An Effective Leader Quotes & Sayings

An effective leader creates specific, achievable goals, initiates action and enlists the participation of others. They remove distractions; grasps the bigger picture, focuses on one task at a time; completes the task competently and organizes for the future. — Ken Wyatt

I've not seen an effective manager or leader who can't spend some fraction of time down in the trenches ... If they don't do that they get out of touch with reality, and their whole thought and management process becomes abstract and disconnected. — Jeff Bezos

An effective leader develops the ability to correctly identify the pertinent detail or details - incidentals in a market, industry or sport that might create an incremental advantage. — John Wooden

To be an effective leader, you have to have a manipulative streak - you have to figure out the people working for you and give each tasks that will take advantage of his strength. — Norman Schwarzkopf

If you don't have the ability to see when to stand up and the conviction to do it, you'll never be an effective leader. — John C. Maxwell

if a leader combines leadership principles with an understanding of context, there will be effective execution. — Russell E. Palmer

Having the right attitude is fundamental to being an effective leader. — Jim George

An effective leader must step back, look at the big picture, and make sure the important things are not being pushed out of the way by the seemingly urgent needs of the moment. — Kenneth H. Blanchard

Authenticity and knowing who you are is fundamental to being an effective and long-standing leader. — Ann M. Fudge

Learning to be an effective leader is no different than learning to be an effective person. And that's the hard part — Warren G. Bennis

You must love those you lead before you can be an effective leader, you can certainly command without that sense of commitment, but you cannot lead without it. And without leadership, command is a hollow experience, a vacuum often filled with mistrust and arrogance. — Eric Shinseki

In my opinion, being an effective leader requires being an effective listener. The most productive leaders are usually those who are consistently willing to listen and learn. — John Wooden

The goal of an effective leader is to recondition your team to be solution focused rather than problem focused. — Jim Rohn

A leader's first priority is to create an environment where others can do these things and that cannot happen if they are not having effective meetings. — Patrick Lencioni

Bill Clinton, who, to his credit, has established a clear and consistent foreign policy, which is as follows: Whenever the president of the United States gets anywhere near any foreign head of state, living or dead, he gives that leader a big old hug. This has proven to be an effective way to get foreign leaders to do what we want: Many heads of state are willing to sign any random document that President Clinton thrusts in front of them, without reading it, just so he will stop embracing them. — Dave Barry

Democrats' attack on the Republican majority leader is nothing but a coordinated agenda to stop an effective leader from accomplishing the people's business. — Bill Shuster

Don't take on things you don't believe in and that you yourself are not good at. Learn to say no. Effective leaders match the objective needs of their company with the subjective competencies. As a result, they get an enormous amount of things done fast. — Peter Drucker

COURAGE isn't an absence of fear. It is doing what you are afraid to do, letting go of the familiar and forging ahead into new territory. What I have discovered is that the best leaders have the courage to act - are willing to take the risk, make the statement, point the way, lead the way - when others hesitate out of fear. Effective leadership requires the ability to stand up, stand out, and the conviction to do it. I have never known a successful leader that was not courageous. — John C. Maxwell

An effective leader is willing to think about what's happening and how to understand what's going on. Facilitating flow and making others more conscious of it, the leader communicates an awareness of process to the group, making them more aware of their energies and options. One important principle is to keep track of who has not spoken ... It's also important to notice when people do speak out but are not heard. Effective leaders practice patience, reminding themselves to wait and observe, remembering that there's always more going on in a group than we're consciously aware of. — Diane Dreher

I believe one of the requirements of good leadership is the ability to listen - really listen - to those in your organization. An effective leader is very good at listening, and it's difficult to listen when you are talking. — John Wooden

My vision of a better world would be one under the control of a strong United Nations, one that truly has the support of all countries in the world. Only an effective world government could provide sufficient law and have the power to control the unboundaried destructive forces of pollution and war. I will continue to be a leader in the World Federalist Association. — Lloyd Bridges

