Heroic Leadership : Best Practices from a 450 Year Old Company That Changed the World

Leaders make great companies, but few of us truly understand how to turn ourselves and others into great leaders. One company--the Jesuits--pioneered a unique formula for molding leaders. In the process, the Jesuits built one of history's most successful companies.
Founded in 1540 by ten men with no capital and no business plan, the Jesuits have been a source of innovation and discovery ever since. In this groundbreaking book, Chris Lowney, a former Jesuit and executive with J. P. Morgan, reveals the leadership principles that have guided Jesuit leaders in their diverse pursuits for more than 450 years.
The Jesuits' enduring success rests upon four core leadership pillars: - self-awareness: Understand
your strengths, weaknesses, values, and worldview
- ingenuity: Confidently innovate and adapt to a changing world
- love: Engage others with a positive attitude that unlocks their potential
- heroism: Energize yourself and others with heroic ambitions and a passion for excellence By incorporating these principles into their daily lives, the Jesuits built an organization that has operated a highly efficient international network of trade, education, missionary work, and scholarship for almost five centuries. Lowney shows how these same principles can make each of us a dynamic leader in the twenty-first century. "I am confident that I would have been a far more effective leader if I had read Heroic Leadership years ago.
Highly recommended!"
--Ron Burkard, Executive Director, World Neighbors
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Praise for Heroic Leadership



"Entertaining and well researched, this is a must-read for any business leader, and an inspirational read for anyone who wants to be a better human being."
--Walter Gubert, Chairman of the Investment Bank, J.P. Morgan


"Lowney does a wonderfully engaging job of making clear the connections between our current leadership challenges and the principles employed so effectively by the Jesuits."
--Edward J. Kelly III, President and CEO, Mercantile Bankshares Corporation


"This 450-year-old institution [seems] as current today as it was four centuries ago. Lowney shows us how every employee can and should be a leader and that love-driven leadership does work."
--Richard K. Green, President and COO, Blistex, Inc.


"With our renewed focus on sustainable growth, Lowney's book comes at the right time, not providing recipes for becoming a leader but guiding us along the Jesuit principles to turn us into leaders."
--Peter Woicke, Executive Vice President, International Finance Corporation


"In this day of Enrons and Tycos, there is a need to reexamine corporate values. Heroic Leadership gives the leader food for thought. The sections on love and heroism are truly energizing."
--John F. Galbraith, President and CEO, Catholic Medical Mission Board


"As Asia surges forward, its managers are realizing that shallow leadership checklists and flashy management slogans from the West do not always work. Heroic Leadership sets out four key principles of whole-person leadership that . . . can be applied across cultures and geographies."
--Jackson Tai, CEO, Development Bank of Singapore


"Lowney brings together extensive experience in international banking, a solid grasp of Jesuit spirituality and history, and a good acquaintance with recent leadership literature to produce a book that is at once challenging and compelling."
--The Reverend Harold Ridley, S.J., President, Loyola College in Maryland


"This informative, fascinating book tells how Jesuits, over 450 years, produced both outstanding individual leaders and a culture of leadership. This is a book to be enjoyed, pondered, and put into practice."
--John W. Padberg, S.J., Director, Institute of Jesuit Sources
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"In his book, Heroic Leadership, Chris Lowney uses the history and tradition of the Jesuit order to articulate a model for authentic, moral leadership. As Governor of Colorado, Heroic Leadership helped me think about how to lead better than any other book out there."Bill Ritter, Jr.Former Governor of Colorado
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Chris Lowney, a former Jesuit, served as Managing Director at J.P. Morgan in New York, Tokyo, Singapore, and London for seventeen years. A popular speaker on issues around leadership, he is the author of the best-selling Heroic Living, and he has been featured in Forbes, the Harvard Business Review, and FastCompany.com. Lowney currently lives in New York where he is a consultant for the Catholic Medical Mission Board.
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