Quotes on Leadership

Posted on July 1, 2010 by David Shedd

For many years, I have been collecting quotes that apply to leadership and business. In a series of blogs, I will be sharing some of the quotes that I have collected. Please feel free to use them to pepper your speeches, conversations or presentations. If you have good quotes that I have not included, please share them. Also note that the sources of some quotes are not named, I have forgotten where I got the quotes from and must apologize. If you must have a source for a quote that you want to use, just credit it to either Winston Churchill or Mark Twain. They both said a whole bunch of clever quotes about nearly everything throughout their lives. In addition, quoting good old Winston or Mr. Twain always sounds impressive.

General Quotes on Leadership

  1. “A leader is an individual who can consistently cause others to win”
  2. “As a leader, it is important to do the right thing and to be seen doing the right thing.” Hank Paulson
  3. “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.” Warren Bennis
  4. “Leadership is communicating to people their worth and potential so clearly that they come to see it in themselves.” Stephen Covey
  5. “There is a real difference between managing and leading. Managing winds up being the allocation of resources against tasks. Leadership focuses on people. My definition of a leader is someone who helps people succeed.” Carol Bartz (CEO, Autodesk and Yahoo!)
  6. “Managers are people who do things right; leaders are people who do the right thing.” Warren Bennis
  7. “You lead and empower people. You manage and control things.” Stephen Covey
  8. “A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.”  Arnold H. Glasgow
  9. “The job of the leader is to do the job of leadership appropriate for the time and situation that you are in.” Jeff Immelt
  10. “Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing. Example is leadership.” Albert Schweitzer
  11. “He that gives good advice builds with one hand. He that gives good counsel and example builds with both. But he that gives good thoughts and bad example builds with one hand and pulls down with the other.” Francis Bacon
  12. “We judge ourselves by our intentions; others judge us by our actions.”
  13. “As a leader, you get the people you deserve. Great people want to work for great leaders.” Brad Sugars
  14. “The key element of leadership is not just making decisions, but drawing out the strengths of your group.” Dan Nyce
  15. “If you are a leader, lives should be better because of the influence you have had.” Tony Dungy
  16. “As a leader, don’t worry about the level of individual prominence you have achieved; worry about the individuals you have helped become better people.” Clayton Christensen
  17. “The lessons for leaders: Your job is to provide resources and support that build the confidence of players in themselves, each other, the team, and the excellence of the surrounding system. Ethics, fair play, mentoring, smooth transitions, continuity, and collaboration should not be luxuries or lip service; they create the margin of victory.” Rosabeth Moss Kanter
  18. “Being powerful is like being a lady; if you have to tell people you are, you aren’t.” Margaret Thatcher

 

 

 

Quotes on the Characteristics Required of a Leader

  1. “See everything; overlook a great deal; correct a little.”   Pope John XXIII
  2. “The great leader speaks little. He never speaks carelessly. He works without self-interest and leaves no trace. When all is finished, the people say: ‘We did it ourselves.'” Lao-tzu
  3. “Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence.” Helen Keller
  4. “A sense of humor is part of the art of leadership, of getting along with people, of getting things done.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
  5. “Like all great leaders, he was truly disciplined.” It’s Your Ship
  6. “Nothing great was every accomplished without enthusiasm.” Ralph Waldo Emerson
  7. “To possess self-confidence and humility at the same time is called maturity.” Jack Welch
  8. “Empowerment means freedom to do the right things rather than what someone feels like doing.”
  9. “He that questions much shall learn much.” Francis Bacon
  10. “You add value to people when you value them.” John Maxwell
  11. “Learn the art of patience. Apply discipline to your thoughts when they become anxious over the outcome of a goal. Impatience breeds anxiety, fear, discouragement and failure. Patience creates confidence, decisiveness, and a rational outlook, which eventually leads to success.” Brian Adams – Author
  12. “Leaders need courage. Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else [the success of the company] is more important than fear.” Ambrose Redmoon
  13. “What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do.” Tim Ferriss
  14. “Managing energy, not time, is the key to high performance and personal renewal.” Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
  15. “If they hope to be CEOs or heads of strategic business units, the ability to take multiple perspectives on the same problem will be critical for their success.” Larry Stybel
  16. “The key to leadership is self-control: primarily, the mastery of pride, which is more difficult to subdue than a wild lion (“If you cannot swallow your pride, you cannot lead.”); secondarily, the mastery of anger, which is more difficult to defeat than the greatest wrestler.” Genghis Khan
  17. “Principled leaders make a difference in the world. To be a principled leader, a person must have many skills and qualities, including the highest standards of integrity, sound judgment, and a strong moral compass – an intuitive sense of what is right and wrong.” Kim Clark, HBS
  18. “To be a success, you need a reasonable degree of intelligence, a strong work ethic, the ability to get along with others, a desire to build something important, and the ability to keep one’s ego in check.” David Rubenstein
  19. “He that would govern others first should be master of himself.” Philip Massinger
  20. “The supreme quality of leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office.” Dwight D. Eisenhower
  21. “To lead in the 21st century, you will be required to have both character and competence.” Norman Schwarzkopf
  22. “Leadership without the discipline of execution is incomplete and ineffective. Without the ability to execute, all other attributes of leadership become hollow.” Ram Charan and Larry Bossidy
     

