Leadership and the Lion

Leadership and the Lion
By Mark Berry
How do you lead when the applause never comes?
In a world that rewards loud voices and quick wins, real leadership is often quiet, consistent, and completely overlooked. Leadership and the Lion is a raw, no-BS guide to leading with clarity, courage, and grit-whether anyone's watching or not.
Written by Mark Berry, a small-town Ohio leader who has managed thousands across high-stakes industries, this book strips away the corporate fluff and digs deep into the truths no one tells you about leadership. From confronting ego and control to building teams that outlast you, it's packed with hard-won lessons forged in real-world trenches-not boardroom theory.
Forget trust falls and buzzwords. This is leadership for the ones who stay when it's hard, speak when it's unpopular, and build things that actually last.
If you're tired of the noise and ready to lead like it matters-this book is for you.
Whether you're a frontline supervisor, founder, coach, or just the one people look to when things go sideways... Leadership and the Lion will sharpen your focus, ground your values, and challenge the way you show up.

Mark Berry is a leadership veteran with over 25 years of real-world experience guiding teams in high-pressure industries-including gas and oil, defense contracting, rail, and steel. He's led through chaos, rebuilds, deadlines, and breakdowns-and what he's learned doesn't come from theory. It comes from doing the work.
Make no mistake-he's been to his fair share of leadership classes, corporate retreats, and professional development seminars. And while the frameworks sound great in a quiet room, most of them fall apart the moment you step back into the real world. That's the gap Mark set out to close-where systems meet execution, where pressure hits people, and where leadership actually has to work.
His first book, Headspace: Surviving the Noise, tackled the internal side of leadership-clarity, resilience, burnout, and the battle between intention and distraction. Leadership and the Lion picks up where that left off, turning the focus outward toward team culture, accountability, and building environments people choose to be part of-not out of pressure, but pride.
Mark writes the way he leads: with clarity, honesty, and zero fluff. His work challenges leadership myths, exposes the cost of control, and helps leaders build something that lasts-something that holds.