100 Best Quotes
On Leadership
1.
A leader is
best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim
fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves. —Lao Tzu
2.
Where there
is no vision, the people perish. —Proverbs 29:18
3.
I must
follow the people. Am I not their leader? —Benjamin Disraeli
4.
You manage
things; you lead people. —Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper
5.
The first
responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you.
In between, the leader is a servant. —Max DePree
6.
Leadership is the capacity to
translate vision into reality. —Warren Bennis
7.
Lead me,
follow me, or get out of my way. — General George Patton
8.
Before you
are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader,
success is all about growing others. —Jack Welch
9.
A leader is
a dealer in hope. —Napoleon Bonaparte
10. You don’t need a title to be a
leader. –Multiple Attributions
11. A leader is one who knows the way,
goes the way, and shows the way. —John Maxwell
12. My own definition of leadership is
this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and
the character which inspires confidence. —General Montgomery
13. Leadership is lifting a person’s
vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher
standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. —Peter
Drucker
14. Never doubt that a small group of
thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that
ever has. —Margaret Mead
15. The nation will find it very hard to
look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground. —Sir Winston
Churchill
16. The most dangerous leadership myth
is that leaders are born-that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s
nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.
—Warren Bennis
17. To command is to serve, nothing more
and nothing less. —Andre Malraux
18. He who has never learned to obey
cannot be a good commander. —Aristotle
19. Become the kind of leader that
people would follow voluntarily; even if you had no title or position. —Brian
Tracy
20. I start with the premise that the
function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers. —Ralph
Nader
21. Effective leadership is not about
making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not
attributes. —Peter Drucker
22. Anyone can hold the helm when the
sea is calm. —Publilius Syrus
23. A great person attracts great people
and knows how to hold them together. —Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
24. The best executive is the one who
has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint
enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it. —Theodore Roosevelt
25. Leadership is influence. —John C.
Maxwell
26. You don’t lead by pointing and
telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a
case. —Ken Kesey
27. When I give a minister an order, I
leave it to him to find the means to carry it out. —Napoleon Bonaparte
28. Men make history and not the other
way around. In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still.
Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to
change things for the better. —Harry S. Truman
29. People buy into the leader before
they buy into the vision. —John Maxwell
30. So much of what we call management
consists in making it difficult for people to work. —Peter Drucker
31. The art of leadership is saying no,
not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes. —Tony Blair
32. The very essence of leadership is
that you have to have a vision. It’s got to be a vision you articulate clearly
and forcefully on every occasion. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet.
—Reverend Theodore Hesburgh
33. The key to successful leadership
today is influence, not authority. —Kenneth Blanchard
34. A good general not only sees the way
to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible. —Polybius
35. A great leader’s courage to fulfill
his vision comes from passion, not position. —John Maxwell
36. A leader takes people where they
want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to
go, but ought to be. —Rosalynn Carter
37. 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. —Jim Rohn
38. Outstanding leaders go out of their
way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in
themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish. —Sam Walton
39. A true leader has the confidence to
stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions, and the compassion to listen
to the needs of others. He does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one by
the equality of his actions and the integrity of his intent. —Douglas MacArthur
40. A ruler should be slow to punish and
swift to reward. —Ovid
41. No man will make a great leader who
wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it. —Andrew
Carnegie
42. Leadership is the art of getting
someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it. —General
Dwight Eisenhower
43. The leader has to be practical and a
realist yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist. —Eric
Hoffer
44. Leaders think and talk about the
solutions. Followers think and talk about the problems. —Brian Tracy
45. A man who wants to lead the
orchestra must turn his back on the crowd. —Max Lucado
46. Never tell people how to do things.
Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity. —General
George Patton
47. As we look ahead into the next
century, leaders will be those who empower others. —Bill Gates
48. 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. —John Kenneth Galbraith
49. Do what you feel in your heart to be
right–for you’ll be criticized anyway. —Eleanor Roosevelt
50. Don’t necessarily avoid sharp edges.
Occasionally they are necessary to leadership. —Donald Rumsfeld
51. Education is the mother of
leadership. —Wendell Willkie
52. Effective leadership is putting
first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.