Even in challenging economic times, making sure that study abroad is part of our college students' education is a vital investment. If we want a new generation of leaders and innovators who can be effective in an ever more globalized world, sending our students overseas is not a luxury. It's a necessity. — Rick Steves

Being an effective leader is enormously complex. It requires vision to see a future, dedication to make things happen, sensitivity to people who are quirky at times, and personal confidence without arrogance. — Dave Ulrich

Reflection doesn't take anything away from decisiveness, from being a person of action. In fact, it generates the inner toughness that you need to be an effective person of action - to be a leader. — Peter Koestenbaum

It has been well said that an effective leader must know the meaning and master the technique of the educator. — Philip Selznick

In Russia an authoritarian leader is running the country. You can't fight Putin with elections because he controls them. That's why demonstrations are the most effective approach. Unfortunately Russia has sunk to this primitive level. — Alexei Navalny

To be an effective leader, you must be trustworthy. If people don't trust you, they won't follow you. And if they won't follow you, your organization won't meet its goals. Sandy Allgeier explains that personal credibility comes down to a simple truth: It's not about the type of person you are; it's about the types of things you do. If you want to be a great leader, read The Personal Credibility Factor. — Quint Studer

An ability to embrace new ideas, routinely challenge old ones, and live with paradox will be the effective leader's premier trait. — Tom Peters

A true leader must have enough backbone to stand alone, even when the crowd wants to take the easy road home. A true leader cannot be dependent on companionship for his or her security, but must learn to trust in God alone. Singleness can give us the kind of backbone - courage, confidence, and leadership skills that an effective Christian must learn. — Leslie Ludy

Competition and rivalry between the members of a group are the antithesis of the cooperation and team play needed in an effective management group. This is why team building is an empty abstraction for a group whose leader controls with power. — Thomas Gordon

We praise our leaders when they act against our adversaries. But when our own interest is threatened, we begin to dislike the same leaders, irrespective of the sincerity of their intentions. An effective leader is bound to create enemies. — Awdhesh Singh

I've written about the giving of trust as though it were a simple formula for building loyalty. But it isn't simple at all. The talent that is an essential ingredient of leadership tells the leader whom to trust and how much to trust and when to trust. The rule is (as with children) that trust be given slightly in advance of demonstrated trustworthiness. But not too much in advance. You have to have an unerring sense of how much the person is ready for. Setting people up for failure doesn't make them loyal to you; you have to set them up for success. Each time you give trust in advance of demonstrated performance, you flirt with danger. If you're risk-averse, you won't do it. And that's a shame, because the most effective way to gain the trust and loyalty of those beneath you is to give the same in equal measure. — Tom DeMarco

As a servant leader the way you serve the vision is by developing people so that they can work on that vision even when you're not around. The ultimate sin of an effective servant leader is what happens when you are not there. That was the power of Jesus' leadership-the leaders He trained went on to change the world when He was no longer with them in bodily form. — Ken Blanchard

To be an effective leader and make sound decisions, you must be able to gather data by seeking out diverse perspectives and be willing to consider points of view other than your own. — Elizabeth Thornton

Only the person who does not evade conflict and directs his efforts in keeping with the course of society's development can be an effective leader. — Georgi Plekhanov

An effective leader allows exceptions to the rule for exceptional results or when circumstance demands. — John Wooden

You don't become an effective leader by default. — John C. Maxwell

Arthur Scargill's leadership of the miners' strike has been a disgrace. The price to be paid for his folly will be immense. He will have destroyed the N.U.M. as an effective fighting force within British trade unionism for the next 20 years. If kamikaze pilots were to form their own union, Arthur would be an ideal choice for leader. — Jimmy Reid

Our leaders have described the recent atrocity with the customary cliche: mindless cowardice. Mindless may be a suitable word for the vandalising of a telephone box. It is not helpful for understanding what hit New York on September 11. Those people were not mindless and they were certainly not cowards. On the contrary, they had sufficiently effective minds braced with an insane courage, and it would pay us mightily to understand where that courage came from. It came from religion ... — Richard Dawkins