David Burkus – Leading from Anywhere: Book Review & Audio Summary

Book Info

• Book name: Leading from Anywhere: The Essential Guide to Managing Remote Teams
• Author: David Burkus
• Genre: Business & Economics, Self-Help & Personal Development
• Pages: 288
• Published Year: 2020
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
• Language: English

Audio Summary

Synopsis

Leading from Anywhere tackles the most pressing challenge modern leaders face: managing remote teams effectively. When COVID-19 forced businesses worldwide to pivot overnight, some thrived while others struggled. David Burkus, an organizational behavior expert, reveals what separates successful remote teams from failing ones. Drawing on real-world examples like Innovative Fitness and Basecamp, he demonstrates that remote work isn’t a temporary fix—it’s the future. Through practical strategies focused on building trust, fostering psychological safety, and creating shared purpose, Burkus provides leaders with actionable tools to unlock their team’s potential. This isn’t about replicating office culture online; it’s about embracing an entirely new way of working that prioritizes understanding, autonomy, and results over presence and process.

Key Takeaways

• Remote teams thrive when leaders understand each member’s unique skills, work situations, and personal preferences rather than forcing one-size-fits-all approaches
• A compelling company-wide purpose—whether revolutionary, underdog, or ally-focused—keeps remote teams motivated and connected beyond simple profit motives
• Trust and psychological safety are foundational to remote team culture, enabling open communication, innovation, and accountability without fear of punishment
• Respect is contagious and learnable; practicing active listening and thoughtful disagreement transforms remote team dynamics and productivity
• Successful remote leadership requires abandoning office-centric management practices in favor of autonomy, flexibility, and results-oriented assessment

My Summary

Why Remote Work Caught Everyone Off Guard (Including Me)

I’ll be honest—when I picked up Leading from Anywhere, I was skeptical. Another book about remote work? In 2020, we were drowning in think pieces and hot takes about Zoom fatigue and makeshift home offices. But David Burkus isn’t just jumping on a trend. As a management professor at Drake University and researcher in organizational behavior, he’s been studying how teams work for years, and this book feels less like pandemic panic and more like a thoughtful blueprint for the future.

What struck me immediately was Burkus’s opening premise: the companies that succeeded during the pandemic weren’t just lucky. They shared specific characteristics that allowed them to pivot quickly while others floundered. Take Innovative Fitness, the personal training company he mentions. They didn’t just survive losing their physical locations—they actually grew by transitioning to virtual sessions. That’s not accident; that’s intentional design.

The book opens with a reality check that still resonates today. Remote work isn’t going away. Even as offices reopened, the genie was out of the bottle. Employees had tasted flexibility, and many weren’t willing to give it up. According to recent data from FlexJobs, 65% of workers want to remain fully remote, and 32% prefer a hybrid arrangement. Burkus saw this coming before most of us did.

The Two Pillars That Hold Remote Teams Together

Burkus identifies two critical elements that separate thriving remote teams from struggling ones: deep understanding of individual team members and a shared sense of purpose. This might sound simple, but it’s deceptively challenging to implement.

Understanding Goes Beyond Job Descriptions

The first pillar—understanding—requires leaders to know their team members at a granular level. This means understanding not just what someone does, but how they work best, when they’re most productive, and what their home situation looks like. In my own experience managing freelance writers for various projects, I’ve learned that one writer produces brilliant work between 5 AM and 9 AM, while another doesn’t hit their stride until after 8 PM. In an office, we’d force both into the same 9-to-5 schedule. Remotely, we can leverage their natural rhythms.

Burkus breaks this understanding into three components. First, know what each person excels at and assign work accordingly. This seems obvious, but how often do we actually do it? Second, accommodate individual work situations—time zones, yes, but also childcare responsibilities, caring for elderly parents, or simply whether someone has a dedicated office or works from their kitchen table. Third, recognize that everyone has different routines and preferences that may not have been visible in the office.

This level of understanding requires intentional effort. It means having real conversations with team members about their lives, not just their deliverables. It means asking questions like “What time of day do you do your best work?” and “What does your workspace look like?” These aren’t invasive questions—they’re essential for effective remote leadership.

Purpose Is the Glue That Holds Everything Together

The second pillar is shared purpose, and this is where Burkus really shines. He argues that most people want to contribute to something beyond shareholder value. We want to feel like our work matters, that we’re solving real problems or contributing to meaningful causes. This becomes even more critical when you’re working from home in your pajamas, disconnected from the physical energy of an office.

Burkus identifies three types of organizational “fights” that can create this sense of purpose. The revolutionary fight involves changing the status quo in your industry or society. Think of companies like Tesla attempting to revolutionize transportation, or how Patagonia fights for environmental causes while selling outdoor gear.

