Read to Lead with Kimberly Miles

About this episode

Kimberly Miles discusses her approach to reading as a leadership practice and the importance of diverse reading for leaders.

In this 'From the Vault' episode of the Transformative Leadership Summit, Jethro sits down with Kimberly Miles, principal of East Gresham Elementary School, to explore her remarkable approach to reading as a leadership practice. Kimberly shares how she strategically selects books — only picking them up after hearing multiple recommendations — and then digs deep using a layered annotation system of underlining, highlighting, color-coded tabs, and 3x5 index card summaries she keeps on hand for professional conversations. She discusses why leaders need to be diverse readers beyond education titles, how she uses books like Make It Stick and Thomas Friedman's work to broaden her thinking, and why she spent two years reading a single book with her staff — and why that was the right call. Whether it's leading book clubs with her leadership team, reading alongside her own adult children, or listening to audiobooks on her commute, Kimberly makes the case that intentional, slow, deep reading is one of the most powerful tools a leader can have. We’re proud to be sponsored by IXL . IXL’s comprehensive teaching and learning platform for math, language arts, science, and social studies is…

People in this episode

Host: Jethro Jones

Guest: Kimberly Miles

Topics covered

• reading as leadership practice
• professional development
• diverse reading
• book clubs
• intentional reading

Keywords

• reading
• leadership
• professional development
• book recommendations
• annotation system

Sponsors

Playworks, IXL, Renaissance Learning

Mentioned in this episode

Books & works: Make It Stick

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