Leaders require tools too, but unlike dentistry, there is no where to recoup the costs.
I remember buying gift cards to bookstores for my friends as they took on leadership roles in their lives. Never seen so much excitement. I just recently left the employ of a university and was absolutely amazed that the leadership team pitched in and gave me a gift card for the university bookstore. Amazed because I thought that was a bit out of style - but am I ever glad they didn't think so.
My library is amazing - I still have books from when I was a child, books that were on my dad's shelf, books from the homes of those who found themselves downsizing in the later years of their life, books from university, my kids books from university, and books from Christian organizations. The temptation that seizes me when I walk into a bookstore today is incredible - this man of steel - and recovering bookaholic, should come across a book on sale - even in the library - becomes a fool in love.
Nowadays, I keep less and give more away. Not sure if that is making a statement to the lack of theological depth in most books, or the absolute lack of contemporary exposure in others, but I am finding more less attractive. So I change my strategy and take out the truths I need give the books away to help others in their journey.
With the desire for a great book to read, I am finding that my university librarian is an amazing fount of information and expertise - find one and use them. The university bookstore I mentioned above always had a book ready for me to buy - find a great bookstore manager. Talk to leaders that you admire, ask them what they are reading and would that be a book they would recommend or another and why - go find a leader you want to follow.
The greatest leadership book of all time is the Bible. Since most of us are amateurs, we need a good contemporary translation and access to quite a few more and at least some access to the original language so that we are able to parlay our modern day parables without going to far astray. If you do not know where to go from here - find someone who has a very open mind themselves and will help you to a study Bible and a few more specific commentaries that deal primarily with leadership issues.
History is a great source of material. My favourite happens to be books on war. I like strategy and can relate very quickly to war plans, and have found myself engaging a few of them, philosophically of course, and succeeding.
Leadership theology are quite in-depth studies on what leadership looks like covering as many facets of leadership that you can imagine - providing breadth, but digging deep to find truths that are secure enough to build upon its foundation as you begin your own journey into building a case for what leadership really is.
Biographies cover a story of a leader's life that you would never see as clearly as when reading a book. The movie does not cut it.
Pull together a group of "leaders" for a time of training, mentoring, encouraging, building, holding each other accountable in area like ethics etc. It will make a difference.
Practice your leadership skills on kids. Could be your own, join your church Sunday School program or mid-week activities, scouts or guides etc. If you can't teach kids, chances are you are boring the brains out of the adults who are too kind to tell you so.
Look to missions as amazing models of leadership activity. I just finished a book on the Jesuits. Again, movies (just finished watching Behind the Iron Mask), wouldn't have helped me understand them well, but this book was an amazing articulation of what they did right - those things were incredible and I want to do incredible things - Jesuits lead the way.
Administration, the anvil of every ENFP (Myers Briggs) and yet I need to know how to organize my life, accomplish my tasks, organize my team, enlist and motivate others to carry out the work of our purpose.
Music, as simple as a phone call to a friend, actually a Skype call, and I heard music in the background. My soul absolute sucked it up - and that was over Skype. I hit myself silly, and as soon as I could, I put on my music. Don't let the urgency of the day stop us from refuelling our soul for a leadership soul gives away constantly.
What are other leaders doing? Sometimes it matters, sometimes not - but why re-invent the wheel we can take a roughly hewn one and replace it with wood , replace that with iron, replace that with steel and then cover it with rubber? Just because someone came up with the idea to create a wheel out of animal bones and wrote a book about it - don't jump on bandwagons that do not have a proven track record over a considerable time period for you my find that they get brittle quickly and do not have any staying power.
