quotations about leadership
Despite the trend to see leaders as benign, ethical, moral, centered people, they're not always. Some theorize that it's not even necessary: in fact, sometimes good behavior is actually counter-productive, and slows down implementation. Forget about finding your emotional true north. Just get it done.
MEGHAN M. BIRO
"5 Great Ways To Hack Your Leadership Style", Forbes, April 22, 2016
Once you've given orders on a subject, you must always give orders on that subject.
FRANK HERBERT
Dune
A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men.
STEPHEN KING
Under the Dome
When one sheep leads the way all the rest follow.
CHINESE PROVERB
Because our desire for a coherent vision of the world is bottomless, our hunger for leadership is insatiable, too. Leaders make the world more sensible, but never sensible enough.
JOSHUA ROTHMAN
"Shut Up and Sit Down", The New Yorker, February 29, 2016
He who thinketh he leadeth and hath no one following him is only taking a walk.
JOHN C. MAXWELL
Leading from the Lockers
If becoming a high performing organization is the destination, leadership is the engine.
KEN BLANCHARD
Leading at a Higher Level
Truly inspiring leaders are authentic, that is, they have done their strategic homework, they have a vision that matches the people they are working with, and they believe in that vision deeply. They are not faking it.
RONALD J. BURKE & CARY L. COOPER
Inspiring Leaders
Bad leadership is an oxymoron.
JOSEPH CLARENCE ROST
Leadership for the Twenty-first Century
The first act of leadership is coming to grips with yourself, who you are, where you are, and what is of value to you, and shaping yourself by acts of conscious will into what you want to become.
FENWICK W. ENGLISH
The Art of Educational Leadership
Leadership is about mobilising people to tackle tough changes and thrive, while authority simply looked at protection, direction and order and can be a strait jacket if not used correctly.
KIRK HUMPHREY
"The Time for Adaptive Leadership is Right Now", Barbados Advocate, April 24, 2016
The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such.
ANDRE MAUROIS
"The Art of Leadership", The Art of Living
Leadership is not just one quality, but rather a blend of many qualities; and while no one individual possesses all the needed talents to go into leadership, each man can develop a combination to make him a leader.
VINCE LOMBARDI
attributed, Run to Win: Vince Lombardi on Coaching and Leadership
To some extent, leaders are storytellers; really, though, they are characters in stories. They play leading roles, but in dramas they can't predict and don't always understand. Because the serialized drama of history is bigger than any one character's arc, leaders can't guarantee our ultimate narrative satisfaction. Because events, on the whole, are more protean than people, leaders grow less satisfying with time, as the stories they're ready to tell diverge from the stories we want to hear.
JOSHUA ROTHMAN
"Shut Up and Sit Down", The New Yorker, February 29, 2016
Leading is a hot seat and some of us embrace it and some of us don't. And there are always ways to do it better.
MEGHAN M. BIRO
"5 Great Ways To Hack Your Leadership Style", Forbes, April 22, 2016
I see [it said that] leaders should keep their ears to the ground. All I can say is that the ... nation will find it very hard to look up to leaders who are detected in that somewhat ungainly posture.
WINSTON CHURCHILL
speech in House of Commons, Sep. 30, 1941
What I want is men who will support me when I am in the wrong.
LORD MELBOURNE
attributed, Lord M.
The best boss is the one who bosses the least.
RALPH MOODY
Little Britches: Father and I Were Ranchers
If you command wisely, you'll be obeyed cheerfully.
THOMAS FULLER
Gnomologia
Ultimately a genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus, but a molder of consensus.
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
address at the Episcopal National Cathedral, Washington D.C., Mar. 31, 1968