32 Books Like The Road to Character

Using the Myers Briggs Type Indicator as the framework, this book offers deep insights into why we think, feel, and function the way we do.

I first read this book years ago and still find myself referring back to it on a regular basis when new issues come up in my life, such as a potential career change. This book truly does help me to understand myself better as well as to understand significant others in my life.

How I’m wired affects how I work, the work I’m drawn to, and how I interact with others. This insight, I have found, is crucial if I am to help make the world a better place. 

If you want to understand the importance of cultural differences across countries and within our own communities, this is a phenomenal book!

I appreciate the tables and charts throughout the book that give me quick access to concrete ways in which people differ culturally. These differences affect our work environments, male/female relationships, and even our life goals, but we are too often oblivious because we don’t know to look for them. 

I’ve used this book for years, and I’m a strong believer that we can’t contribute to positive change around the world unless we understand more about the many ways that we all differ culturally. 

This is a quick read that gives me fascinating insights into the American culture. The authors wrote it for international students who come to the U.S. and find the cultural differences confusing at best.

Reading this book, I feel like I’m observing conversations between Americans and catching insights that I would otherwise miss simply because it’s all so natural and comfortable to me as an American.

Understanding how Americans operate and what we most value is crucial if we are to effectively function in another culture and help to improve vulnerable people’s lives. 

This short book explores the potential for individual and community empowerment through impact investing. It explores the drawbacks of foreign aid and offers a powerful alternative by providing numerous examples of the potential of social enterprise to truly make a difference in people’s lives.

I know the first author, Kim Tan, and have the utmost respect for his knowledge, his humility, and his passion to change the world for the better. I also value his perspective as Malaysian-born rather than Western-born. We, as Americans and Westerners, tend to be quite isolated from other perspectives about the problems in our world and how to solve them. 

This is a wonderful book!

The ways in which we lead must be examined in order to lead with compassion and empathy. Traditionally, leaders have used a top-down approach to leadership, very regimented and militaristic, but we are talking about people not war. So how can one lead a people, an organization, in a way that is efficient and allows for growth?

Koenig’s approach is less a “heroic” leadership style but one that is human-centered, seeing humility as strength is key to achieving goals in a multicultural and complex society.

Over a number of decades, Schein has been one of the guiding thinkers in professional services and consultancy. His books are always worth reading as the advice is sounds and practical. In this book he talks about how it is better, and more productive, to help people by the practice of asking questions rather than giving answers. The model in the book goes completely against the stereotype of the consultant as a brash and overconfident individual pretending to be an expert who can tell anyone the answer to any question. Instead, Schein proposes a model that would be more familiar to those with a coaching background. It is brilliant advice.

This book, bundled as the first three in the series, is one that I’ve reread often over the last twenty years. It may be in the science fiction genre, but it’s really Dr. Vic Hunt connecting the dots that others can’t quite see. The author pours brilliance and humility into Dr. Hunt which creates an almost immediate bond. The characters are written so well that you feel that you’re uncovering the mysteries at the same time Dr. Hunt is. This is rare in third person writing as authors tend to tell you the story instead of taking you on the journey of the character. Throw in the right mix of light and deep plot lines and it will soon become a regular read for you, too.

I’m absolutely obsessed with this book.

It earned a spot on the 2014 Gittle List, a contest I hosted for 5 years for self-published children’s book authors. I’ve purchased several copies for both children and adults. Somewhere, there’s a video of my grandson reading it to me (well, a couple of pages).

It’s unique in character, words, and pace. Seeing the two characters becoming friends, being the closest of friends, having a fallout that separates them, and finding their way back to each other moved me to tears because that is what my son and I were doing, at the time. Finding our way back to each other.

The lessons of forgiveness and humility flow naturally without ever saying those words explicitly. 

Once you’ve opened yourself up, gotten a few instructions and are reminded that nothing is holding you back, you’re ready to connect with your own internal mechanisms. Hillman re-positions psychology in the context of soul-making, where it makes most sense and is most useful for us.

We get hung up on so many things, and Hillman fearlessly wades into every one of them with great intention. I think Hillman is one of the smartest, most perceptively radical writers not named Jung, and this book grapples with the uneasy humility that is creative work: your own soul-making.

Inspired by Napoleon Hill, Jones researched thoroughly to come up with a simple four-step approach that can help a person get everything they want out of life. Once he found his research completed, he then determined to test it—and wound up with a national company with representatives in every state, plus an 8-figure income in 5 years (starting in the early 1950s). I use this four-step formula daily—for everything.