Leadership Style Quotes & Sayings

The ways we communicate convey meaning. To the extent that a boss sees a woman subordinate's actions as indicative of nurturance and kindness but not of assertiveness and leadership capability, he is likely to treat her ideas as not deserving of attention and fail to seriously consider her for promotion as well. If his misinterpretation of her communication style is not brought to his attention, she is denied access to senior levels. — Kathleen Kelley Reardon

Our evolution depends on our memory. If we keep forgetting the mistakes of the past, only to keep repeating them, then we will never change. And if we keep recycling through the exact same kind of leaders - the kind who do not propel us forward, but only hold us back - then perhaps what we really need now is a completely different style of leadership altogether. We need heart-driven leaders, not strictly mind-driven ones. We need compassionate humanitarians, not greedy businessmen. Peacemakers, not war instigators. We need unity, not division. Angels, not devils. — Suzy Kassem

You have to imprint your own style. People like authentic personalities. — Dexter Hawk

Leadership is an intense journey into yourself. You can use your own style to get anything done. It's about being self-aware. Every morning, I look in the mirror and say, 'I could have done three things better yesterday.' — Jeffrey R. Immelt

This is easy to say with the benefit of hindsight, but I think it once again points out how very important style of leadership, that is the way he does what he does, is to his perception. — Robert Teeter

To successfully respond to the myriad of changes that shake the world, transformation into a new style of management is required. The route to take is what I call profound knowledge, knowledge for leadership of transformation. — W. Edwards Deming

Whether there are innately female leadership styles ... is not really the right question. It is more important to ask why there has been so little attention paid to women leaders over the years as well as why the styles of leading more often exhibited by women are particularly useful at this critical moment in history. — Charlotte Bunch

You can't dominate a network with old-style leadership.

But, you can emerge, with the network's consent, as one of its leaders, regardless of your formal position or job title. — Phil Dourado

Hitler's unusually improvisational and personal style of leadership, which created constant responsibility conflicts and an anarchic tangle of offices and portfolios, was anything but an expression of political incompetence. On the contrary, it served to make Hitler's own supremacy essentially unassailable. — Volker Ullrich

The conservatives had started bringing demagoguery to the table on the [Afghan] war issue the previous fall [fall 2006]. Whenever opposition members criticized the war policy, assorted Tories accused them of being disloyal and of failing to support the troops ... [Harper] was gaining the reputation of a leader who couldn't see a belt without wanting to hit below it. — Lawrence Martin

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

Yet the opposite style of leadership, which the guilt-ridden neurotic so often exerts over his feelings, is equally self-destructive. In this style the slave-owner is so obsessed with the fear that his slaves (feelings) might get out of control and so determined that they should cause him no trouble that he routinely beats them into submission and punishes them severely at the — M. Scott Peck

Bill Clinton was friendly and charming with just about everyone besides Hillary. He always seemed to want to give his company extra time. He was very generous that way. Like him or not, share his political ideas or not, find yourself in the same room with him, and you are hooked. You can't help but like him. But that was not Hillary. She was clearly all business, 24/7. Her private leadership style was based on pure fear and loathing - and I never saw her that turn off. Even in the president's presence, Mrs. Clinton operated at far greater than arm's length - a cheerless grifter always on her scheming way to someone or something else more important than the person directly in front of her. — Gary J. Byrne

We are watching industries crumble, Wall Street firms disappear, unemployment spike, and unprecedented government intervention. And our designated opinion leaders want to know: Is Obama up this week? Is he down? And is his leadership style more like Bill Clinton's, or Abraham Lincoln's? — Thomas Frank

Added pressure and responsibility should not change one's leadership style, it should merely expose that which already exists. — Mark W. Boyer

