Quotes About Leadership

What followed became known as "the exodus." First, a whole group of senior managers who had been part of Ron's team—our financial officer, our data processing manager, the guy who was running our distribution centers—all walked out behind him. You can imagine how Wall Street felt about that.

But if American management is going to say to their workers that we're all in this together, they're going to have to stop this foolishness of paying themselves $3 million and $4 million bonuses every year and riding around everywhere in limos and corporate jets like they're so much better than everybody else.

A lot of what goes on these days with high-flying companies and these overpaid CEO's, who're really just looting from the top and aren't watching out for anybody but themselves, really upsets me. It's one of the main things wrong with American business today.

From 1977 to 1987, our average annual return to investors was 46 percent. And even in the middle of the recession, in 1991, we reported a return on equity of more than 32 percent.

Closer at hand, I had decided I wanted to be president of the university student body. I learned early on that one of the secrets to campus leadership was the simplest thing of all: speak to people coming down the sidewalk before they speak to you. I did that in college.

Also while I was at Missouri, I was elected president of the Burall Bible Class—a huge class made up of students from both Missouri and Stephens College. Growing up, I had always gone to church and Sunday school every Sunday; it was an important part of my life. I don't know that I was that religious, per se, but I always felt like the church was important.

One way I've managed to keep up with everything on my plate is by coming in to the office really early almost every day, even when I don't have those Saturday numbers to look over. Four-thirty wouldn't be all that unusual a time for me to get started down at the office. That early morning time is tremendously valuable: it's uninterrupted time when I think and plan and sort things out. I write my letters and my articles for Wal-Mart World, our company newsletter.

If you want the people in the stores to take care of the customers, you have to make sure you're taking care of the people in the stores. That's the most important single ingredient of Wal-Mart's success.

DAVID GLASS: "Two things about Sam Walton distinguish him from almost everyone else I know. First, he gets up every day bound and determined to improve something. Second, he is less afraid of being wrong than anyone I've ever known. And once he sees he's wrong, he just shakes it off and heads in another direction.

These days, the real challenge for managers in a business like ours is to become what we call servant leaders. And when they do, the team—the manager and the associates—can accomplish anything.

I learned this early on in the variety store business: you've got to give folks responsibility, you've got to trust them, and then you've got to check on them.

Mike Bloomberg

when I chaired meetings in 2009 to consider whether our administration should take a fresh position on something, I often heard one of two entrenched views: We never do that, or We always do that. The past was prologue: those who had conceived of policies in a certain way were ill disposed to try something new.

When USUN diplomats committed the cardinal sin of 'admiring the problem,' I would handwrite on their memos, 'If you were Obama, what would you do?' (p. 350).

She becomes the voice of reason when there is none

In politics, what begins in fear usually ends in folly.

Bonhoeffer knew that when the church stops talking about Jesus, it has nothing to say. And when it assumes dominance, it's not talking about Jesus.

great leader knows the value of holding his own counsel and listening. He doesn't reveal what he's thinking until he knows the minds of those around him. "How so, Dabney?

Because the only thing that made you part of any team was wearing the same color jersey. You made no friends. Teammates admired your game. Those who didn't envy you idolized you. But they didn't like you, and that was okay with you. You didn't give a damn so long as they carried out the plays you called.

All little lambs need a shepherd.

I rest my rule on Loyalty, not on Force.

Small countries have to come to terms with great ones. Hitler had the power; thus some of his demands had to be accepted.

to never again be led like sheep to the slaughter.

Don't wait for a light to appear at the end of the tunnel, stride down there and light the bloody thing yourself.