Leadership Quotes

Leadership Quotes

"Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do."
--John Wooden

"It takes leaders to grow other leaders."
--Ray Blunt

"Change from the top down happens at the will and whim of those below. "
--Peter Block

"There are no bad regiments, there are only bad officers."
--Field Marshall Lord Slim

"The most important thing about a commander is his effect on morale."
--Field Marshall Viscount Slim

"In the face of leadership flaws, too many people assume cynical perspectives, rather than do the hard work of building relationships in which they can have more positive influence."
--Ira Chaleff

"If you stand up and be counted, from time to time you may get yourself knocked down. But remember this: A man flattened by an opponent can get up again. A man flattened by conformity stays down for good."
--Thomas J. Watson, Jr.

"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

"People don't care how much you know--until they know how much you care."
--John C. Maxwell

"Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don't quit."
--Conrad Hilton

"Let no man imagine that he has no influence. Whoever he may be, and wherever he may be placed, the man who thinks becomes a light and a power."
--Henry George

"There are three kinds of people: Those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who ask, 'What happened?'"
--Casey Stengel

"Press on: nothing in the world can take the place of perseverance. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful men with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent."
--Calvin Coolidge

"You are not here merely to make a living. You are here to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, and with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world. You impoverish yourself if you forget this errand."
--Woodrow Wilson

"Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed no help at all."
--Dale Carnegie

"If you work in government, you'll see things that need doing. You can choose to stay out of trouble, or you can ask yourself, 'If not me, who?'"
--Bob Stone

"Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it."
--Dwight D. Eisenhower

"Whether you think you can or think you can't--you are right."
--Henry Ford

"Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go."
--T.S. Eliot

"You've got to go out on a limb sometimes because that's where the fruit is."
--Will Rogers

"The men who have done big things are those who were not afraid to attempt big things, who were not afraid to risk failure in order to gain success."
--B.C. Forbes

"As a leader...your principal job is to create an operating environment where others can do great things."
--Richard Teerlink

"You may have to fight a battle more than once in order to win it."
--Margaret Thatcher

"The...thing you can do to make your agency a more interesting place to work and consequently less bureaucratic is to enable those under you to feel they control their own areas of work. In this way they acquire a sense of ownership in what gets done and how they do it."
--Kenneth Ashworth

"Our country, right or wrong. When right, to be kept right; when wrong, to be set right."
--Carl Schurz

"You cannot be effective if those who work for you are not. So building their effectiveness ought to be a priority."
--Richard N. Haass

"All men who have turned out worth anything have had the chief hand in their own education."
--Sir Walter Scott

"Make sure you're not just waiting for someone else to fix things, or hoping that things will improve...Figure out what's going on and make a plan to improve things."
--Kenneth W. Thomas

"Nothing so undermines organizational change as the failure to think through the losses people face."
--William Bridges

"You may be the boss, but you're only as good as the people who work for you."
--Rear Admiral William Leahy

"Leadership is the creation of an environment in which others are able to self-actualize in the process of completing the job."
--John Mellecker

"We talk about deadwood, but we don't talk to deadwood."
-- Zane Schauer, NOAA

"Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there."
--Will Rogers

"We must be the change we wish to see."
-- Mahatma Gandhi

"It is the nature of man to rise to greatness if greatness is expected of him."
-- John Steinbeck

"You have to enable and empower people to make decisions independent of you. As I've learned, each person on a team is an extension of your leadership; if they feel empowered by you they will magnify your power to lead. Trust is a great force multiplier."
-- TomRidge

"No executive has ever suffered because his subordinates were strong and effective."
-- Peter Drucker

"The growth and development of people is the highest calling of leadership."
-- Harvey S. Firestone

"Successful leaders see the opportunities in every difficulty rather than the difficulty in every opportunity."
-- Reed Markham

"The deepest principle of human nature is the craving to be appreciated."
-- William James

"If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader."
-- John Quincy Adams

"Always do right. It will gratify some people and astonish the rest."
-- Mark Twain

"Outstanding leaders go out of the way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it's amazing what they can accomplish."
-- Sam Walton

"Don't be afraid to take a big step when one is indicated. You can't cross a chasm in two small steps."
-- David Lloyd George

"Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity."
-- Gen. George S. Patton

"Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way."
-- Gen. George S. Patton

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has. "
-- Margaret Mead

"A competent leader can get efficient service from poor troops, while on the contrary an incapable leader can demoralize the best of troops."
-- Gen. John J. Pershing

"Example is not the main thing in influencing others, it is the only thing."
-- Albert Schweitzer

Leadership

Leaders are called to stand
in that lonely place
between the no longer and the not yet
and intentionally make decisions
that will bind, forge, move
and create history.
We are not called to be popular,
we are not called to be safe,
we are not called to follow,
we are the ones called to take risks,
we are the ones called to change attitudes;
to risk displeasures,
we are the ones called to gamble our lives,
for a better world.

