Leadership Authenticity Quotes

Leadership is much less about what you do, and much more about who you are. If you view leadership as a bag of manipulative tricks or charismatic behaviors to advance your own personal interest, then people have every right to be cynical. But if your leadership flows first and foremost from inner character and integrity of ambition, then you can justly ask people to lend themselves to your organization and its mission.

The power for authentic leadership is found not in external arrangements, but in the human heart.

Churchill wrote his own speeches. When a leader does that, he becomes emotionally invested with his utterances...If Churchill had had a speech write in 1940, Britain would be speaking German today.

What’s the use of getting elected or getting re-elected if you don’t stand for anything …. I fully realize that this is the termination of my political career.

Winning supporters over can only really be achieved by what you do, not what you say. It's no use just smiling and shaking hands and getting quoted with witty one-liners.

Too often, we are being programmed by the environment around us to behave differently. But I think a true leader is an authentic person who feels good about who he is.

Presenting leadership as a list of carefully defined qualities (like strategic, analytical, and performance-ori ented) no longer holds. Instead, true leadership stems from individuality that is honestly and sometimes imperfectly expressed.... Leaders should strive for authenticity over perfection.

I'm inclined to believe that most Negro leaders, professional Negroes are professional Negroes. Being a Negro is their professional, and being a profe - a leader is their profession. And usually they say exactly what the white man wants - wants to hear them say.

I end up liking politicians, both left and right, who talk about political matters as if they are addressing a bunch of adults, as if they are capable of handling both complexity and emotional responsibility.