American presidential leadership never goes out of style. — Monica Crowley

You don't need fashion designers when you are young. Have faith in your own bad taste. Buy the cheapest thing in your local thrift shop - the clothes that are freshly out of style with even the hippest people a few years older than you. Get on the fashion nerves of your peers, not your parents - that is the key to fashion leadership. Ill-fitting is always stylish. But be more creative - wear your clothes inside out, backward, upside down. Throw bleach in a load of colored laundry. Follow the exact opposite of the dry cleaning instructions inside the clothes that cost the most in your thrift shop. Don't wear jewelry - stick Band-Aids on your wrists or make a necklace out of them. Wear Scotch tape on the side of your face like a bad face-lift attempt. Mismatch your shoes. Best yet, do as Mink Stole used to do: go to the thrift store the day after Halloween, when the children's trick-or-treat costumes are on sale, buy one, and wear it as your uniform of defiance. — John Waters

First let's look at a model of Situational Leadership II that shows a combination development level and leadership style. — Kenneth H. Blanchard

What about feedback you've received about your leadership style over the years? Years ago, an executive editor of mine said, "You should count the number of times you praise somebody and then double that." Even the toughest, steeliest writer or editor often really wants to be told, "Hey, that was a great piece." Early in my career as a manager, it probably took me a while to realize that everybody wants that. It's just a human need. — Anonymous

Dubnus. Brother. I wouldn't have amounted to anything better than a rotting corpse in a ditch on the road south from Yew Grove without your help over the last few months. Nor can I pretend that I was responsible for turning the Ninth from a waste of rations to a fighting century, that was mostly you too. But trust me when I tell you this, these men will not respond to your style of leadership. They are lonely, frightened, but worst of all they feel worthless. They've sat here for the last month watching Gaulish farm boys in armour get snapped up like the last cake in the bakery while they, with all their abilities, are demeaned as incapable of fighting our war. — Anthony Riches

A leadership comfort zone brings stagnancy, deprives one of innovation, stifles growth and frustrates both the leader and the team they lead. Your personal preferences like leadership style, communication style, prejudices, habits and mannerisms must be effectively managed so that they do not work against you. You have to be careful that your strengths do not end up becoming a hindering comfort zone. Seek to lead, driven by a cause. — Archibald Marwizi

One of the ways we'll know that Work-Out has been successful is that my style of leadership will no longer be tolerated in this company. — Jack Welch

I think that my leadership style is to get people to fear staying in place, to fear not changing. — Louis V. Gerstner Jr.

What happens with a lot of leaders is that their leadership style is like ADD; they are all over the place with different ideas. They could be driving one idea forward but then move on to something else too soon. — Henry Cloud

If we try to emulate the leadership style of others we perceive as successful, we end up being second-rate versions of someone else. — Henna Inam

For those of you who really want to give critical thought to your unique leadership style and foster genuine followership, learn from what's out there and weave it into something meaningful and authentic. — Stacy Feiner

I don't want to over generalize, but I believe that women are typically drawn to leadership styles that focus on consensus building, effective listening and working in teams. That's certainly been my leadership style, and I think it's been very successful. — Margaret Hamburg

My style of leadership is to lead with the lightest touch that I possibly can. — Steve Squyres

Substance and content over style and hype any day. — Derwin L. Gray

As a woman, my style defines my leadership. It's a gentler, more compassionate approach. I consult, I listen and I compromise where it's in the best interest of the citizens. — Kamla Persad-Bissessar

Loving leaders allow for individuality in style and expression. — Glenn C. Stewart

Only experience can refine a leader's art. High-uncertainty projects are full of anxiety, change, and ambiguity that the team must deal with. It takes a different style of project management, a different pattern of team operation, and a different type of project leader. I've labeled this type of management leadership-collaboration. — Jim Highsmith

That very aggressive, unapologetic leadership style is needed in Washington, D.C., and I'm not afraid to tackle big issues. — Stephanie Rawlings-Blake

Research has shown that the perceived style of leadership is by far the most important thing to most voters in evaluating officeholders and candidates. — Robert Teeter

Leadership is not about personality, possessions, or charisma, but all about who you are as a person. I used to believe that leadership was about style but now I know that leadership is about substance, namely character. — James Hunter

