Boardroom Quotes & Sayings

EVERYONE JOINS A BAND IN THIS LIFE. You are born into your first one. Your mother plays the lead. She shares the stage with your father and siblings. Or perhaps your father is absent, an empty stool under a spotlight. But he is still a founding member, and if he surfaces one day, you will have to make room for him. As life goes on, you will join other bands, some through friendship, some through romance, some through neighborhoods, school, an army. Maybe you will all dress the same, or laugh at your own private vocabulary. Maybe you will flop on couches backstage, or share a boardroom table, or crowd around a galley inside a ship. But in each band you join, you will play a distinct part, and it will affect you as much as you affect it. And, as is usually the fate with bands, most of them will break up - through distance, differences, divorce, or death. — Mitch Albom

Instead of fostering the kind of dialogue in the boardroom that has in part contributed to our success, the board has inappropriately chosen to silence my concerns through termination as an executive officer. — George Zimmer

The Boardroom Paradox: Harden the softest like culture, and soften the hardest like number. — Pearl Zhu

Diversity is not a politically correct idea. Diversity in a boardroom or in a Parliament means that you just have different minds, different life experience, different ways of thinking about patients or customers or voters so that when you bring that intellect, you look at opportunity and risk, and then you have it in much better balance. — Jenny Shipley

The secret is that everything is always on the line. The more present we are at practice, the more present we will be in competition, in the boardroom, at the exam, the operating table, the big stage. If we have any hope of attaining excellence, let alone of showing what we've got under pressure, we have to be prepared by a lifestyle of reinforcement. Presence must be like breathing. — Josh Waitzkin

If you DON'T have diversity around your boardroom table, then what is wrong with you? — Rachel Sklar

There is no discussion inside this boardroom to say we've got to get into this or that. We look at every growth opportunity on its merits. — James Packer

How far we claim to have come - accepting all men as created equal. Gender being the requisite qualifier, as women are not reviewed in the same fashion - their fashion hopefully better suited to the bedroom than the boardroom. And, you know, homosexuals not really being 'men,' cannot be judged equivalent to their stiffer-wristed brethren. On religion, well, some Christians are willing to make room for a Jew or two in their inner circles. But Mecca-facing prayer must be met with flaming crosses. Close your eyes to the details, the big picture can still be viewed through rose-colored glass. But go any distance beyond the rhetoric, truth becomes a shadowed lens. — Ellen Hopkins

We'll see She-Hulk fighting evil everywhere from the boardroom to the Bowery, using her mind as much as her fists. — Charles Soule

The purpose of Innovation Management is not to promote innovation, but to manage innovation as a process. — Pearl Zhu

Oliver's boardroom was actually a library. A good library. A library where books looked worn-out and well read and loved on. The library was two stories tall with a balcony wrapped around the top level. The big window on the top floor was propped half open. A rebel beam of sunlight pushed through the clouds, shining through the rain beads stuck to the screen and glass. And then that strange, golden rain light shone warm and pretty over Oliver's books. I wondered if the sun had missed the books, had waited as long as it possibly cold to shine over those spines again. I knew how that felt, to love a story so much you didn't just want to read it, you wanted to feel it. — Natalie Lloyd

We are beckoned to see the world through a one-way mirror, as if we are threatened and innocent and the rest of humanity is threatening, or wretched, or expendable. Our memory is struggling to rescue the truth that human rights were not handed down as privileges from a parliament, or a boardroom, or an institution, but that peace is only possible with justice and with information that gives us the power to act justly. — John Pilger

Every company, every boardroom in which I sit, has a plan, and they have objectives, goals, and a process. And to make it work, the pressure and incentive have to come from the top. — Vernon Jordan

Heroes are men who admit to being difficult to live with, who demand extremely high standards in every aspect of their lives, who are natural, effortless leaders, strong men, men with prestige and intelligence, whose faults are likely to be manifestations of strength and power. He is the master of his life; he is in control. Whether his sphere of influence is the boardroom or the mountains, the sea or the stage, the hero dominates it with his personality, his intelligence, and his quick, hard-honed grasp of every situation. A hero can seem arrogant and short-tempered, ruthless, tough, even cruel
he can be quite unlovable at first. — Robyn Donald

