The Seven Strategies of Master Leaders: Featuring Key Insights from 30 of Canada's Top Leaders

Louise Karch is a career consultant with Carswell Partners in London, Ontario.

Canada is lucky to have Dr. McRae writing on leadership. Why? Because, as McRae says, Canadians have a unique perspective on leadership. We are more collaborative versus individualistic, more interested in significance not just success, and many of our leaders were born female.

This is McRae’s eighth book. I refer to it as a guide intentionally because this leadership book is bound to become a well-thumbed reference for those who aspire to be exceptional leaders.

McRae writes masterfully. He outlines a leadership model of seven competencies, from Inspiring Vision to Transforming Competence to Mastery. Each chapter contains the latest theoretical insights about leadership, compelling profiles of the nation’s preeminent leaders that best illustrate the core competence, and thought-provoking exercises to help readers transfer what they’ve learned, from the page to their lives. All of this is accomplished using McRae’s signature accessible style. His stories of his own leadership as business owner, father, and as someone involved in community service keeps the material readable and reachable.

We are lucky to have this book. So much leadership material comes from the U.S., mostly from men writing about men. Here is something refreshingly different. Whether it is an interview with Louise Arbour, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, or Sheila Watt-Cloutier, environmental activist and Nobel Prize nominee, McRae has wisely included an inspiringly diverse profile of Canada’s most remarkable leaders. Michael Lazaridis and Jim Balsillie from RIM share equal billing with Peter Robinson from Mountain Equipment Co-op, the world’s largest cooperative. Canada has a surfeit of successful leaders and it is a joy to see their insight framed in such a useful and useable leadership model.