Below are some of the many powerful leadership quotes which I find them to be utmost useful and valuable in helping me to improve my leadership skills.
Leadership is much more than just management. It is the ability to lead a group of followers effectively, empower them and also to make the organization successful; without sacrificing valid principles and ideals.
As you know a leader must have followers to be successful, and they must know how to treat and motivate the followers to ensure their success. Leadership comes with responsibility, commitment, and producing favorable results.
“The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.” – Kenneth Blanchard
“A good leader inspires people to have confidence in the leader, a great leader inspires people to have confidence in themselves” – Eleanor Roosevelt
“A real leader faces the music, even when he doesn’t like the tune.” – Anon
“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.” – John C. Maxwell
“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
“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” – Peter F. Drucker
“A great leader’s courage to fulfill his vision comes from passion, not position.” – John Maxwell
“He that cannot obey, cannot command.” – Benjamin Franklin
“Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them.” – John Maxwell
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.” – John Quincy Adams
“Leadership is getting someone to do what they don’t want to do, to achieve what they want to achieve.” -Tom Landry
“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” – Harold R. McAlindon
“The task of leadership is not to put greatness into humanity, but to elicit it, for the greatness is already there.” – John Buchan
“People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader works in the open, and the boss in covert. The leader leads, and the boss drives.” -Theodore Roosevelt
“A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.” – Lao Tzu
“You manage things; you lead people.” – Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper
“The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.” – Max DePree
“Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” – Jack Welch
“A leader is a dealer in hope.” – Napoleon Bonaparte
“My own definition of leadership is this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence.”- General Montgomery
“Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.” – Peter Drucker
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.” – Margaret Mead
“The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground.” – Sir Winston Churchill
“To command is to serve, nothing more and nothing less.” – Andre Malraux
“He who has never learned to obey cannot be a good commander.” – Aristotle
“I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.” – Ralph Nader
“Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes.” – Peter Drucker
“Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.” – Publilius Syrus
“A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together.” – Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
“The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.” – Theodore Roosevelt
“Leadership is influence.” – John C. Maxwell
“A good general not only sees the way to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible.” – Polybius
“A great leader’s courage to fulfill his vision comes from passion, not position.” – John Maxwell
“Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.” – Sam Walton
“A ruler should be slow to punish and swift to reward.” – Ovid
“Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.” – General Dwight Eisenhower
“The leader has to be practical and a realist yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.” – Eric Hoffer
“Leaders think and talk about the solutions. Followers think and talk about the problems.” – Brian Tracy
“A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd.” – Max Lucado
“Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.” – General George Patton
“Education is the mother of leadership.” – Wendell Willkie
“Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.” – Stephen Covey
“Great leaders are not defined by the absence of weakness, but rather by the presence of clear strengths.” – John Zenger
“He who has great power should use it lightly.” – Seneca
“He who has learned how to obey will know how to command.” – Solon
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.” – John Quincy Adams
“In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.” – Thomas Jefferson
“Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them.” – John C. Maxwell
“Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.” – John F. Kennedy
Yes, in other words, leadership is having the skill of motivating a group of people to act towards achieving a common goal. Leadership involves communicating, motivating and supervising.
If you are still uncertain whether you have any leadership skill, then read through the above leadership quotes again. You will find your answer.