 

…And Quotes on Characteristics a Leader Should Avoid

  1. “Whom the Gods want to destroy, they first make angry.” Ancient Greek Saying
  2. “Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it stands than to anything on which it is poured.” Mahatma Ghandi
  3. “The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.” Richard Feynman, Physicist
  4. “A prince who is not himself wise cannot be well advised.” Machiavelli
  5. “Fail to honor people, they fail to honor you.” Lao Tzu
  6. “90% of all leadership failures are character failures.”
Posted in Leadership | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

Good to Great (Jim Collins)

Posted on June 28, 2010 by David Shedd

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap… and Other Don’t:  Jim Collins

  1. Good is the enemy of great
    1. Complacency creeps in
  2. Good to great transitions do not happen via the following:
    1. Larger than life, celebrity CEO arriving to save the day
    2. Technology change
    3. Mergers and acquisitions
  3. Level V Leadership Required
    1. Level I: Highly Capable Individual
      1. Makes productive contributions through talent, knowledge, skills and good work habits
    2. Level II: Contributing Team Member
      1. Contributes individual capabilities to the achievements of group objectives
    3. Level III: Competent Manager
      1. Organize people and resources toward the effective pursuit of pre-determined objectives
    4. Level IV: Effective Leader
      1. Catalyzes commitment to and vigorous pursuit of a clear and compelling vision, stimulating higher performance standards
    5. Level V: Level V Executive
      1. Builds enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will
        1. Ambitious first and foremost for the institution not themselves
        2. Set up their successors for success
        3. Compelling modesty
        4. Unwavering resolve to do what must be done
        5. Blame themselves for failure; congratulate the team or good luck on success
  4. First Who… Then What
    1. First get the right people on the bus and the wrong people off the bus – build a superior executive team
    2. Need to be rigorous in people decisions
    3. Make decisions based on ability and corporate fit / culture
    4. People are not your Number One Asset; the right people are your Number One Asset
    5. Put your best people on your biggest opportunities, not your biggest problems
      1. Confront the Brutal Facts (Yet Never Lose Faith)
  5. Have the truth be heard
    1. Lead with questions, not answers
    2. Engage in dialogue and debate, not coercion
    3. Conduct autopsies without blame
    4. Build “red flag” mechanism that turn information into information that cannot be ignored
  6. Unwavering faith amid the brutal facts
    1. Stockdale Paradox
      1. Optimists lose: “We’re going out to be out by Christmas.”
      2. The realists: “I know that we will get out, I just do not know when.”
    2. Be a hedgehog (focused) rather than a fox (scattered, diffused and inconsistent)
      1. What can you be the best in the world at?
      2. What drives your economic engine?
      3. What are you deeply passionate about?
      4. At the intersection of these three circles is where you should focus your efforts
  7. A culture of discipline: disciplined people, disciplined thought, disciplined action
    1. Build a culture around the idea of freedom and responsibility within a framework
    2. Fill that culture with self-disciplined people who are willing to go to extreme lengths to fulfill their responsibilities
    3. Don’t confuse a culture of discipline with a tyranny
  8. Stay focused on what you are doing; create a “stop doing” list and unplug extraneous activities
    1. Success comes not from what you add to the situation, rather by what you take away
  9. Budgeting is a discipline to decide which arenas should be fully funded and which should not funded at all
  10. Technology is an accelerator of momentum, not a creator of it
    1. Technology does not solve the problem or create greatness in itself, but the proper use of technology is key
    2. Invest in technology to become excellent not for fear of being left behind
  11. The Flywheel and the Doom Loop
    1. Transitions look different from the outside than from the inside
      1. From the outside, they are dramatic, almost revolutionary breakthroughs
      2. From the inside, they feel like an organic development process
    2. With the flywheel, you build momentum and many problems fade away: commitment and alignment, motivation, etc.
      1. Follow a pattern of build-up leading to breakthrough
      2. Let results do most of the talking
      3. Maintain consistency over time
        1. Each generation builds on the work of the previous generation
        2. The flywheel continues to build momentum
  12. Good to Great to Built to Last
    1. Established company or start-up + Good to Great Concepts = Sustained Great Results + Built to Last Concepts = Enduring Great Company.
  13. Final Thoughts
    1. Do not add these thoughts and ideas to what we are already doing rather use them to organize your work around what is essential and ignore or stop doing everything else
    2. If so, your lives are simpler and your results are vastly improved

