Motivational Quotes

Leadership

Leadership is the wise use of power. Power is the capacity to translate intention into reality and sustain it.

- Bennis, Warren

Best Quotes about Leadership

I must follow the people. Am I not their leader?

Disraeli, Benjamin

If you want to be comfortable -- take an easy job. If you aspire to leadership, take off your coat.

The shepherd always tries to persuade the sheep that their interests and his own are the same.

Stendhal, Henri B.

The leader seeks to communicate his vision to his followers. He captures their attention with his optimistic intuition of possible solutions to their needs. He influences them by the dynamism of his faith. He demonstrates confidence that the challenge can be met, the need resolved, the crisis overcome.

Haggai, John

Leaders create an environment which everyone has the opportunity to do work which matches his potential capability and for which an equitable differential reward is provided.

Jaques, Elliott

Doing what's right isn't the problem. It is knowing what's right.

Johnson, Lyndon B.

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

A leader has been defined as one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.

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.

Leadership has to do with direction. Management has to do with the speed, coordination and logistics in going in that direction. The WORKERS are chopping their way through the jungle. The MANAGERS are coordinating, making sure the tools are sharp, etc. The LEADERS climb a tree and shout Wrong jungle!! The MANAGERS shout back Be quiet! We're making progress!

11.

The ability to deal with people is as purchasable a commodity as sugar or coffee and I will pay more for that ability than for any other under the sun.

Rockefeller, John D.

12.

The secret of a leader lies in the tests he has faced over the whole course of his life and the habit of action he develops in meeting those tests.

Sheehy, Gail

13.

An order that can be misunderstood will be misunderstood.

Bonaparte, Napoleon

14.

A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way and shows the way.

Maxwell, John C.

15.

Leadership is the challenge to be something more than average.

Rohn, Jim

16.

Outstanding leaders appeal to the hearts of their followers -- not their minds.

17.

I'm their leader, I've got to follow them.

Ledru-Rollin, Alexandre

18.

Search others for their virtue, and yourself for your vices.

Fuller, R. Buckminster

19.

A leader knows what's best to do; a manager knows merely how best to do it.

Adelman, Ken

20.

Tell a person they are brave and you help them become so.

Carlyle, Thomas

21.

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

22.

A leader is best when people barely know he exists, not so good when people obey and acclaim him, worse when they despise him. But of a good leader who talks little when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves.

Lao-Tzu

23.

Men shrink less from offending one who inspires love than one who inspires fear.

Machiavelli, Niccolo

24.

Great leaders understand human behavior rather than the cybernetics of any function.

Schorr, James

25.

It often happens that I wake up at night and begin to think about a serious problem and decide I must tell the Pope about it. Then I wake up completely and remember that I am the Pope.

Pope John XXIII

26.

Eagles don't flock, you have to find them one at a time.

Perot, H. Ross

27.

In really good companies, you have to lead. You have to come up with big ideas and express them forcefully. I have always been encouraged -- or sometimes forced -- to confront the very natural fear of being wrong. I was constantly pushed to find out what I really thought and then to speak up. Over time, I came to see that waiting to discover which way the wind was blowing is an excellent way to learn how to be a follower.

Enrico, Roger

28.

Popularity is not leadership.

Marcinko, Richard

29.

Those who can command themselves command others.

Hazlitt, William

30.

The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet.

Hesburgh, Theodore M.

31.

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

32.

Leadership is a matter of having people look at you and gain confidence, seeing how you react. If you're in control, they're in control.

Landry, Tom

33.

The highest of distinctions is service to others.

King George VI

34.

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it.

Roosevelt, Theodore

35.

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

36.

I don't believe in just ordering people to do things. You have to sort of grab an oar and row with them.

Geneen, Harold S.

37.

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

38.

True leadership must be for the benefit of the followers, not the enrichment of the leaders.

Townsend, Robert

39.

You do not lead by hitting people over the head -- that's assault, not leadership.

Eisenhower, Dwight D.

40.

A leader has the vision and conviction that a dream can be achieved. He inspires the power and energy to get it done.

Lauren, Ralph

41.

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

Diderot, Denis

42.

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.

43.

An army of deer would be more formidable commanded by a lion, than an army of lions commanded by a stag.

Proverb

44.

Don't tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.

Patton, George S.

45.

It is a terrible thing to look over your shoulder when you are trying to lead -- and find no one there.

Roosevelt, Franklin D.

46.

If I advance, follow me! If I retreat, kill me! If I die, avenge me!

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

47.

It is the Vague and Elusive. Meet it and you will not see its head. Follow it and you will not see its back.

Lao-Tzu

48.

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

49.

There is great force hidden in a gentle command.

Herbert, George

50.

A leader is someone who helps improve the lives of other people or improve the system they live under.

Ervin, Sam