Showing posts with label Quotes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Quotes. Show all posts
Monday, March 10, 2014
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Wednesday, March 13, 2013
Positive Leadership: Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.
Steve Jobs was always described as an innovator, a
visionary; and rightly so.
Over the years, many people have looked up to Steve Jobs as
a source of inspiration.
Here are what we consider are the ten best
inspirational quotes by the man himself.
1. At an Apple product event for the first Macintosh
computer on January 24, 1984: "We're gambling on our vision, and we would
rather do that than make "me, too" products. Let some other companies
do that. For us, it's always the next dream."
2. In Playboy magazine in February 1985: "If you want
to live your life in a creative way, as an artist, you have to not look back
too much. You have to be willing to take whatever you've done and whoever you
were and throw them away."
3. At the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, May 1997:
"I'm actually as proud of the things we haven't done as the things I have
done. Innovation is saying no to 1,000 things."
4. Talking about work at the Stanford University's
Commencement address on June 12, 2005: "Your work is going to fill a large
part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you
believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you
do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle."
5. Talking about him being fired from Apple at the Stanford
University's Commencement Speech 2005: "I didn't see it then, but it
turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have
ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the
lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to
enter one of the most creative periods of my life.[...] It was awful tasting
medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the
head with a brick. Don't lose faith."
6. Steve Jobs gave an interview in "60 minutes" in
2003 in which he shared that his business model was inspired by The Beatles:
"My model for business is The Beatles: They were four guys that kept each
other's negative tendencies in check; they balanced each other. And the total
was greater than the sum of the parts. Great things in business are not done by
one person, they are done by a team of people."
7. In an interview to BusinessWeek in 1998: "That's
been one of my mantras - focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than
complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple.
But it's worth it in the end, because once you get there, you can move
mountains."
8. In a statement to The New York Times, 2003: "[Design
is] not just what it looks like and feels like. Design is how it works."
9. On being the richest man in an interview to The Wall
Street Journal in 1993 "Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't
matter to me... Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful...
that's what matters to me."
10. Talking about Death at the Stanford University
commencement speech, June 2005: "Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the
most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in
life. Because almost everything -- all external expectations, all pride, all
fear of embarrassment or failure -- these things just fall away in the face of
death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to
die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to
lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart. ...
Stay hungry. Stay foolish."
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Positive Leadership: Vince Lombardi
'The difference between a successful person and others is not
a lack of strength, not a lack of knowledge, but rather a lack of will.'
'The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at
hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the
best of ourselves to the task at hand.'
'Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard
effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is
worthwhile.'
Vince Lombardi (1913-1970)
Friday, May 04, 2012
Positive Leadership: The Leadership Philosophy of Steve Jobs and Apple
Simpler is always better: Jobs’ advice: “One product, one
box”.
Blunt communication works: Bluntness leaves no room for
confusion, distraction or complexity.
Good leaders can compartmentalise: Jobs compartmentalised
criticism so he could move towards his goals.
Small groups work better: Restrict meetings to people who would
be discussing the topic at hand.
Keep things minimal and move quickly: Apple campaigns are
put out within a month.
Simple names are superior: Apple does not hire naming experts;
it relies on a small internal team and a group of advertising consultants.
Simplicity is human: Not a five-gigabyte drive on an iPod,
but a “thousand songs in your pocket”.
Simplicity even works in retail: Focus on quality,
uncluttered and inviting design and fantastic customer service.
Friday, October 07, 2011
Positive Leadership: Some Thoughts on Leadership
- “It begins with people. Life is people.”
- “If we get the right ‘whos’ on the bus, we get the right outcomes.”“
- Try to change every ‘what’ to a ‘who’”
- “It is not about personality, it is about humility.”
- “Humility is burning ambition channelled to do good outside yourself.”
- “Hubris is outrageous arrogance that inflicts suffering on the innocent.”
- “Bad decisions with good intentions are still bad decisions.”
- “True innovation comes from empirical creativity.”
- “The only mistakes you learn from are ones you survive.”
- “The signature of mediocrity is chronic inconsistency.”
Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Monday, July 04, 2011
Sunday, July 03, 2011
Wednesday, May 04, 2011
Positive Leadership: The Power of Leadership Quotes
Leadership quotes are leadership tools that inspire us. Studies have shown that leadership quotes have made a positive impact in our day-to-day life. They are considered as one of the best leadership tools. These inspirational words awaken your potential. Leadership quotes are one-line statements but their meaning is vast and impact is immense. These words not only inspire but also promote personal development.
Leadership quotes are the right words that are delivered at right time and in a right way. They can change your negative attitude and transform your problems into opportunities. Leadership quotes can give you strategy to solve your problems. These words help to stay focused in your work. Leadership quotes will encourage and inspire you to achieve higher goals. If you use leadership quotes in a speech, it will have a greater impact on the audience. Leadership quotes will help the speaker to effectively communicate with the audience. Strong leaders use leadership quotes for effective leadership. They use it as a tool to support their strategy, vision and mission.
Leadership quotes are like pearls of wisdom. It is up to you, to find vision in leadership quotes. A leadership quote if implemented can transform your life positively. Leadership quotes can tell you how to be successful in life.
Sunday, April 03, 2011
Positive Leadership: Building Your Emotional Well-Being
Three Blessings™ is designed to increase your life satisfaction and to sweeten your memories about the past. It has been determined in well-designed research studies that becoming much more conscious of good events reliably increases happiness and decreases depression.
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Thursday, February 17, 2011
Positive Leadership: Build Collaboration
All successful influencers cultivate collaboration to form productive relationships. Effective influence results from two-way dialogue, not manipulation.
Here are six questions to ask yourself when forming productive partnerships:
- What do I want to achieve from this relationship?
- What does my potential colleague want to achieve?
- How can I weave these sets of wants together so we are both satisfied?
- What can I give up without undermining my overall goal?
- What can my counterpart bring to the table that might not be immediately obvious?
- What new solutions serve our common goal?
"The secret is to gang up on the problem, rather than each other." - Thomas Stallkamp
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Positive Leadership: Our Priorities Reveal our Values
It has been said that values are the standards by which we set our priorities. This means we can understand the values of a person or an organisation by examining their priorities.
Listening to a presentation given by top executives of a large firm recently, we heard them list the company’s priorities:
1. Top line growth
2. Enhance shareholder value
3. Focus on global expansion
4. Enhance customer satisfaction
5. Our people.
From this listing, it seems they don’t really value their people. Or at least they don’t put their people before growth. Ironically, the best organisations we have seen, the ones that are actually more profitable for the long-term, all put people before growth on their list of priorities.
As Lou Gerstner, the man who reinvented IBM, said: "Culture is not an aspect of the game. Culture is the game."
So what of other priorities?
If a company says shareholder value is their main priority how do they value customers? If an executive has their Blackberry at his child’s football match because work it still a priority, then how much does he value the fleeting time he has to watch his children grow up? If the urgent always takes priority over the important, then how much do we value the important over the urgent? If indeed we value things that we are not prioritising or prioritising things we do not value as much, then perhaps it is time to realign our priorities. If we value those kinds of things...
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
Positive Leadership: Winning
‘Players have to have passion and emotion to succeed and achieve. Winning and a belief in winning is emotional. It gets the adrenaline moving which sends you on a high when you win and makes you cry when you lose – because it matters. There must be passion to succeed; to achieve and to keep achieving; to raise horizons and expectations. Excellence is continuous; you’ve never done enough; you can never be satisfied, but as the team grows it achieves a special identity – no longer one person’s image – but a reflection of everyone’s interests, their abilities and their beliefs.'
Sir Ian McGeechan, British & Irish Lions Rugby Coach 1989, 1993, 1997, 2009
Monday, January 17, 2011
Dr Martin Luther King Jr on Leadership
As a tribute to the great leadership of Dr Martin Luther King Jr., here are some of his words to reflect on regarding leadership.
LEADING BY EXAMPLE
"People are often led to causes and often become committed to great ideas through persons who personify those ideas. They have to find the embodiment of the idea in flesh and blood in order to commit themselves to it."