The underdog fight positions your team against larger competitors, motivating everyone to do things better, smarter, or more innovatively. This is the classic David versus Goliath narrative, and it’s incredibly motivating when done authentically.

The ally fight focuses on fighting for your customers and stakeholders. This is about being so customer-obsessed that your team sees themselves as advocates and problem-solvers for the people they serve.

What I appreciate about this framework is that it forces leaders to answer a simple but profound question: “What are we all fighting for?” If you can’t answer that clearly and compellingly, don’t be surprised when your remote team feels disconnected and unmotivated.

Trust and Respect Aren’t Soft Skills—They’re Survival Skills

One of my favorite sections of the book discusses the transformation Frank Van Massenhove led at the Belgian Ministry of Social Security. When he took over, he inherited a stereotypical bureaucracy—rigid schedules, micromanagement, low morale. His solution wasn’t more oversight or stricter policies. Instead, he gave employees autonomy, allowing them to set their own schedules and work from anywhere.

The result? The ministry transformed into an attractive workplace with strong team spirit and collaboration. This wasn’t magic—it was trust in action.

Psychological Safety Is Non-Negotiable

Burkus leans heavily on Amy Edmondson’s concept of psychological safety, and for good reason. Psychological safety means creating an environment where people feel comfortable sharing ideas, asking questions, and even admitting mistakes without fear of humiliation or punishment.

In remote settings, this becomes exponentially more important. When you’re not sharing physical space, it’s easier for misunderstandings to fester. A comment in Slack can be interpreted as harsh when it was meant to be neutral. A lack of response to an email can feel like rejection when someone was simply busy. Without psychological safety, these small moments accumulate into toxic team dynamics.

Building this safety requires intentional practices. It means leaders need to model vulnerability by admitting their own mistakes. It means explicitly encouraging questions and dissent. It means responding to bad news with curiosity rather than blame. These behaviors set the tone for the entire team.

Respect Is Contagious (And So Is Disrespect)

The second cultural ingredient Burkus emphasizes is respect. He cites research showing that only 54% of employees feel respected at work—a shockingly low number. But here’s the good news: respect is a learned behavior, and it spreads.

In practical terms, this means practicing active listening during video calls. It means not interrupting colleagues or speaking over them. It means that when you disagree with someone, you hear them out fully before responding. You can disagree respectfully—in fact, healthy teams do this regularly—but you can’t simply dismiss or bulldoze people.

I’ve noticed in my own work that when I make a conscious effort to say things like “That’s an interesting perspective, tell me more about why you think that,” the entire conversation shifts. People lean in rather than shutting down. They offer more creative ideas because they feel heard.

The flip side is equally true. Rudeness and disrespect are also contagious. If a leader regularly interrupts, dismisses ideas, or responds sarcastically, that behavior cascades through the team. Remote work amplifies this effect because written communication lacks the softening effects of tone and body language.

The Basecamp Philosophy: Rethinking Everything

While the summary I received was cut off, it mentioned Basecamp, the software company founded by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson. These two are famously anti-office, and their book “Remote: Office Not Required” preceded Burkus’s work. What makes Basecamp relevant to this discussion is their willingness to completely rethink work from first principles.

Basecamp doesn’t try to replicate office culture online. They’ve built an entirely different system based on asynchronous communication, deep work, and respecting people’s time. They famously limit work weeks to 40 hours (sometimes 32 in summer) and discourage after-hours communication.

This connects to Burkus’s broader argument: successful remote leadership isn’t about managing people the same way you did in an office, just using different tools. It requires fundamentally rethinking how work gets done, how performance is measured, and what leadership actually means.

Applying These Principles to Your Team

Reading about these concepts is one thing; implementing them is another. Here are some practical applications I’ve drawn from Burkus’s framework:

Create Individual Work Profiles

Schedule one-on-one conversations with each team member to create a “work profile.” Ask about their peak productivity hours, their home workspace setup, their communication preferences, and any personal commitments that affect their schedule. Document this information and share it with the team (with permission) so everyone understands each other’s contexts.

Articulate Your Team’s Fight

Gather your team for a dedicated session to discuss and define what you’re all fighting for. Is it revolutionary, underdog, or ally-focused? Write it down in clear, compelling language. Then reference it regularly—in meetings, in project kickoffs, in performance discussions. Make it a living part of your team culture, not just words on a website.

Institute Psychological Safety Practices

Start meetings with a “what went wrong” check-in where you share something you messed up recently. Explicitly invite dissenting opinions by saying “I’d love to hear a different perspective on this.” When someone admits a mistake, thank them for their honesty and focus on solutions rather than blame. These small practices accumulate into cultural shifts.

