’ve learned and taught around maximizing presence and presentation skills. I see this book as part of my legacy, and hope that its availability can help people anywhere (and any time) find the answers, guidance, and courage they need to step up and share their genuine selves and important ideas on public stages. Writing this book is also a response to all of my coaching and training clients who have bugged me for years to write a book they can refer to when they need some guidance and bolstering, and I’m not there to give it to them!
Can you share with us a little about the research that went into putting your book together?
The content of my book was informed in three ways:
- By my first-hand experience as a young professional actress in NYC and Hollywood, who had to learn the hard way how to bring a more confident, consistent presence to my auditions and interviews
- By the countless hours I’ve spent over the past two-plus decades figuring out how to help hundreds of business professionals, entrepreneurs, and thought leaders (not to mention some scared-to-speak-in-public teens, fathers-of-the-bride-speech-givers, and don’t-make-me-do-it deliverers of wedding toasts) manage their limiting beliefs about presenting, create awesome pitches and presentations, and deliver them with confidence and clarity in high-stakes scenarios
- Many wonderful books and articles that have allowed me to expand, bolster and affirm the basic principles of my work
What is one misconception you believe many people have about overcoming their apprehensions regarding public speaking?
I think one of the biggest misconceptions held by many people is that they need to completely overcome nervousness before speaking to a group. Everyone, including the most seasoned speakers, sometimes feel some level of pre-show “jitters” or adrenaline boost before they step into spotlight moments–it’s a natural physiological response to the situation. Trying to be 100% calm before you start is an impossible goal to hit, and can actually increase anxiety. The key is not to try to get rid of the feeling, but to work with it and find ways to not only minimize it but to manage and channel it into energy, focus, and connection with your audience of one or many. You can be both brave and afraid at the same time! Having the tools to manage those pre-show “jitters” can go a long way at amping up that bravery, which is one of the things I teach in my book.
What is one thing you hope readers are able to take away from your experiences?
That their wisdom, perspective, and big ideas matter; and that by honoring the five principles I share in the book, they really can show up, step up, and speak up on a public platform in an authentic, accessible manner that can make their message (and their presence) magnetic and memorable.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Website | Amazon
Drawing on her diverse background in theater, music, and executive coaching, Eleni Kelakos presents a five-principle process to help you develop a Charismatic Presence that commands attention and inspires action. With real-world examples, actionable exercises, and proven techniques, this book is a roadmap to conquering your fears, connecting deeply with your audience, and becoming a truly magnetic communicator.
Charismatic Presence
Eleni Kelakos’ Charismatic Presence is a practical, personal, and surprisingly heartfelt guide to becoming a more effective, engaging, and authentic public speaker. Built around five core principles: Know Thyself, Be Thyself, Prepare Thyself, Commit Thyself, and Turn Thyself On, the book walks readers through the psychological and physical terrain of presence and presentation. With stories from her own life as a performer and coach, Kelakos fuses actor training, business communication, and personal development into a coaching experience that feels as intimate as a one-on-one session and as comprehensive as a classroom.
What struck me most about this book was how deeply human it felt. Kelakos doesn’t hide behind buzzwords or corporate polish. She opens with vulnerable stories of stage fright and failure, like forgetting lyrics at Shea Stadium, and threads that same humility throughout the text. She writes like someone who’s been in the trenches and genuinely wants you to succeed, not just to be a better speaker, but a braver, more grounded version of yourself. Her voice is clear and unpretentious, which makes the content not just accessible but inviting. I found myself laughing, wincing, nodding, often on the same page; that’s rare in a business book.
Where the book really shines is in its actionable advice. The exercises don’t feel like filler. They actually helped me reflect on my own habits and hang-ups when I speak. Kelakos’ concept of “the lies that bind,” those internal voices that whisper you’re not good enough, was especially powerful. Her approach to turning those lies into “power phrases” wasn’t just feel-good fluff. It felt doable. Her tips on preparation, from warming up your physical and vocal presence to structuring a talk, are the kind of grounded guidance I wish I’d had ten years ago. Sometimes the tone leans into cheerleader territory, but honestly, it works.
If you’re someone who freezes at the thought of public speaking, or even someone who does it often but feels stuck in a rut, Charismatic Presence is worth your time. It’s for anyone who wants to feel more like themselves in the spotlight, not some polished robot or shallow “thought leader.” I’d especially recommend it to leaders, coaches, entrepreneurs, or anyone who finds themselves needing to inspire or persuade others. Kelakos reminds us that charisma isn’t about being loud or flashy. It’s about being present. And that’s something anyone can learn.
Pages: 168 | ISBN : 978-1966168218
Connected: A Guide for Leading in a More Human Way
Jami Varela’s Connected: A Guide for Leading in a More Human Way is a refreshingly candid and insightful guide to leadership that challenges the outdated, robotic style of management and replaces it with something far more meaningful, human connection. The book is built around a simple but powerful idea: great leadership isn’t about control, it’s about empathy, trust, and real relationships. Drawing from personal experiences, Varela takes readers through the highs and lows of her own leadership journey, making this book feel less like a manual and more like a conversation with a mentor who’s been in the trenches.
One of the book’s biggest strengths is its honesty. From the book’s introduction, Varela lays it all out: being a top performer in your field doesn’t automatically make you a good leader. Her story of transitioning from a superstar sales rep to a struggling manager is both relatable and eye-opening. She describes the frustration of suddenly feeling incompetent in a new role, a feeling many professionals experience but rarely talk about. I appreciated how she didn’t sugarcoat the difficulties of leadership but instead offered real, actionable ways to navigate them. The chapter The Path to Compassionate Leadership was especially compelling, showing how vulnerability and self-awareness can turn a struggling manager into a true leader.