Product Details

Posted in Business Acumen, Improve / Turnaround | 1 Comment

Winning Business

Posted on June 27, 2010 by David Shedd
  1. Why Winning Business?
    1. As the leader of your company, you win personally when your business wins. Success in business is about winning. The money is important, but true long-term business are built and improved because the business leader has the vision to succeed and to win.

     

  2. What Defines a Winning Business?
    1. Be the investment of choice
      1. The business is ethical and respectful of all stakeholders
      2. The business makes a strong return on investment, both in profit and cash flow
      3. The business continues to grow in sales, profits and cash flow
    2. Be the employer of choice
      1. “A” players throughout the business
      2. “A” players want to come work for the business
    3. Be the supplier of choice
      1. Your customers think of your business when they are making their buying decision
      2. Your reputation and brand has a value that customers are willing to pay a premium for and that differentiates you from others in the market.

     

  3. Leadership in a Winning Business
    1. Building and Improving a Winning Business is all about your leadership.
      1. If the business succeeds, then you and your team have won. Congratulations!!! Celebrate and give your team the credit!!!
      2. If the business is failing, then the only useful answer is that it is your fault.
        1. It is not the fault of the weather, the terrible economy, your employees, or your customers. It is your fault.
        2. By accepting that it is your fault, you set a positive example of accountability in the organization, and you take responsibility to take the actions that will make it better

     

  4. How to Build and Improve a Winning Business
    1. Focus on three core principles that match up to the definition of a winning business
      1. Do the Right Thing
      2. Winning Teamwork
      3. Customer Service
    2. These three principles should guide how everyone, and especially the leaders, make decisions and act
      1. Is what I am about to do the right thing to do?
      2. Does it support the team?
      3. Does it help us in providing better customer service?
    3. Having only these three principles is critical
      1. Three principles can be communicated, referred to, and kept front in mind
        1. We have all read or seen those corporate guidelines that consist of 10 – 15 themes, principles, or ideas. Do you think that anyone in the company, even the leader, can recite the full list? I do not think so.
      2. These principles are short, simple and easily understood throughout the organization
        1. Short and simple – do the right thing, winning teamwork, customer service. I can remember, I can keep front of mind, and I can use to guide my decisions and actions.

           

  5. What is “Do The Right Thing”
    1. Goal
      1. Create a business that is efficient, effective, and that you can be proud of every day
    2. Details
      1. Ethics, Integrity, and Character
        1. Everything that we do should pass the newspaper front page test
      2. Do the right thing to ensure the success of the business
        1. Make the tough decisions to build and improve the business and its profitability in both the short and the long term
        2. If the business does not succeed, none of us do.
      3. Focus and prioritize to get the right thing done
        1. Focus on our contribution. Not, our activity or doing what we like to do
        2. Prioritize on the constraint in the business – that which is important, not on what is most urgent
        3. Prioritizing means consciously deciding what not to do

     

  6. What is “Winning Teamwork”
    1. Goal
      1. Having the right people on your team fully engaged, respected, and appreciated, and focused on doing the right things energizes any business.
      2. For winning teams in business as in sport, the whole is always greater than the sum of the individuals.
    2. Details
      1. Listening and Communication
      2. Accountability with Mutual Respect and Recognition
      3. Learning

     

  7. What is “Customer Service”
    1. Goal
      1. The customer pays the bills and salaries of everyone in the company. The customer provides the profit.
      2. Success and value comes from providing the right products and services to the right customers in the right niche in the right industries.
    2. Details
      1. Value your customers and exceed their expectations
      2. Expand your business outward on the shoulders of satisfied customers
      3. Focus on a few profitable niches where you have a competitive advantage
Posted in Leadership, Perform / Execution | Leave a comment

Things to Start Doing Today to Re-Charge Growth

Posted on June 22, 2010 by David Shedd

Summary: 

 There are three things that you, as the leader of your business, can start to do today to re-charge your company’s growth.