—Stephen Covey
53. Great leaders are almost always
great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate, and doubt to offer a
solution everybody can understand. —General Colin Powell
54. Great leaders are not defined by the
absence of weakness, but rather by the presence of clear strengths. —John
Zenger
55. He who has great power should use it
lightly. —Seneca
56. He who has learned how to obey will
know how to command. —Solon
57. I am reminded how hollow the label
of leadership sometimes is and how heroic followership can be. —Warren Bennis
58. I cannot give you the formula for
success, but I can give you the formula for failure, which is: Try to please
everybody. —Herbert Swope
59. If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy
can totally transform one million realities. —Maya Angelou
60. If you would not be forgotten, as
soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading, or do
things worth the writing. —Benjamin Franklin
61. If your actions inspire others to
dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. —John Quincy
Adams
62. In matters of style, swim with the
current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. —Thomas Jefferson
63. It is absurd that a man should rule
others, who cannot rule himself. —Latin Proverb
64. It is better to lead from behind and
to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things
occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will
appreciate your leadership. —Nelson Mandela
65. Lead and inspire people. Don’t try
to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be
lead. —Ross Perot
66. 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. —Vince Lombardi
67. Leaders must be close enough to
relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them. —John C. Maxwell
68. Leadership and learning are
indispensable to each other. —John F. Kennedy
69. Leadership cannot just go along to
get along. Leadership must meet the moral challenge of the day. —Jesse Jackson
70. Leadership does not always wear the
harness of compromise. —Woodrow Wilson
71. Leadership is a potent combination
of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the
strategy. —Norman Schwarzkopf
72. Leadership is solving problems. The
day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped
leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded
you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership. —Colin Powell
73. Leadership is the key to 99 percent
of all successful efforts. —Erskine Bowles
74. Leadership is unlocking people’s
potential to become better. —Bill Bradley
75. Management is about arranging and
telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing. —Tom Peters
76. Management is efficiency in climbing
the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning
against the right wall. —Stephen Covey
77. Never give an order that can’t be
obeyed. —General Douglas MacArthur
78. No man is good enough to govern
another man without that other’s consent. —Abraham Lincoln
79. What you do has far greater impact
than what you say. —Stephen Covey
80. Not the cry, but the flight of a
wild duck, leads the flock to fly and follow. —Chinese Proverb
81. One of the tests of leadership is
the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency. —Arnold
Glasow
82. The final test of a leader is that
he leaves behind him in other men, the conviction and the will to carry on.
—Walter Lippman
83. The greatest leaders mobilize others
by coalescing people around a shared vision. —Ken Blanchard
84. The growth and development of people
is the highest calling of leadership. —Harvey Firestone
85. To do great things is difficult; but
to command great things is more difficult. —Friedrich Nietzsche
86. To have long term success as a coach
or in any position of leadership, you have to be obsessed in some way. —Pat
Riley
87. True leadership lies in guiding
others to success. In ensuring that everyone is performing at their best, doing
the work they are pledged to do and doing it well. —Bill Owens
88. We live in a society obsessed with
public opinion. But leadership has never been about popularity. —Marco Rubio
89. Whatever you are, be a good one.
—Abraham Lincoln
90. You gain strength, courage and
confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the
face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do. —Eleanor Roosevelt
91. A competent leader can get efficient
service from poor troops, while on the contrary an incapable leader can
demoralize the best of troops. —John J Pershing
92. A good leader is a person who takes
a little more than his share of the blame and a little less than his share of
the credit. —John Maxwell
93. There are three essentials to
leadership: humility, clarity and courage. —Fuchan Yuan
94. I am endlessly fascinated that
playing football is considered a training ground for leadership, but raising
children isn’t. —Dee Dee Myers
95. A cowardly leader is the most
dangerous of men. —Stephen King
96. My responsibility is getting all my
players playing for the name on the front of the jersey, not the one on the
back. –Unknown
97. A good plan violently executed now
is better than a perfect plan executed next week. –George Patton
98. The supreme quality of leadership is
integrity. –Dwight Eisenhower
99. You don’t lead by hitting people
over the head—that’s assault, not leadership. –Dwight Eisenhower
100.Earn your leadership every day.
–Michael Jordan
