Top 140 Mike Krzyzewski Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Effective teamwork begins and ends with communication.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

Featured in: Communication Quotes

2. “A basketball team is like the five fingers on your hand. If you can get them all together, you have a fist. That’s how I want you to play.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

3. “Two are better than one if two act as one.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

4. “Champions play as they practice. Create a consistency of excellence in all your habits.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

5. “There are five fundamental qualities that make every team great: communication, trust, collective responsibility, caring and pride. I like to think of each as a separate finger on the fist. Any one individually is important. But all of them together are unbeatable.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

6. “My hunger is not for success, it is for excellence. Because when you attain excellence, success just naturally follows.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

7. “Discipline is doing what you are supposed to do in the best possible manner at the time you are supposed to do it.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

8. “Almost everything in leadership comes back to relationships.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

9. “Courage and confidence are what decision making is all about.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

10. “Our goal is not to win. It’s to play together and play hard. Then, winning takes care of itself.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

11. “People want to be on a team. They want to be part of something bigger than themselves. They want to be in a situation where they feel that they are doing something for the greater good.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

12. “In leadership, there are no words more important than trust. In any organization, trust must be developed among every member of the team if success is going to be achieved.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

13. “If what you have done yesterday still looks big to you. You haven’t done much today.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

14. “You develop a team to achieve what one person cannot accomplish alone. All of us alone are weaker, by far, than if all of us are together.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

15. “In order to be a winner, you have to look for ways of getting things done and not for reasons why things can’t be done. People who live with excuses have things that can’t be done hovering around them all the time.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

16. “A team is a fist-not five fingers.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

17. “I believe work is good. There is dignity in work. I also believe that a hard-work ethic forges strong leaders.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

18. “A leader may be the most knowledgeable person in the world, but if the players on his team cannot translate that knowledge into action, it means nothing.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

19. “Always get back to your core principles.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

20. “I have a plan of action, but the game is a game of adjustments.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

21. “When a leader takes responsibility for his own actions and mistakes, he not only sets a good example, he shows a healthy respect for people on his team.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

22. “The truth is that many people set rules to keep from making decisions. Not me. I don’t want to be a manager or a dictator. I want to be a leader-and leadership is ongoing, adjustable, flexible, and dynamic. As such, leaders have to maintain a certain amount of discretion.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

23. “Growth creates complexity, which requires simplicity.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

24. “In developing teams, I don’t believe in rules. I believe in standards. Rules don’t promote teamwork, standards do.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

25. “A common mistake among those who work in sport is spending a disproportional amount of time on “x’s and o’s” as compared to time spent learning about people.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

26. “When you first assemble a group, it’s not a team right off the bat. It’s only a collection of individuals.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

27. “When you are passionate, you always have your destination in sight and you are not distracted by obstacles. Because you love what you are pursuing, things like rejection and setbacks will not hinder you in your pursuit. You believe that nothing can stop you!”

— Mike Krzyzewski

28. “In putting together your standards, remember that it is essential to involve your entire team. Standards are not rules issued by the boss; they are a collective identity. Remember, standards are the things that you do all the time and the things for which you hold one another accountable.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

29. “Imagination has a great deal to do with winning.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

30. “I’m looking for players who make their teammates better. You do that with enthusiasm and passion.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

31. “Leaders show respect for people by giving them time.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

32. “In leadership, there are no words more important than trust.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

33. “Courage gives a leader the ability to stand straight and not sway, no matter which way the wind blows.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

34. “I think leadership is never singular. In a good organization, it’s plural.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

35. “To me, teamwork is the beauty of our sport, where you have five acting as one. You become selfless.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

36. “Play and practice like you are trying to make the team.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

37. “Confidence shared is better than confidence only in yourself.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

38. “It takes courage not only to make decisions, but to live with those decisions afterward.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

39. “Encourage members of your team to take the initiative and act on their own.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

40. “Mutual commitment helps overcome the fear of failure – especially when people are part of a team sharing and achieving goals. It also sets the stage for open dialogue and honest conversation.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

41. “You cannot merely expect culture to be a natural occurrence; it has to be taught and made a part of your everyday routine.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

42. “You don’t just be a team. You become a team. Through tough games you find that you need each other.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

43. “Leaders have to search for the heart on a team, because the person who has it can bring out the best in everybody else.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

44. “Effort is fully replenishable. There is no need to save any of it. Leave every bit you have on the playing field.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

45. “Never delegate. Always empower.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

46. “I have a rule on my team: When we talk to one another, we look each other right in the eye, because I think it’s tough to lie to somebody. You give respect to somebody.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

47. “You can’t defer if you’re the person who’s in the leadership position.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

48. “A leader has to show the face his team needs to see.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

49. “Great rivalries don’t have to be built on hatred. They’re built on respect, on a respect for excellence.”

— Mike Krzyzewski

50. “Every season is a journey. Every journey is a lifetime.”

— Mike Krzyzewski