Paul Polman Quotes

To be a leader is to be awake and dissatisfied at all times. Leadership is action. Leadership is influence

A lot of people ask what it takes to move from being a creative to a leader: Take everyone's career personally. People will work hard for you if you work hard for them. Any idiot can be a boss; all you need is a title. But to be a leader, you need to earn respect and have an opinion you stand by.

When you were made a leader you weren't given a crown, you were given the responsibility to bring out the best in others.

If there is such a thing as good leadership, it is to give a good example. I have to do so for all the Ikea employees.

As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.

Leadership is not about a title or a designation. It's about impact, influence and inspiration. Impact involves getting results, influence is about spreading the passion you have for your work, and you have to inspire team-mates and customers.

True leadership isn't about having an idea. It's about having an idea and recruiting other people to execute on this vision.

Good leadership is to know when to go, and you only succeed as a good leader if you've transported someone else in and the company gets stronger. Then you've succeeded as leader.

Leaders don't create followers, they create more leaders.

Leadership matters most, and optimism and unity comes from the leader.

Leadership requires a blend of strategy, persuasion, inspiration and motivation. It is based on respect more than fear.

Leadership is the willingness to put oneself at risk…. Leadership is seeing the possibilities in a situation while others are seeing the limitations…. Leadership is evoking in others the capacity to dream.

Leaders must exemplify integrity and earn the trust of their teams through their everyday actions. When you do this, you set high standards for everyone at your company. And when you do so with positive energy and enthusiasm for shared goals and purpose, you can deeply connect with your team and customers.

Leadership contains certain elements of good management, but it requires that you inspire, that you build durable trust. For an organization to be not just good but to win, leadership means evoking participation larger than the job description, commitment deeper than any job contract's wording.

Leadership is service to others.

Leadership is more than just managing economic reforms. Leadership means giving broad direction, take up challenges which other people cannot do.

One of the things you look for is leadership, and it comes in different forms. There's vocal leaders, there's quiet leaders, there's leaders that lead by example.

When I look at a leader, I look at someone who is able to get exceptional performance out of others.

You don't lead by hitting people over the head - that's assault, not leadership.

To me, leadership is about encouraging people. It's about stimulating them. It's about enabling them to achieve what they can achieve - and to do that with a purpose.

I would say a good leader brings results. A great leader writes a new story, it's different. Obviously a new story has to incorporate a lot of results. But a story is a chapter in the life of a company that people want to write and want to remember.

I believe to be a leader is to enable others to embrace a vision, initiative or assignment in a way that they feel a sense of purpose, ownership, personal engagement, and common cause. I was very affected as a child by my father's positive example as a civic leader who inspired others to share his commitment to improving our community.

Real leadership is leaders recognizing that they serve the people that they lead.

Good leaders make people feel that they're at the very heart of things, not at the periphery.

While a lab Director can get done the things that he regards as important, he has the more important job of bringing out the best ideas of the broader scientific community.