Model Active Listening

In video meetings, give people your full attention. Close other tabs, silence notifications, and actually listen rather than planning what you’ll say next. Paraphrase what people say to confirm understanding: “So what I’m hearing is…” When you disagree, start with “Help me understand…” rather than “I think you’re wrong because…”

Audit Your Communication for Respect

Before sending messages, especially critical ones, reread them through the lens of respect. Does this message value the recipient’s perspective? Does it assume positive intent? Would I want to receive this message? This simple pause can prevent countless misunderstandings.

Where Burkus Gets It Right (And Where He Could Go Further)

Burkus’s greatest strength is his ability to synthesize research into practical frameworks. He’s not just theorizing—he’s providing actionable strategies backed by evidence. The book is well-researched without being academic, accessible without being simplistic.

His emphasis on trust and psychological safety feels particularly timely. In an era where many leaders want to use surveillance software to monitor remote workers, Burkus offers a compelling alternative: build cultures where people want to do good work because they feel valued and connected to a meaningful purpose.

The real-world examples throughout the book ground his concepts in reality. Companies like Innovative Fitness and leaders like Frank Van Massenhove aren’t hypotheticals—they’re proof that these approaches work.

However, the book could go deeper on some challenges. While Burkus acknowledges that remote work isn’t perfect for everyone, he doesn’t spend much time on the very real downsides: isolation, burnout, the blurring of work-life boundaries, or the career disadvantages that can come with being remote when leadership is in-office. These aren’t arguments against remote work, but they are complications that leaders need to address.

Additionally, while the book discusses trust and autonomy, it could offer more guidance on accountability. How do you balance trust with ensuring work actually gets done? How do you handle team members who abuse flexibility? These are questions many leaders grapple with, and more specific guidance would be valuable.

How This Compares to Other Remote Work Books

Leading from Anywhere sits in a crowded field. Fried and Hansson’s “Remote: Office Not Required” is more philosophical and provocative, arguing forcefully for the remote work revolution. Cal Newport’s “A World Without Email” tackles the communication overload that often accompanies remote work. Priya Parker’s “The Art of Gathering” offers insights on creating meaningful connection in virtual settings.

What distinguishes Burkus’s contribution is its balance. He’s neither a zealot claiming remote work is perfect nor a skeptic arguing for a return to offices. He’s pragmatic, evidence-based, and focused on what actually works. If Fried and Hansson are the revolutionaries and Newport is the deep work philosopher, Burkus is the practical guide helping leaders navigate the messy middle.

His background as a management professor gives him credibility, but he writes in an accessible style that doesn’t feel academic. This makes the book useful for both experienced executives and first-time managers suddenly thrust into leading remote teams.

Questions Worth Considering

As I finished this book, several questions stayed with me. How do we balance the flexibility that makes remote work attractive with the structure that many people need to thrive? How do we prevent remote work from becoming a two-tier system where remote workers are disadvantaged compared to their in-office colleagues? How do we maintain company culture across distributed teams as organizations grow?

These aren’t questions Burkus fully answers, but that’s okay. They’re ongoing challenges that will require continuous adaptation and experimentation. What the book does provide is a solid foundation of principles—understanding, purpose, trust, respect—that can guide leaders as they navigate these complexities.

Why This Book Still Matters

We’re now several years past the initial pandemic panic, and the remote work landscape has stabilized somewhat. Some companies have embraced permanent flexibility, others have mandated returns to office, and many have settled on hybrid arrangements. So why read a book published in 2020?

Because the fundamental challenges Burkus addresses haven’t changed. Whether your team is fully remote, hybrid, or occasionally distributed, the principles of effective leadership remain the same. Understanding your people, articulating shared purpose, building trust, and fostering respect are timeless leadership competencies. Burkus simply shows how to apply them in contexts where physical proximity isn’t a given.

Moreover, as younger generations enter the workforce with different expectations about flexibility and autonomy, these skills will only become more important. Gen Z workers, in particular, prioritize purpose and work-life balance over traditional markers of success. Leaders who can’t articulate a compelling “fight” or who rely on surveillance rather than trust will struggle to attract and retain talent.

I’d love to hear from other leaders and team members about their experiences. What has worked in your remote or hybrid teams? Where do you still struggle? Have you found ways to build trust and psychological safety in virtual environments? The conversation Burkus started in this book is far from over, and I think we all have something to learn from each other’s experiences. Drop your thoughts in the comments—I’m genuinely curious about what’s working out there in the real world.