leadership insight Quotes

When I talk to CEOs, they're not educated about social media.

The greatest leader in the world could never win a campaign unless he understood the men he had to lead.

Vision is the most powerful weapon in the leader's arsenal.

When I was CEO, and I'd listen to music, a lot of people listen to music and you get inspiration from it. And a lot of things in hip hop are very instructive for being in business. Particularly, hip hop is a lot about business, and so it was very useful for me in any job.

I don't read such small stuff as letters, I read men and nations. I can see through a millstone, though I can't see through a spelling-book. What a narrow idea a reading qualification is for a voter!

I was able to do something that people can't do these days, which is to have quality time with the guys who were trying to be president and a number of them who got the job.

Apple was very close to bankruptcy and to irrelevance [but] you learn a lot about life through death, and I learnt a lot about vital corporations by experiencing a non-vital corporation. You would have thought that, when what stands between you and bankruptcy is some money, your focus would be on making some money, but that was not [Steve Jobs’] preoccupation. His observation was that the products weren’t good enough and his resolve was, we need to make better products. That stood in stark contrast to the previous attempts to turn the company around.

The best bosses understand the people working for them. That's the first component: what makes my people tick? What are they in it for?

I'm probably the only guy who worked for (Casey) Stengel before and after he was a genius.

Liverpool is one of the great institutions of the world, and you understand that when you see it from the outside, but you only really get to know when you go inside as manager.

My co-pastor is Randy Frazee. Randy is the brightest bulb in this box. He really has a feeling for what a church needs in terms of maturity, so I listen to him.

Colin Powell speaks regularly to high-ranking U.S. officials, he knows a lot about what's going on in the government. And so he's a powerful person who merits transparency, just like any other powerful people do.

If the CEO doesn’t see the playing field, nobody else can. The team may need to see it too, but the CEO really needs to be able to see the entire competitive space.

Use makes a better soldier than the most urgent considerations of duty,--familiarity with danger enabling him to estimate the danger. He sees how much is the risk, and is not afflicted with imagination; knows practically Marshal Saxe's rule, that every soldier killed costs the enemy his weight in lead.

I was struck by the ideas of Sarri, when you see them from outside you get a certain idea but when you are inside you understand the intelligence of a coach who has brought new ideas.

Wise kings generally have wise counselors; and he must be a wise man himself who is capable of distinguishing one.

Interpreting anyone's marriage - a neighbor's, let alone the president's - is extremely difficult. And yet, examining the first couple's relationship - their negotiations of public and private life, of conflicts and compromises - offers hints about Barack Obama the president, not just Barack Obama the husband.

Any one prominent in affairs can always see when a man may steal a horse and when a man may not look over a hedge.

Let him [the President] once win the admiration and confidence of the country, and no other single force can withstand him, no combination of forces will easily overpower him.... If he rightly interpret the national thought and boldly insist upon it, he is irresistible; and the country never feels the zest of action so much as when the President is of such insight and caliber.

But people don't know if I can teach the game. I know I can. My experience in Oklahoma was positive. It opened my eyes to how the game is played - the interaction among players, fans and media, how all that works. You have to know about the business of the game and how the actions of players and coaches affect the business. I think I have it down now.

I think that President George W. Bush was ahead of most of his government, in realizing that Putin was not the person we thought he was.