Quotes About Leadership

The opportunity of a lifetime is to pick yourself. Quit waiting to get picked; quit waiting for someone to give you permission; quit waiting for someone to say you are officially qualified and pick yourself. It doesn't mean you have to be an entrepreneur or a freelancer, but it does mean you stand up and say, 'I have something to say. I know how to do something. I'm doing it. If you want me to do it with you, raise your hand.

It's okay. Let your ego push you to be the initiator. But tell your ego that the best way to get something shipped is to let other people take the credit. The real win for you (and your ego) is seeing something get shipped, not in getting the credit when it does.

The people who skip the hard questions are in the majority, but they are not in demand.

Heretics must believe. More than anyone else in an organization, it's the person who's challenging the status quo, the one who is daring to be great, who is truly present and not just punching a clock who must have confidence in her beliefs. Can you imagine Steve Jobs showing up for the paycheck? It's nice to get paid. It's essential to believe.

Leadership isn't something that people hand to you. ... [i]t's a gradual process, one where you take responsibility years before you are given authority. And that's something we can teach.

It's not time, Take it easy, Wait and see, It's someone else's turn - none of these stalls are appropriate for a leader in search of change. There's a small price for being too early, but a huge penalty for being too late. The longer you wait to launch an innovation, the less your effort is worth.

Your job isn't to do your job. Your job is to decide what to do next.

People don't believe what you tell them. They rarely believe what you show them. They often believe what their friends tell them. They always believe what they tell themselves. What leaders do: they give people stories they can tell themselves. Stories about the future and about the change.

It's extremely difficult to find smart people willing to start useful projects. Because sometimes what you start doesn't work. The fact that it doesn't work every time should give you confidence, because it means you're doing something that frightens others.

The secret of leadership is simple: Do what you believe in. Paint a picture of the future. Go there.

What most people want in a leader is something that's very difficult to find: we want someone who listens...The secret, Reagan's secret, is to listen, to value what you hear, and then to make a decision even if it contradicts the very people you are listening to. Reagan impressed his advisers, his adversaries, and his voters by actively listening. People want to be sure you hear what they said - they're less focused on whether or not you do what they said.

Skill and attitude are essential. Authority is not. In fact, authority can get in the way.

in every organization everyone rises to the level at which they become paralyzed with fear.

So great leaders don't try to please everyone. Great leaders don't water down their message in order to make the tribe a bit bigger. Instead, they realize that a motivated, connected tribe in the midst of a movement is far more powerful than a larger group could ever be.

Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department." David Packard

Initiating is really and truly difficult, and that's what leaders do. They see something others are ignoring and they jump on it. They cause the events that others have to react to. They make change.

Change isn't made by asking permission. Change is made by asking forgiveness, later.

Once you've engaged with an organization or a relationship or a community, you owe it to your team to start. To initiate. To be the one who makes something happen. To do less is to steal from them.

Group projects are the exception in school, but they should be the norm.

Successful heretics create their own religions....You can recognize the need for faith in your idea, you can find the tribe you need to support you, and yes, you can create a new religion around your faith. Steve Jobs did it on purpose at Apple and Phil Knight is famous for doing it at Nike.

It's uncomfortable to stand up in front of strangers. It's uncomfortable to propose an idea that might fail. It's uncomfortable to challenge the status quo. It's uncomfortable to resist the urge to settle. When you identify the discomfort, you've found the place where a leader is needed.

Real leaders don't care [about receiving credit]. If it's about your mission, about spreading the faith, about seeing something happen, not only do you not care about credit, you actually want other people to take credit...There's no record of Martin Luther King, Jr. or Gandhi whining about credit. Credit isn't the point. Change is.

When you are leading a tribe, a tribe that you belong to, the benefits increase, the work gets easier, and the results are more obvious. That's the best reason to overcome the fear.

It's clearly more fun to make the rules than to follow them. ~ Seth Godin