Leadership quotes that can serve as an introduction to a discussion with your company's management team on how to improve leadership and employee engagement.

1. You have no right to manage others if you are not passionate about what you do. Bill Quiseng

2. A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go but ought to be. Rosalynn Carter

3. It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership. Nelson Mandela

4. I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people . Mahatma Gandhi

6. Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes. Peter Drucker

7. I forgot to shake hands and be friendly. It was an important lesson about leadership. Lee Iacocca

8. Don't tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results. George S. Patton

9. Leadership can be thought of as a capacity to define oneself to others in a way that clarifies and expands a vision of the future. Edwin H. Friedman

10. If you want one year of prosperity, grow grain. If you want ten years of prosperity, grow trees. If you want one hundred years of prosperity, grow people. Chinese proverb

11. All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership. John Kenneth Galbraith

12. Most important, leaders can conceive and articulate goals that lift people out of their petty preoccupations and unite them in pursuit of objectives worthy of their best efforts. John Gardner

13. Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality. Warren G. Bennis, President University of Southern California

14. Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected. Steve Jobs

15. If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea. Antoine de Saint-Exuperv

16. The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority. Kenneth Blanchard

17. An outstanding leader clearly articulates the goals and objectives and makes sure every member of the organization understands the role he or she plays in achieving these goals. Jack Bingleman, President, Staples

19. Customer satisfaction starts with employee satisfaction . Charlie P. Crockett Sales Director, 3M

20. The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly." Jim Rohn

21. If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. John Quincy Adams

22. A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way. John Maxwell

23. The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it. Theodore Roosevelt

24. The very essence of leadership is that you have to have a vision. It’s got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet. Theodore Hesburgh, President Norte Dame University

25. No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or to get all the credit for doing it. Andrew Carnegie

26. Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership. Colin Powell

27. The job of leadership today is not just to make money. It’s to make meaning. John Seely Brown Director, XEROX Parc

28. Outstanding leaders go out of the way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it's amazing what they can accomplish. Sam Walton

29. You can take great people, highly trained and motivated, and put them in a lousy system and the system will win all the time. Geary Rummier, President The Rummier-Bache Group

30. But of a good leader who talks little when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say, "We did it ourselves.” Lao Tzu

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