Reviewed by Jamie Michele for Readers' Favorite

Success DNA by Alinka Rutkowska et al. is a leadership and self-development anthology in which accomplished contributors explain how their understanding of success has changed across their careers. Each writer begins with lived experience, tracing the decisions that altered their approach to leadership while showing why persistence became essential to reaching long-term aims. The contributors come from fields as different as finance and medicine, which gives the collection a wide professional range while keeping its subject consistent. Their accounts move from career turning points into reinvention, then toward the mentors who helped them continue. Success is presented as something each person defines for themselves, with professional achievement often connected to service and the people helped along the way. Across these first-person accounts, the contributors describe lives spent pursuing ambitious goals while continually reconsidering their own definition of achievement.

Success DNA: Mastering Persistence in Leadership and Life by Alinka Rutkowska et al. is a fantastic collection, and I love how readily its contributors turn experience into advice readers can use straight away. The backgrounds give each contribution a distinct point of view, with their own stories and practical, accessible exercises. Paul Hepworth’s “horrible version” exercise is a perfect example. He asks teams to build a rough version of a project quickly, giving readers a concrete way to get an idea moving before improving it. I also liked Jochen Schwenk’s use of the Eisenhower Matrix, which separates time-sensitive tasks from those that can wait. Schwenk shows how lower-priority items can be delegated, making the method easy to use. These contributors know their fields first-hand, bringing both their knowledge and exhaustive research to the table. Well written and perfectly formatted, readers looking to strengthen their approach to success will adore this.