  1. Commit to get personally involved in sales, marketing and customer service on a daily basis
  2. Go out today and talk with your customers
  3. Go out today and talk with the “headlights of your organization”, your sales team

 

Blog Post:

“I know that I need to grow sales and develop my market presence.  But, we have tried everything.  The market stinks, and I just do not know where the growth is going to come from.”

 How many of you have heard or are experiencing this same issue?  Many?  Most?  All?

 O.K.   It is Quiz Time.  I have two quizzes for you.

First, Quiz One.

Quiz One: Please answer the following one question.

Do you personally like being involved in sales and dealing with sales and marketing people and customers?

Being absolutely honest, the answer for many of you may be… NO!

Ouch!!!

But, that is all right.  You see I am a recovering customerophobe.  At the beginning of my time as a company President, I thought of customers as a necessary evil that distracts from all the other fun stuff in business (acquisitions, business turn-arounds, operational improvement, start-ups, etc.).  Of course, that all changed for me during the telecommunications bust when our customers literally disappeared overnight and through the positive influence of my two Sales and Marketing VP’s. 

So, if I can change you can change as well.

Doing the right thing in business is not just about doing what you like to do; it is about doing what needs to be done.  And today in this economy, in your market space, with your company, the right thing is to “do” customer service, sales and marketing.  Full Stop.

If your answer to the question above was “No”, great job in realizing it and acknowledging it (“Hi, my name is David and I am a customerophobe…”).  Now that you have acknowledged it, you must figure out how to force yourself to do what needs to be done with regard to customer service and sales.  As leaders, I am sure that you have lectured, taught, or screamed at somebody to change the way they do their job… or else!!  Swallow your own medicine and figure out how you are going to change the way you do your job and spend the needed time on sales, customers, and growth.

For me, the easiest way to do this is to commit to some small amount of time each day, say 2 hours.  Make this public to others in your organization to give you the extra incentive to do what you say to avoid losing face.  Then, track your time.  Follow through on your commitment and track your time every day.

If you are not willing to commit your time and effort to sales, customers and growth, save yourself some time now and Stop Reading this Blog Post because nothing will happen and nothing will change.

For those of you who are still with me, let’s go on to Quiz Two.

Quiz Two:  Please answer the following three questions.

  1. How many customer service problems / poor quality products / missed customer deadlines has your company had in the past month?  How were they resolved?
  2. How many times have you personally been in front of a customer in the past month?
    1. To resolve a customer service issue and personally apologize?
    2. To be on a sales call (with mouth shut) listening and learning how your best salesperson sells your products and services?
    3. To visit with a good and satisfied customer

             i.     To thank them for their business?

             ii.     To ask how easy it is to do business with your company?

             iii.     To ask how you can serve them better?

             iv.     To ask if they would recommend your company to others?

             v.     To ask about problems that they are having in their business

             vi.     To ask if there are any related products and services that they might need that you could provide?

3.   How many times have you attended a sales meeting in the past month?

       A.  To go through your sales teams’ activity reports asking about who is buying and why and about new and different customers that they are seeing in the market?

      B.  To find out who are the high margin customers and who are the low margin customers and why?

      C.  To find out from the sales team about unsatisfied customers?

      D.  To find out how the sales team is being successful / unsuccessful in selling your products in the market and against the competition?

I would daresay that many of you have incomplete answers to these three questions.  If so, then you know where to begin to re-charge growth.

The Chinese say that a long journey begins with the first step.  So, the beginning of re-charging growth is to spend the next several weeks immersing yourself in customer service issues, customer visits, and time and attention with your sales team.  That is what you can start doing today to re-charge growth.

WAIT!! STOP!! HOLD THE PRESSES!!!  David, you stupid @*$&#*, you have not even talked about marketing and the brand!!!

That would be correct, I have not talked about marketing and brand on purpose.  The goal of your branding and your marketing effort is to tell customers and potential customers what your company is about, what makes it unique and better, and why they should do business with you.