--Mary Lou Anderson, April 1970

Ozymandias

I MET a Traveler from an antique land,
Who said, "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desart. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read,
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed:
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is OZYMANDIAS, King of Kings."
Look on my works ye Mighty, and despair!
No thing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that Colossal Wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

-- Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)
(Analysis)

A leader is best when people barely know that he exists.
Less good when they obey and acclaim him.
Worse when they fear and despise him.
Fail to honor people, and they fail to honor you.
But of a good leader, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled,
they will say, "We did this ourselves."
-- Lao-Tzu

"When people feel trusted, they'll do almost anything under the sun not to disappoint the person who gave them the gift of trust."
-- Rob LeBow

"God grant that men of principle shall be our principal men."
-- Thomas Jefferson

"The greatness of a leader is measured by the achievements of the led. This is the ultimate test of his effectiveness."
-- Gen. Omar Bradley

"When things go wrong in your command, start searching for the reason in increasingly large circles around your own desk."
-- Gen. Bruce Clarke

"You must underwrite the honest mistakes of your subordinates if you wish to develop their initiative and experience."
-- Gen. Bruce Clarke

"I cannot trust a man to control others who cannot control himself."
-- Gen. Robert E. Lee

"A reflective reading of history will show that no man ever rose to military greatness who could not convince his troops that he put them first, above all else."
-- Gen. Maxwell Taylor

Colin Powell Quotes

"Leadership is all about people. It is not about organizations. It is not about plans. It is not about strategies. It is all about people--motivating people to get the job done. You have to be people-centered."
--Colin Powell

"Trust is the essence of leadership."
--Colin Powell

"Optimism is a force multiplier."
--Colin Powell

Andrew Jackson Quotes

"Take time to deliberate; but when the time for action arrives, stop thinking and go in."
--Andrew Jackson

"One man with courage makes a majority."
--Andrew Jackson

George C. Marshall Quotes

"It is not enough to fight. It is the spirit which we bring to the fight that decides the issue. It's morale that wins the victory."
--George C. Marshall

"Don't fight the problem, decide it."
--George C. Marshall

"I don't want you fellows sitting around asking me what to do. I want you to tell me what to do."
--George C. Marshall

Abraham Lincoln Quotes

"Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power."
-- Abraham Lincoln

"The probability that we may fail in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just."
-- Abraham Lincoln

Admiral Hyman Rickover Quotes

"It is necessary for us to learn from others' mistakes. You will not live long enough to make them all yourself."
-- Admiral Hyman G. Rickover

"Good ideas are not adopted automatically. They must be driven into practice with courageous impatience. Once implemented they can be easily overturned or subverted through apathy or lack of follow-up, so a continuous effort is required."
-- Admiral Hyman G. Rickover

Quotes by General Bill Creech

"Pride is the fuel of human accomplishment."
--General Bill Creech

"Any organization will be only as successful as those at the bottom are willing to make it."
--General Bill Creech

"Think big about what you can achieve; think small about how to achieve it. That's because you get things done through individuals and small groups of individuals."
--General Bill Creech

"Wars are won, in the final analysis, by what goes on at the front."
--General Bill Creech

"Many people believe that decentralization means loss of control. That's simply not true. You can improve control if you look at control as the control of events and not people. Then, the more people you have controlling events -- the more people you have that care about controlling the events, the more people you have proactively working to create favorable events -- the more control you have within the organization, by definition."
--General Bill Creech

Theodore Roosevelt Quotes

"Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat."
--Theodore Roosevelt

"Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell 'em, "Certainly, I can!" Then get busy and find out how to do it."
--Theodore Roosevelt

"In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing."
--Theodore Roosevelt

"The only man who never makes a mistake is the man who never does anything."
--Theodore Roosevelt

"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

Benjamin Franklin Quotes

"Anger is never without a reason, but seldom with a good one."
--Benjamin Franklin
"Those who are fear'd, are hated."
--Benjamin Franklin
"An honest man will receive neither money nor praise that is not his due.
--Benjamin Franklin
"Learn of the skilful; he that teaches himself, hath a fool for his master."
--Benjamin Franklin
"Search others for their virtues, thy self for thy vices."
--Benjamin Franklin
"Neglect mending a small fault, and 'twill soon be a great one."
--Benjamin Franklin
"How few there are who have the courage to own their own faults, or resolution enough to mend them!"
--Benjamin Franklin
"Glass, china, and reputation, are easily crack'd, and never well mended."
--Benjamin Franklin
"Do not do that which you would not have known."
--Benjamin Franklin