There are conspiracy theorists who think I was crafted in a boardroom. Because I'm so very relatable and so very topical and so very Tumblr. — Halsey

It is what the "I" stands for - Information, Innovation, Insight, Improvement, or Influence, that needs to be represented by CIOs in the Boardroom. — Pearl Zhu

Find your own authentic leadership style; your own unique way of listening to, helping and engaging with your front line. Challenge the often formidable psychological distance between basement and boardroom. Your people will thank you, and so will your customers. — Chris Van Gorder

So how do you know whether a person has integrity? After all, like the foundation of a house, it may not be visible at first glance. It may not show up when you have pizza together or sit around a boardroom table for a meeting, but sooner or later, a situation will arise that will tell you whether someone operates with integrity or not. — Van Moody

Behind every book for young people and every global product of family entertainment, the hum of boardroom discussion about the politics of the work can be heard. — Marina Warner

The value-added Board brings the high-performance result, "deep common sense," balance, improved strategic thinking, creativity, wisdom and more. — Pearl Zhu

There are two kinds of warriors:
those on the battlefield,
and those in the boardroom;
both are out to win.
But the age of King Alexander has gone,
and the age of Bill Gates has come. — Matshona Dhliwayo

When it comes to business, I am a woman, and when it comes to relationships, I am a child. I just haven't figured out how to bring the same confidence and conviction I have in the boardroom to my romantic relationships. — Drew Barrymore

From its humble origins in college dorm rooms, social media has quietly crept into the boardroom. — Ryan Holmes

A boardroom is a collection of individuals, and individuals have varying motives, egos, agendas and qualifications. Sometimes the dynamics can go off track. — Carly Fiorina

We need women who are at the head of a boardroom, like at the head of the White House, at the head of kind of major scientific enterprises so that little girls everywhere can then think, you know what? I can do that, I want to do that, I will do that. — Chelsea Clinton

You don't need a Harvard MBA to know that the bedroom and the boardroom are just two sides of the same ballgame. — Stephen Fry

Truth has its place. In a courtroom, certainly. A boardroom? I don't know. I think truth is in the listener. Truth is something the listener bestows on a story
or not — J.R. Moehringer

Yes, damn it, I love you! But the bedroom is not the boardroom, Robert. In the boardroom only one person can be in charge. — Barbara Taylor Bradford

Jack and Ev looked at each other for a moment in the boardroom. At that moment neither realized that they were both fundamental to what Twitter had become. The perfect equilibrium of two different ways of looking at the world: the need to talk about yourself, compared with the need to let people talk about what was happening around them. One could never have existed without the other. That balance, or battle, had created Twitter. A tool that could be used by corporate titans and teens, by celebrities and nobodies, by government officials and revolutionaries. A place where people with fundamentally different views of the world, like Jack and Ev, could converse. — Nick Bilton

The things that hold women back, hold them back from sitting at the boardroom table and they hold women back from speaking at the PTA meeting. — Sheryl Sandberg

Politics exist in the boardroom, as well. — Carly Fiorina

The genre of narrative business books that I love so much - the ones that have a you-are-there quality - was invented, or so it is said, in 1982 by David McClintick, who wrote 'Indecent Exposure,' a rollicking good read about a Hollywood scandal and the ultimate boardroom power struggle at Columbia Pictures. — Andrew Ross Sorkin

Governance is not about maximization, but about optimization. — Pearl Zhu

Women do not win formula one races, because they simply are not strong enough to resist the G-forces. In the boardroom, it is different. I believe women are better able to marshal their thoughts than men and because they are less egotistical they make fewer assumptions. — Henry Ford

The key reason executives are paid so much now is that they appoint the members of the corporate board that determines their compensation and control many of the perks that board members count on. So it's not the invisible hand of the market that leads to those monumental executive incomes; it's the invisible handshake in the boardroom. — Paul Krugman

Employers should not be able to impose their religious beliefs on female employees, ignoring their individual health decisions and denying their right to reproductive care. Bosses belong in the boardroom, not in the bedroom. — Dina Titus