But for a younger generation of conservative operatives who would soon rise to power ... They were true believers who meant what they said, whether it was 'No New Taxes' or 'We are a Christian Nation.' In fact, with their rigid doctrines, slash-and-burn style, and exaggerated sense of having been aggrieved, this new conservative leadership was eerily reminiscent of some of the New Left's leaders during the sixties. As with their left-wing counterparts, this new vanguard of the right viewed politics as a contest not just between competing policy visions, but between good and evil. Activists in both parties began developing litmus tests, checklists of orthodoxy, leaving a Democrat who questioned abortion increasingly lonely, any Republican who championed gun control effectively marooned. In this Manichean struggle, compromise came to look like weakness, to be punished or purged. You were with us or you were against us. You had to choose sides. — Barack Obama

The best leaders don't know just one style of leadership - they're skilled at several, and have the flexibility to switch between styles as the circumstances dictate. — Daniel Goleman

Whereas many coaches left to others the minutiae of leading an organization, Walsh broke down the minute-to-minute progression of team practices, defined responsibilities for coaches and players, and set rules for how to handle business matters such as negotiating contracts and dealing with the media. He also dispensed with an authoritarian style of leadership and empowered individuals by teaching them to think independently. These innovations amounted to a comprehensive new approach to coaching, one adopted and refined by a generation of Walsh's successors. — Sydney Finkelstein

Are you conscious of the scent or odour emanating from your mouth, arm pits, stockings or elsewhere? Are you friendly to your environment? Is your dressing, hair style and make up in line with your defined mission and values? How can you start managing your image and brand for a consistently good impression all the time? Does your image reflect your aspirations? — Archibald Marwizi

Even as an 18-year-old, I had to grow comfortable with my leadership style, which is that I was really impatient with under-motivated people - extremely impatient, to the point where I was counterproductive as a manager of underproductive people. And that hasn't really changed. If people need to be motivated, I'm no good. — Bing Gordon

Gandhi and Mandela and Churchill and JFK and Reagan and Thatcher and Sarkozy and Franklin and Washington set the tone to an incredible degree-their "personal style" was their "brand." ("It" starts with personal style of the tip-top leadership team. Sorry to be politically insensitive, but who would give a hoot about Tibet if it weren't for the look and style of the Dalai Lama?) Boss at any level: You're either on the "it" boat-or not. — Tom Peters

Knowing, glorifying and loving God are difficult to quantify, so we seldom include them in the evaluation process. We are tempted to evaluate goals that are easy to measure but that are much less significant. The final evaluation of leadership and of organizations is to ask, Did our efforts, programs, finances, structures and leadership style bring glory to God? Did these help people to know and love God? Too often we merely ask, Did the organization grow under my leadership? Did the budget increase? Did we plant more churches? Instead we must ask, Did the budget make God glad? Do people in the churches we planted truly love God more deeply? The fact that we will never be able to precisely quantify and evaluate the ultimate purpose must not dissuade us from being passionate about God's glory. The Lord will likely give us glimpses or indications of leadership effectiveness, but most of the critical outcomes will only be known in eternity. — James E. Plueddemann

I am honored and quite proud that a class is being taught on my sensationalist lyrics, unique style and fashion and leadership role within the hip-hop community. — Lil' Kim

Depending on the skill and will of the individual, the right leadership style may be coaching, motivating, or directing rather than delegating. A leader has to pick the right style of leadership for each employee, and it is not one-size-fits-all, — Thomas Lee

True leadership must have follower-ship. Management styles can vary, but even an autocrat needs people who believe and simply don't follow from fear. — James D. Robinson III

APM focuses on team management, from building self-organizing teams to developing a servant leadership style. It is both more difficult, and ultimately more rewarding than managing tasks. — Jim Highsmith

Despite the increasingly presidential style of political leadership in our country, teamwork is essential. — Bob Ainsworth

I think the guys are starting to rally around my leadership style and the way I do things. I've been waiting for this opportunity my whole life. — Aaron Rodgers

Though there were auspicious signs that preceded and accompanied his birth, preparing the world for the majestic and kingly, the birth of Jesus itself was of the humblest peasant parentage, in an unimportant town, and in the roughest of buildings. He made a career of rejecting marks of status or privilege: he touched lepers, washed the feet of his disciples, befriended little children, encouraged women to join his entourage, and, finally submitted to crucifixion by a foreign power. Everything about Jesus spoke of servitude: if Jesus is our model of leadership there can be no avoidance of the style by pastors. — Eugene H. Peterson