Motivational Quotes

Leadership

The leader can never close the gap between himself and the group. If he does, he is no longer what he must be. He must walk a tightrope between the consent he must win and the control he must exert.

- Lombardi, Vince

Best Quotes about Leadership

Our chief want in life is somebody who will make us do what we can.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

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

Diderot, Denis

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

Bonaparte, Napoleon

Public sentiment is everything, with it nothing can fail, without it nothing can succeed.

Lincoln, Abraham

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.

When the leadership is right and the time is right, the people can always be counted upon to follow -- to the end at all costs.

Seymour, Harold J.

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

Gandhi, Mahatma

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

Leaders aren't born, they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work. And that's the price we'll have to pay to achieve that goal, or any goal.

Lombardi, Vince

10.

Time and money spent in helping men to do more for themselves is far better than mere giving.

Ford, Henry

11.

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

12.

Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility.

Augustine, St.

13.

Reason and judgment are the qualities of a leader.

Tacitus, Publius Cornelius

14.

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

15.

The chief executive who knows his strengths and weaknesses as a leader is likely to be far more effective than the one who remains blind to them. He also is on the road to humility -- that priceless attitude of openness to life that can help a manager absorb mistakes, failures, or personal shortcomings.

Adair, John

16.

Leadership is not a position. You are not a leader because you have the title of manager. Leadership is something that we earn from followers on a day to day basis.

The EMS Manager Newsletter

17.

The penalty of leadership is loneliness.

Robinson, H. Wheeler

18.

The real leader has no need to lead -- he is content to point the way.

Miller, Henry

19.

The wicked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, We did it ourselves.

Lao-Tzu

20.

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

Perot, H. Ross

21.

The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly.

Rohn, Jim

22.

Leadership appears to be the art of getting others to want to do something you are convinced should be done.

Packard, Vance

23.

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

24.

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

Stendhal, Henri B.

25.

A good leader needs to have a compass in his head and a bar of steel in his heart.

Townsend, Robert

26.

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!

27.

If you have fear of those that command you, spare those that obey you.

Azai, Rabbi Ben

28.

Do your best to be the lead dog otherwise the view never changes.

29.

Some men must follow, and some command, though all are made of clay.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth

30.

When the best leader's work is done the people say, We did it ourselves.

Lao-Tzu

31.

Leadership must be established from the top down.

Nunn, Sam

32.

The person who renders loyal service in a humble capacity will be chosen for higher responsibilities, just as the biblical servant who multiplied the one pound given him by his master was made ruler over ten cities...

Forbes, B. C.

33.

Right or wrong, the customer is always right.

Field, Marshall

34.

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

35.

When placed in command -- take charge.

Schwarzkopf, Norman

36.

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

La Rochefoucauld, Francois De

37.

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.

38.

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

39.

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

40.

Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.

Eisenhower, Dwight D.

41.

Morale is faith in the man at the top.

Johnston, Albert Sidney

42.

Leadership is a serving relationship that has the effect of facilitating human development.

Ward, Ted

43.

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

Peter Drucker

44.

It is a great pity when the one who should be the head figure is a mere figure head.

Spurgeon, Charles Haddon

45.

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

Iacocca, Lee

46.

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

47.

Keep cool and you will command everyone.

Justinian

48.

Pull the string, and it will follow wherever you wish. Push it, and it will go nowhere at all.

Eisenhower, Dwight D.

49.

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

Bennis, Warren

50.

Leadership is not magnetic personality--that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not making friends and influencing people --that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person's vision to higher sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.

Drucker, Peter F.