Motivational Quotes

Leadership

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

Best Quotes about Leadership

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

Self-regulation will always be a challenge, but if somebody's going to be in charge, it might as well be me.

Daniel Akst

I am a leader by default, only because nature does not allow a vacuum.

Tutu, Bishop Desmond

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

Eisenhower, Dwight D.

A prince should be slow to punish, and quick to reward.

Ovid

That is no use at all. What I want is men who will support me when I am in the wrong.

Melbourne, Lord

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.

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

Barker, Joel A.

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

Milton, John

10.

There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things.

Machiavelli, Niccolo

11.

There is great force hidden in a gentle command.

Herbert, George

12.

It's important for the explorer to be willing to be led astray.

Oech, Roger Von

13.

He who dreads hostility too much is unfit to rule.

Seneca

14.

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

15.

I learned that a great leader is a man who has the ability to get other people to do what they don't want to do and like it.

Truman, Harry S

16.

The boss drives people; the leader coaches them. The boss depends on authority; the leader on good will. The boss inspires fear; the leader inspires enthusiasm. The boss says I; The leader says WE. The boss fixes the blame for the breakdown; the leader fixes the breakdown. The boss says, GO; the leader says lets, GO!

Selfridge, H. Gordon

17.

The penalty of leadership is loneliness.

Robinson, H. Wheeler

18.

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

Peters, Thomas J.

19.

The right man comes at the right time.

Proverb, Italian

20.

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

Patton, George S.

21.

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.

22.

It is time for a new generation of leadership, to cope with new problems and new opportunities. For there is a new world to be won.

Kennedy, John F.

23.

Napoleon affords us an example of the danger of elevating one's self to the absolute, and sacrificing everything to the carrying out of an idea.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

24.

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

Ford, Henry

25.

The crowd gives the leader new strength.

Evenius

26.

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

27.

Most of the ladies and gentlemen who mourn the passing of the nation's leaders wouldn't know a leader if they saw one. If they had the bad luck to come across a leader, they would find out that he might demand something from them, and this impertinence would put an abrupt and indignant end to their wish for his return.

Lapham, Lewis H.

28.

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.

29.

Leadership involves finding a parade and getting in front of it.

Naisbitt, John

30.

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

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

31.

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

32.

Leadership must be established from the top down.

Nunn, Sam

33.

Efficiency tends to deal with Things. Effectiveness tends to deal with People. We manage things, we lead people

34.

No affection and a great brain, these are the people to command the world.

Disraeli, Benjamin

35.

A boss creates fear, a leader confidence. A boss fixes blame, a leader corrects mistakes. A boss knows all, a leader asks questions. A boss makes work drudgery, a leader makes it interesting. A boss is interested in himself or herself, a leader is interested in the group.

Ewing, Russell H.

36.

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

37.

A leader who doesn't hesitate before he sends his nation into battle is not fit to be a leader.

Meir, Golda

38.

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

39.

Leadership is an opportunity to serve. It is not a trumpet call to self-importance.

Walters, J. Donald

40.

Blessed is he who has learned to admire but not envy, to follow but not imitate, to praise but not flatter, and to lead but not manipulate.

Ward, William A.

41.

Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.

John F. Kennedy

42.

The first task of a leader is to keep hope alive.

Batten, Joe

43.

The successful man doesn't use others, other people use the successful man, for above all the success is of service.

Caine, Mark

44.

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.

45.

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

Carlyle, Thomas

46.

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

Patton, George S.

47.

The first thing a great person does, is make us realize the insignificance of circumstance.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

48.

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

Disraeli, Benjamin