"The people are looking to me for leadership - and if I stand before them without strength and courage, they too will falter."
COMMITTED/COMPELLED
"If a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live."
CONFIDENCE
"I have a dream my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today!"
COMPOSURE
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
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CHARACTER
"The time is always right to do what is right."
"There comes a time when one must take the position that is neither safe nor political nor popular, but he must do it because his conscience tells him it is right."
VOCAL LEADERSHIP
"I will not be intimidated, I will not be harassed. I will not be silent, and I will be heard."
SERVANT-LEADERSHIP
"A man all wrapped up in himself is a mighty small package."
CONFIDENCE-BUILDER
"We've got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn't matter with me now. Because I've been to the mountaintop... I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land."
RE-FOCUSER
"The first thing we must do here tonight is to decide we are not going to become panicky. That we are going to be calm, and we are going to continue to stand up for what is right. Fear not, we've come too far to turn back... we are not afraid and we shall overcome."
TEAM-BUILDER
"A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a moulder of consensus."
ENFORCER
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
"We are not asking, we are demanding the ballot... "
"When evil men plot, good men must plan. When evil men burn and bomb, good men must build and bind."
RECOMMENDED READING
For more information on Dr. King and his powerful leadership, read the following:
Martin Luther King, Jr., on Leadership: Inspiration and Wisdom for Challenging Times
by Donald T. Phillips
by Donald T. Phillips
by Charles Johnson and Bob Adelman
Saturday, January 08, 2011
Friday, December 10, 2010
Excellence & Success
'There are many people, particularly in sports, who think that success and excellence are the same thing. They are not the same thing. Excellence is something that is lasting and dependable and largely within a person’s control. In contrast, success is perishable and is often outside our control. If you strive for excellence, you will probably be successful eventually. People who put excellence in the first place have the patience to end up with success. An additional burden for the victim of the success mentality is that he is threatened by the success of others and he resents real excellence. In contrast, the person that is fascinated by quality is excited when he sees it in others.'
Joe Paterno, Head Football Coach at Penn State University
Monday, December 06, 2010
Decision Making at GE
Leadership by fiat when done in moderation can drive change and set a course.
“I think that if you run a big company, you’ve got to four or five times a year, just say, ‘Hey team, look, here’s where we’re going’. If you do it 10 times, nobody wants to work for you. If you do it zero times, you have anarchy.”
Jeff Immelt, CEO, General Electric
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
Educating for Ethics
The Analects covers most of Confucius' teachings and philosophy. He is at the start of a long literary tradition that assumes that good leadership and good followership can, at least to some extent be taught.
Book 1: 1.4 Circa 475-221 BCE
Confucius said, "Clever talk and affected manners are seldom signs of goodness."
Zeng-tzu said, "I examine myself three times a day. When dealing on behalf of others, have I been trustworthy? In intercourse with my friends, have I been faithful? Have I practised what I was taught?"
Friday, October 29, 2010
Lombardi
Earlier this month, a new play based on one of our heroes, former Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, premiered on Broadway. Our first reaction to this news was utter surprise. It doesn’t seem like Vince’s life would lend itself easily to the Broadway stage.
But, as we began to think about it, we realised that his life really was the stuff of good theatre. His no-nonsense determination to win, his endless ability to inspire, and his penchant for delivering pitch-perfect motivational wisdom are all characteristics that have the potential to create great theatre.
It’s great to know that, even 40 years after his death, there’s no shortage of enthusiasm about this inspirational character.
Here’s a taste of vintage Lombardi:
"Coaches who can outline plays on a black board are a dime a dozen. The ones who win get inside their player and motivate."
"Confidence is contagious. So is lack of confidence."
"The dictionary is the only place that success comes before work. Hard work is the price we must pay for success. I think you can accomplish anything if you're willing to pay the price."
"Football is like life - it requires perseverance, self-denial, hard work, sacrifice, dedication and respect for authority."
"The real glory is being knocked to your knees and then coming back. That's real glory. That's the essence of it."
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