The book is also packed with humor and real-world wisdom. Chapter titles like Don’t Bring Fear to the Village People and 1980 Called. They Want Their Leadership Style Back makes it clear that Varela isn’t here to lecture, she’s here to shake things up. One of my favorite sections, Golden Globe Best Supporting Actor, emphasizes how leadership often requires showing up as your best self, even on days when you don’t feel like it. Her ability to blend humor with hard truths makes Connected an engaging read, and I found myself nodding (and sometimes laughing) as she called out common leadership mistakes in a way that felt constructive rather than judgmental.
What sets Connected apart from other leadership books is its focus on emotional intelligence. Varela doesn’t just tell you to “be a better leader;” she breaks down exactly how to do it, how to build trust, how to give and receive feedback without fear, and how to lead with both confidence and compassion. The chapter Unlicensed Therapist stood out to me because it tackles something few leadership books address: the emotional baggage that employees bring to work. Instead of dismissing personal struggles as “not my problem,” Varela encourages leaders to create a supportive environment while maintaining healthy boundaries. This approach is not only refreshing but necessary in today’s workplace.
Connected: A Guide for Leading in a More Human Way is a must-read for anyone who wants to lead in a way that actually works, whether you’re a first-time manager or a seasoned executive looking to revamp your leadership style. Varela makes it clear that leadership isn’t about having all the answers; it’s about building real connections, earning trust, and fostering an environment where people can thrive. If you’re tired of old-school, fear-based management tactics and want to lead in a way that feels natural and fulfilling, this book is for you.
Pages: 112 | ISBN : 978-1544546223
Be Human, Lead Human: How to Connect People and Performance
In her book, Be Human, Lead Human: How to Connect People and Performance, Jennifer Nash, Ph.D., brings a distinctive and deeply personal perspective to the topic of leadership. Drawing on her own experiences and contemplations, Nash takes the reader on a journey to explore what it truly means to lead with a sense of humanity in an era where traditional leadership methodologies often seem inadequate.
Nash’s narrative is not just a recount of her own journey; it serves as a catalyst for delving into the ethos and practices of Human Leadership. The book is peppered with engaging anecdotes and reflective insights that highlight the importance of empathy, authenticity, and connection in leadership roles. One of the book’s strengths lies in its emphasis on actionable advice. Nash opts for providing a constructive roadmap for evolving leadership practices, steering clear of merely critiquing conventional methods.
The inclusion of self-assessment exercises and “Pro Tips” throughout the book actively engages the reader, offering them tangible steps to enhance their leadership skills with compassion and effectiveness. Nash’s writing style is approachable and relatable, successfully weaving personal stories with professional insights. Her vivid descriptions, such as the image of a paper plate decorated with Superman stickers or the emotional resonance of receiving a handwritten note from a CEO, effectively draw the reader into the narrative. This approach not only engages the reader but also makes the material relevant and thought-provoking. The book does an excellent job of illustrating the significant impact that a human-centered approach to leadership can have in the workplace. It addresses common professional challenges, such as the silencing of diverse voices and adhering to the status quo, which will resonate with many readers.
Be Human, Lead Human: How to Connect People and Performance stands out as a thoughtful and insightful exploration of leadership. Nash offers practical advice for leaders looking to improve their approach to people management. The book is a valuable resource for leaders aiming to enhance their effectiveness and create a more engaging and fulfilling workplace in today’s dynamic work environment.
Pages: 346 | ASIN : B0BYKWRGH9
Perspective and Process
Simply Put, Why Clear Messages Win and How to Design Them teaches readers how to improve their communication through simple and straightforward methods. What was the idea or spark that first set off the need to write this book?
I ran a marketing agency for ten years before recently selling it, and I joke that you can take the boy out of the marketing agency but can’t take the marketing out of the boy. I kept seeing amazing leaders and organizations with things to say and ideas to share, but who struggled to communicate in a way that lands. So I looked back at the work I did, my experience in the classroom as an adjunct, and through even my personal life as a user of the world to investigate how we can get better at that.
What is your background and experience in writing, and how did it help you write Simply Put?
Having first-hand experience in the field, as well as access to academic resources, shaped my entire perspective and process. This book is science-based, but it also draws deeply from real-world examples to illustrate the key ideas.
What is one piece of advice you wish someone had given you when you were younger?
I often say that all advice is autobiographical. When people are giving advice, they are really talking to themselves in the past. Equipped with that lens, this bit of meta-advice makes all other pieces of advice more effective.
What is one thing that you hope readers take away from your book?
Just as the sender of a letter needs to pay the postage, when we’re communicating in our realms it’s our responsibility to own the literal and metaphorical cost of our message.
Author Links: Goodreads | Website | Amazon
Why do some messages work when others don’t? Why do some ideas break through, why do some slogans stick in your brain, and why do some leaders inspire change – when others don’t?
The answer is simple. Literally.
The most effective communicators in the world all structure their messages the same way, by designing for simplicity. But the problem is, simple is hard work. Our brains are programmed to complicate. Our world incentivizes more, more, more. It takes deliberate, intentional effort to communicate in a way that seems effortless.
In Simply Put, award-winning marketing entrepreneur Ben Guttmann unveils a five-part framework that allows anybody to communicate with clarity. With this book, you’ll be able to design messages that are beneficial, focused, salient, empathetic, and minimal – and that work.
