Motivational Quotes

Leadership

A leader is one who, out of madness or goodness, volunteers to take upon himself the woe of the people. There are few men so foolish, hence the erratic quality of leadership in the world.

- Updike, John

Best Quotes about Leadership

The high sentiments always win in the end, the leaders who offer blood, toil, tears, and sweat always get more out of their followers than those who offer safety and a good time. When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic.

Orwell, George

The crowd gives the leader new strength.

Evenius

I've always found that the speed of the boss is the speed of the team.

Iacocca, Lee

The world of the 90s and beyond will belong to managers or those who make the numbers dance, as we used to say, or those who are conversant with all the business jargon we used to sound smart. The world will belong to passionate, driven leaders -- people who not only have an enormous amount of energy but who can energize those whom they lead.

Welch, John

People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.

Roosevelt, Theodore

The best leaders are those most interested in surrounding themselves with assistants and associates smarter than they are. They are frank in admitting this and are willing to pay for such talents.

Parrish, Amos

Those that rule must hear and be deaf, must see and be blind.

Proverb, German

I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people.

Gandhi, Mahatma

Six traits of effective leaders: 1. Make others feel important 2. Promote a vision 3. Follow the golden rule 4. Admit mistakes 5. Criticize others only in private 6. Stay close to the action Example has more followers than reason. We unconsciously imitate what pleases us, and approximate to the characters we most admire.

Bovee, Christian Nevell

10.

Faith in the ability of a leader is of slight service unless it be united with faith in his justice.

George Goethals

11.

I have three precious things which I hold fast and prize. The first is gentleness; the second is frugality; the third is humility, which keeps me from putting myself before others. Be gentle and you can be bold; be frugal and you can be liberal; avoid putting yourself before others and you can become a leader among men.

Lao-Tzu

12.

Do what is right, not what you think the high headquarters wants or what you think will make you look good.

Schwarzkopf, Norman

13.

Every leader needs to look back once in a while to make sure he has followers. Source Unknown Effective leaders are known by the questions they ask rather than the statements they make.

14.

When a customer enters my store, forget me. He is king.

Wanamaker, John

15.

Impatience is the cause of most of our irregularities and extravagances Command by obeying.

Motto

16.

'Tis a dainty thing to command, though 'twere but a flock of sheep.

Cervantes, Miguel De

17.

One secret of leadership is that the mind of a leader never turns off. Leaders even when they are sightseers or spectators, are active; not passive observers.

Humes, James

18.

Management is about arranging and telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing.

Peters, Thomas J.

19.

The manager administers; the leader innovates. The manager has a short-range view; the leader has a long-range perspective. The manager asks how and when; the leader asks what and why. The manager has his eye on the bottom line; the leader has his eye on the horizon. The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it.

Bennis, Warren

20.

You can lead a whore to culture but you can't make her think.

Parker, Dorothy

21.

So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for people to work.

Peter Drucker

22.

People try so hard to believe in leaders now, pitifully hard. But we no sooner get a popular reformer or politician or soldier or writer or philosopher --a Roosevelt, a Tolstoy, a Wood, a Shaw, a Nietzsche, than the cross-currents of criticism wash him away. My Lord, no man can stand prominence these days. It's the surest path to obscurity. People get sick of hearing the same name over and over.

23.

Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy.

Schwarzkopf, Norman

24.

To lead people walk behind them.

Lao-Tzu

25.

There are many elements to a campaign. Leadership is number one. Everything else is number two.

Brecht, Bertolt

26.

Leadership is the activity of influencing people to cooperate towards some goal which they come to find desirable and which motivates them over the long haul.

Tead, Orway

27.

There is no such thing as a perfect leader either in the past or present, in China or elsewhere. If there is one, he is only pretending, like a pig inserting scallions into its nose in an effort to look like an elephant.

Liu Shao-Ch'I

28.

Every private in the French army carries a Field Marshall wand in his knapsack.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

29.

There is great force hidden in a gentle command.

Herbert, George

30.

We will make them think it's their idea. That's how all great leaders fool people.

Laura Preble

31.

The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on. The genius of a good leader is to leave behind him a situation which common sense, without the grace of genius, can deal with successfully.

Lippmann, Walter

32.

If you lead a country like Britain, a strong country, a country which has taken a lead in world affairs in good times and in bad, a country that is always reliable, then you have to have a touch of iron about you.

Thatcher, Margaret

33.

It is very comforting to believe that leaders who do terrible things are, in fact, mad. That way, all we have to do is make sure we don't put psychotics in high places and we've got the problem solved.

Wolfe, Thomas

34.

Certainly a leader needs a clear vision of the organization and where it is going, but a vision is of little value unless it is shared in a way so as to generate enthusiasm and commitment. Leadership and communication are inseparable.

Taylor, Claude

35.

We are reformers in the spring and summer, but in autumn we stand by the old. Reformers in the morning, and conservers at night.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

36.

The penalty of leadership is loneliness.

Robinson, H. Wheeler

37.

All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.

Galbraith, John Kenneth

38.

A crown, golden in show is but a wreath of thorns.

Milton, John

39.

Leadership is the other side of the coin of loneliness, and he who is a leader must always act alone. And acting alone, accept everything alone.

Marcos, Ferdinand E.

40.

We herd sheep, we drive cattle, we lead people. Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.

Patton, George S.

41.

Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.

Lombardi, Vince

42.

Managers are people who do things right; leaders are people who do the right thing.

Bennis, Warren

43.

Justice is the first virtue of those who command, and stops the complaints of those who obey.

Diderot, Denis

44.

I am more afraid of an army of 100 sheep led by a lion than an army of 100 lions led by a sheep.

Talleyrand, Charles Maurice De

45.

A leader is a person you will follow to a place you wouldn't go by yourself.