While modern women take charge in the boardroom or form their own rugby teams, none have yet demanded acceptance in the world of trainspotting. — Nicholas Whittaker

Not all psychopaths are in prison - some are in the boardroom. — Robert D. Hare

I think African Americans are resilient and hustlers by nature. I think they need to understand that you can take that hustle to the boardroom, but it has to be an education process. — Daymond John

I don't want Democrats in the boardroom and I don't want Republicans in the bedroom. — Jesse Ventura

Under no circumstances should doodling be eradicated from a classroom or a boardroom or even the war room. On the contrary, doodling should be leveraged in precisely those situations where information density is very high and the need for processing that information is very high. — Sunni Brown

Buyer Legends is a business process that uses storytelling techniques to map the critical paths a prospective buyer might follow on his journey to becoming a buyer.

This process aligns strategy to brand story to the buyer's actual experience on their customer journey.

These easy-to-tell stories reveal the opportunities and gaps in the customer's experience versus the current marketing & sales process.

These legends communicate the brand's story intent and critical touch point responsibilities within every level of an organization, from the boardroom to the stockroom.

Buyer Legends reconcile the creative process to data analysis; aligning metrics with previously hard-to-measure marketing, sales, and customer service processes. The first result is improved execution, communications, and testing. The second result is a big boost to the bottom line. — Bryan Eisenberg

GRC is about collaboration and harmony. — Pearl Zhu

There can be no equality in the boardroom until there is in the bedroom. — Sheryl Sandberg

This quality of self-denial in pursuit of a longer-term goal and, indeed, the willpower to maintain the denial, is excellent training for the boardroom. — John Viney

It takes more than driving to become an IndyCar driver. Gone are the days when drivers show up Friday morning and go home Sunday night. We're all integral to our partnerships, commercially, motorsports. We're as much champions in the boardroom as we are on the racetrack. — Charlie Kimball

Finally, though, I arrived at a point where I decided this was bullshit. I stopped feeling as if I didn't belong anywhere, and realized that I belonged anywhere I wanted to be - whether that was a boardroom, business class, or on — Sophia Amoruso

Quality starts in the boardroom. — W. Edwards Deming

The implications of likability are long-lasting and serious. Women adjust their behavior to be likable and as a result have less power in the world. And this desire to be liked and accepted goes beyond the boardroom - it's an issue that comes up for women in their personal lives as well, especially as they become more opinionated and outspoken. — Jessica Valenti

The moment when I can see a student's block, name the challenge and watch them become fuller and more dynamic in front of their colleagues' eyes is as rich a moment in a boardroom as it is in a ring. — Jeff Raz

What should be the aim of management? What is their job? Quality is the responsibility of the top people. Its origin is in the boardroom. They are the ones who decide. — W. Edwards Deming

Ask any successful person to look back over the events of his or her life, and chances are there'll be a turning point of one kind or another. It doesn't matter if that success has come on a ball field or in a boardroom, in a research laboratory or on a campaign trail - it can usually be traced to some pivotal moment. — Bill Rancic

Our children need to be able to see us take a stand for a value and against injustices, be those values and injustices in the family room, the boardroom, the classroom, or on the city streets. — Barbara Coloroso

We encounter very healthy boardroom debates and pretty diverse views, so we have always had the benefit of diversity of opinion and expression before we take some important calls. — Uday Kotak

Despite the headmaster's romantic claims that the origin of the cravat went back to the silk fascalia worn by Roman orators to warm their vocal cords, Langdon knew that, etymologically, "cravat" actually derived from a ruthless band of Croat mercenaries who donned knotted neckerchiefs before they stormed into battle. To this day, this ancient battle garb was donned by modern office warriors hoping to intimidate their enemies in daily boardroom battles. — Dan Brown

I had the blessing of opportunity. You need the folks in the boardroom who have consciences and the people in the streets who can picket at the right time. — Julian Castro

