Quotes from James C. Collins

if we don't spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect, we cannot possibly have a great life.

Your mission must meet one overriding criterion: it must be compelling. The best missions have an element of genuine passion in them. Don't set a mission like this: To make and sell athletic shoes on a worldwide basis. Set a mission like this: Crush Reebok.

But if we spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect—people we really enjoy being on the bus with and who will never disappoint us—then we will almost certainly have a great life, no matter where the bus goes. The people we interviewed from the good-to-great companies clearly loved what they did, largely because they loved who they did it with.

We all know now that the 747 became the flagship jumbo jet of the airline industry, but the decision looks much different from the perspective of the late 1960s. Yet—and this is the key point—Boeing was willing to make the bold move in the face of the risks. As in Boeing's case, the risks do not always come without pain.

Discipline is the greatest thing in the world. Where there is no discipline, there is no character. And without character, there is no progress. . . . Adversity gives us opportunities to grow. And we usually get what we work for. If we have problems and overcome them, we grow tall in character, and the qualities that bring success.

But isn't setting such an audacious mission risky? Yes. A good mission should be difficult to achieve. There should be a chance you'll fail, combined with an off-setting belief that you'll make it anyway. That's part of what makes it a real mission.

When you turn over rocks and look at all the squiggly things underneath, you can either put the rock down, or you can say, 'My job is to turn over rocks and look at the squiggly things,' even if what you see can scare the hell out of you."25 That quote, from Pitney Bowes executive Fred Purdue

We expected that good-to-great leaders would begin by setting a new vision and strategy. We found instead that they first got the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats - and then they figured out where to drive it.

There are four basic types of mission to choose from: Targeting Common Enemy Role Model Internal Transformation.

When you have disciplined people, you don't need hierarchy. When you have disciplined thought, you don't need bureaucracy. When you have disciplined action, you don't need excessive controls. When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great performance.

Vision provides guidance about what core to preserve and what future to stimulate progress toward.

Far better to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory, nor defeat.

we've found that quantitative missions are often less exciting to people throughout the company than, say, democratizing the automobile or becoming the preeminent company in your industry. Just stating, "Our mission is $50 million in revenues in 1995" won't necessarily excite people. If you use a quantitative mission, be sure to tie it to something meaningful to everyone.

That's what makes death so hard—unsatisfied curiosity. —BERYL MARKHAM, West with the Night1

doing what you are good at will only make you good;

focusing solely on what you can potentially do better than any other organization is the only path to greatness.

It is very important to grasp that Level 5 leadership is not just about humility and modesty. It is equally about ferocious resolve, an almost stoic determination to do whatever needs to be done to make the company great.

A culture of discipline involves a duality. On the one hand, it requires people who adhere to a consistent system; yet, on the other hand, it gives people freedom and responsibility within the framework of that system.

Practical Discipline #2: When you know you need to make a people change, act.

When you combine a culture of discipline with an ethic of entrepreneurship, you get the magical alchemy of great performance. Technology

First, at the top levels of your organization, you absolutely must have the discipline not to hire until you find the right people. The single most harmful step you can take in a journey from good to great is to put the wrong people in key positions. Second, widen your definition of "right people" to focus more on the character attributes of the person and less on specialized knowledge. People can learn skills and acquire knowledge, but

first who... then what" start-up.

Larger-than-life, celebrity leaders who ride in from the outside are negatively correlated with taking a company from good to great. Ten of eleven good-to-great CEOs came from inside the company, whereas

they cannot learn the essential character traits that make them right for your organization.