Quotes from James C. Collins

Victory awaits him who has everything in order—luck people call it. Defeat is certain for him who has neglected to take the necessary precautions in time; this is called bad luck." —Roald Amundsen, The South Pole

Indeed, if there is any one "secret" to an enduring great company, it is the ability to manage continuity and change—a discipline that must be consciously practiced, even by the most visionary of companies.

need hierarchy. When you have disciplined thought, you don't need bureaucracy. When you have disciplined action, you don't need excessive controls.

Comfort is not the objective in a visionary company. Indeed, visionary companies install powerful mechanisms to create /dis/comfort--to obliterate complacency--and thereby stimulate change and improvement /before/ the external world demands it.

the primary reality people worry about, rather than reality being the primary reality, you have a recipe for mediocrity, or worse. This is one of the key reasons why less charismatic leaders often produce better long-term results than their more charismatic counterparts. Indeed

We will never give up. We will never capitulate. It might take a long time, but we will find a way to prevail.

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 the comparison companies tried outside CEOs six times more often.

This is a very important lesson. You must never confuse faith that you will prevail in the end—which you can never afford to lose—with the discipline to confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.

Level 5 leaders are a study in duality: modest and willful, humble and fearless. To quickly grasp this concept, think of United States

lasting transformations from good to great follow a general pattern of buildup followed by breakthrough.

technology is important—you can't remain a laggard and hope to be great. But technology by itself is never a primary cause of either greatness or decline.

A Culture of Discipline. All companies have a culture, some companies have discipline, but few companies have a culture of discipline. 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. Technology

The only truly reliable source of stability is a strong inner core and the willingness to change and adapt everything except that core.

Goals live on the other side of obstacles and challenges," said Bourque. "Along

You can accomplish anything in life, provided that you do not mind who gets the credit. —

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. Indeed, we debated for a long time on the

The envisioned future should be so exciting in its own right that it would continue to keep the organization motivated even if the leaders who set the goal disappeared.

years. What separates people, Stockdale taught me, is not the presence or absence of difficulty, but how they deal with the inevitable difficulties of life. In

We find out who they are by asking them why they made decisions in their life. The answers to these questions give us insight into their core values.33

because expending energy trying to motivate people is largely a waste of time.

A key psychology for leading from good to great is the Stockdale Paradox: Retain absolute faith that you can and will prevail in the end, regardless of the difficulties, AND at the same time confront the most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be. UNEXPECTED

The good-to-great companies displayed two distinctive forms of disciplined thought. The first, and the topic of this chapter, is that they infused the entire process with the brutal facts of reality. (The second, which we will discuss in the next chapter, is that they developed a simple, yet deeply insightful, frame of reference for all decisions.) When

What work makes you feel compelled to try to create greatness?

The idea that leading in a "fast world" always requires "fast decisions" and "fast action"—and that we should embrace an overall ethos of "Fast! Fast! Fast!"—is a good way to get killed. 10X leaders figure out when to go fast, and when not to.