In Marketing 101, marketing and brand is defined as being all about the customer’s…

  1. Experiences when they deal with your company
  2. Perceptions when they think of your company
  3. Expectations of what will happen when they deal with your company

 

To be blunt, unless you had some really good answers on the second quiz, you do not yet know the experiences, perceptions, and expectations of your current customers.  Thus, there is no point in building a branding and marketing campaign yet because it may not match the reality of what you are delivering and what you can deliver.

As a personal anecdote, I went through this exercise with one of my companies several years ago.  The General Manager, the VP of Sales, and I all spent time reviewing customer service issues, speaking with customers, and meeting with the sales team.  In our initial analysis, it became obvious that we had a lot of work to do before we could begin to market and brand ourselves.  We agreed that if we were to market and brand ourselves right then and there, the only truthful branding tag line would have been:

“Buy from us, because we suck less than everybody else.”

Until next time.

Posted in Growth and Strategy, Sales and Marketing | 1 Comment

Prioritize on the Most Important

Posted on June 20, 2010 by David Shedd

In the last downturn in the early 2000’s, re-engineering was all the rage.  One of the books that defined re-engineering was Michael Hammer’s The Agenda: What Every Business Must Do to Dominate the Decade.   It is actually quite a good book (contact me if you would like a Cliff Notes version of the book).  Nevertheless, two years later in 2003 – 2004 as the economy began to pick up speed, the book and re-engineering in general came in for criticism as corporations were ill-prepared for growth and changing customer expectations.  Companies had focused too much on re-engineering in the previous few years.

As Mark Twain said: “History never repeats itself, it only rhymes.”

Today, there is a disturbing rhyme with companies focused on internal cost-cutting and efficiency initiatives.  A recent survey of businesses ranked business priorities in 2010 as follows:

Business Priorities 2010

1. Improving business processes

2. Cutting costs

3. Increasing the use of analytics

4. Improving enterprise effectiveness

5. Attracting new customers

6. Managing change initiatives

7. Innovation in products and services creation

8. More effective targeting

9. Consolidating business operations

10. Growing customer relationships

As you know, only the top few priorities will get the attention and energy that is needed to succeed.   Please note that I do not believe that improving business processes and cutting costs are unimportant; each and every initiative and/or program related to these priorities has merit.  However, the energy spent pursuing these programs crowds out and exhausts people and companies without solving the most important issue facing the company.

Focus and Prioritize on the Most Important

What is the most important issue facing most businesses today?  Please raise your hand if your business is on relatively stable footing and finding more customers and getting more customers is not the most important single issue that you are facing.  Hands?  Hands?  Anyone?  Bueller?

Yes, in today’s “New Normal”, for most financially stable companies, the single biggest issue they are facing is to increase sales, find new customers, and re-ignite growth. 

Why then, are companies focused internally?  I immediately can think of three reasons:

  1. The company just recovered from a near – death experience and is not going to let that happen again
  2. The leadership of the company comes from the operations and/or finance and that is what they know – cut costs and improve efficiency.  “To a hammer, everything looks like a …”
  3. The company has multiple initiatives (read: 10 – 20) and some include sales and they are sure that they can get them all done.

 

What To Do?

A recent contact of mine reminded me of a quote from Winston Churchill.  “It is not enough that we do our best; sometimes we have to do what is required.”

Today, it is required to focus the time and effort of your company on the single most important issue – re-charging growth by servicing your current customers and developing new customers, products, and markets.  All other initiatives and priorities need to be subservient to that most important issue. 

“No!!! You cannot do it all!!!”  Doing it all means too many priorities which means no priorities which leads to initiative over-kill, bureaucracy, waste and slow corporate death.

So, kill kill kill all the useful, important and reasonable initiatives that have nothing to do with re-charging growth.  Instead, focus the company on the 1 – 3 initiatives that will help you win with current and new customers.

Next Week:  Things to Start Doing Today to Re-Charge Growth

Posted in Leadership, Perform / Execution | 1 Comment

Hello world!

Posted on June 20, 2010 by David Shedd

This website and blog is all about business success and what companies need to do in order to perform, improve, and grow.  The website is targeted to the business leaders and executives (Owners, CEO’s, Presidents, COO’s, Vice Presidents, and General Managers) of small to middle –market companies or operating divisions with revenues from $10M to $200M.  The focus is to give these executives and leaders straightforward insight, ideas, and tools that will enable them to move their companies forward.

Posted in Business Acumen | Leave a comment