Religious freedom doesn't include the freedom to disregard the law and restrict another's freedom to believe and act differently. No one's forcing Catholic nuns to practice birth control, or priests to wear condoms (good idea tho). If you really feel your religious beliefs conflict with the mandates of running a business, the solution is simple: Get your ass out of the boardroom and back to the pulpit (where it belongs). — Quentin R. Bufogle

The best discussion of trouble in boardroom and business office is found in newspapers' own financial pages and speeches by journalists in management jobs. — Russell Baker

What do you call a co-worker these days? Neither teammate nor confederate will do, and partner is too legalistic. The answer brought from academia to the political world by Henry Kissinger and now bandied in the boardroom is colleague. It has a nice upper-egalitarian feel, related to the good fellowship of collegial. — William Safire

A single boot dangled loosely from his hand, and once in front of Rachel he raised it high above the table top and let go. It struck the beautifully polished oak with a resounding thunk, sending a puff of dust into the filtered air of the boardroom and scattering a residue of dried mud and gravel across the table. "Yours, I believe, Ms. Jennings-Porter," he said, charmingly straight-faced. — Cheryl Cooke Harrington

Business is war! Its leaders are strategic commanders, who boldly snatch victory from the jaws of defeat - and who perform other acts of derring-do. This kind of talk sounds great in the boardroom, and, for that matter, in the bookstore, where dozens of authors counsel would-be corporate warriors. — Nathan Myhrvold

The kingdom of God dawns in trailer parks and refugee camps. That shouldn't surprise us. The kingdom came to us not from a boardroom or a literary guild, but from a feeding trough and an execution stake. — Russell D. Moore

In science, technology, engineering and mathematics, men far outnumber women in the classroom and the boardroom. — Weili Dai

Group Thinking" or lack of courage to ask the tough and strategic questions is the chief weakness on Boards today. — Pearl Zhu

Get me inside any boardroom and I'll get any decision I want. — Tom Stoppard

I couldn't help myself. This woman whom I'd seen handle an entire boardroom full of cocky sons of bitches without batting an eye was crazy adorable. She was tough as nails and hotter than sin. And Christ, she was hilarious. I wanted more of her. A lot fucking more. — Max Monroe

The angel we named God banned representations of himself, even the writing of his name, trying to halt the process of literalization - but in the end it became inevitable. The angel found himself at the head of a corporation, run by Young Turks who wouldn't respect the line management structure: They rewrote his memos to make the law more rigorous, more confined, more human. He got ousted in a boardroom coup and kicked upstairs. He hadn't realized the power of corporeality, that the minds of men would of necessity alter the mind of their God. Being a deity meant taking on a lot of your subjects' qualities - both profound and trivial. — Michael Marshall Smith

A gig, I realise now, is a place where people come together and give permission for anything to happen. Things can be said and shouted and sung; people get pissed; people get kissed - there is a communal agenda of joyous wilding. These are the boardroom meetings of young people, where we establish our vibe. — Caitlin Moran

Scratch the surface in a typical boardroom and we're all just cavemen with briefcases, hungry for a wise person to tell us stories. — Alan Kay

Thinking professionally" is the first step in building a high-performance digital Board. — Pearl Zhu

As life goes on, you will join other bands, some through friendship, some through romance, some through neighborhoods, school, an army. Maybe you will all dress the same, or laugh at your own private vocabulary. Maybe you will flop on couches backstage, or share a boardroom table, or crowd around a galley inside a ship. But in each band you join, you will play a distinct part, and it will affect you as much as you affect it. — Mitch Albom

Corporate brand, culture, knowledge, and risk management are all boardroom concerns. — Pearl Zhu

From the boardroom to the bedroom, we're connected 24/7, yet loneliness is at an all-time high. More people are reaching for mobile devices than for the hand of someone in need. Where did our humanity go? — Elizabeth Kapu'uwailani Lindsey

Even if you love your current job and don't work in a hostile environment, you can still learn how to better equip yourself for when conflict and trials do come around. And believe me, sooner or later they always come around! For the devil can't stand for God's people to advance His causes without a fight. So if your present workplace isn't hostile, then thank the Lord for this wonderful respite and use it to train yourself for when you will be sitting across the boardroom from a devil in disguise. — T.D. Jakes