Top 200 Leadership Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “Average leaders raise the bar on themselves; good leaders raise the bar for others; great leaders inspire others to raise their own bar.”

— Orrin Woodward

52. “Great leaders hire outstanding people, train them well, inspire them, and then get out of their way.”

— Frank Sonnenberg

53. “Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.”

— Publilius Syrus

54. “When we do more than we are paid to do, eventually we will be paid more for what we do.”

— Zig Ziglar

55. “If you are working on something exciting that you really care about, you don’t have to be pushed. The vision pulls you.”

— Steve Jobs

56. “The quality of a leader is reflected in the standards they set for themselves.”

— Ray Kroc

57. “Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

58. “The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.”

— Max De Pree

59. “Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes.”

— Peter F. Drucker

60. “When a manager openly expresses his faith in an employee’s skill, he doesn’t just improve mood and motivation; he actually improves their likelihood of succeeding.”

— Shawn Achor

61. “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers who can cut through the argument debate and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand.”

— Colin Powell

62. “The more intentional you are about your leadership growth, the greater your potential for becoming the leader you’re capable of being. Never stop learning.”

— John C. Maxwell

63. “Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing.”

— Albert Schweitzer

64. “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”

— Edward Everett Hale

65. “My job is not to be easy on people. My job is to take these great people we have and to push them and make them even better.”

— Steve Jobs

66. “Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.”

— Sam Walton

67. “Individual commitment to a group effort – that is what makes a team work, a company work, a society work, a civilization work.”

— Vince Lombardi

68. “Don’t blow off another’s candle for it won’t make yours shine brighter.”

— Jaachynma N.E. Agu

69. “Lead and inspire people. Don’t try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be led.”

— H. Ross Perot

70. “The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled.”

— Plutarch

71. “True leadership lies in guiding others to success. In ensuring that everyone is performing at their best, doing the work they are pledged to do and doing it well.”

— Bill Owens

72. “While a good leader sustains momentum, a great leader increases it.”

— John C. Maxwell

73. “People buy into the leader before they buy into the vision.”

— John C. Maxwell

74. “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.”

— Peter F. Drucker

75. “Great leaders are not defined by the absence of weakness, but rather by the presence of clear strengths.”

— John Peter Zenger

76. “He who has learned how to obey will know how to command.”

— Solon

77. “The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.”

— Eric Hoffer

78. “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be.”

— Rosalynn Carter

79. “A great leader’s courage to fulfill his vision comes from passion, not position.”

— John C. Maxwell

80. “Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.”

— Stephen R. Covey

81. “A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together.”

— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

82. “Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way.”

— George S. Patton Jr.

83. “A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men.”

— Stephen King

84. “To command is to serve, nothing more and nothing less.”

— André Malraux

85. “The best leaders are the ones who show their true colors not during the banner years but during times of struggle.”

— Shawn Achor

86. “Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.”

— Peter F. Drucker

87. “Do what you feel in your heart to be right – for you’ll be criticized anyway. You’ll be “damned if you do, and damned if you don’t.””

— Eleanor Roosevelt

88. “You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.”

— Ken Kesey

89. “A ruler should be slow to punish and swift to reward.”

— Ovid

90. “Most of what we call management consists of making it difficult for people to get their work done.”

— Peter F. Drucker

91. “Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.”

— Steve Jobs

92. “When you put together deep knowledge about a subject that intensely matters to you, charisma happens. You gain courage to share your passion, and when you do that, folks follow.”

— Jerry I. Porras

93. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

— Margaret Mead

94. “The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet.”

— Theodore Hesburgh

95. “The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born - that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.”

— Warren G. Bennis

96. “My own definition of leadership is this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence.”

— Bernard Law Montgomery

97. “Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power.”

— Robert G. Ingersoll

98. “Affirmation without discipline is the beginning of delusion.”

— Jim Rohn

99. “A good general not only sees the way to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible.”

— Polybius

100. “If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy can totally transform one million realities.”

— Maya Angelou