Quotes on Business Leaders

Business leaders take things far too seriously, and forget that most of the time people spend in their lives is at work, and it should be fun.

Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.

The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things.

Of all the things that your company owns, brands are far and away the most important and the toughest. Founders die. Factories burn down. Machinery wears out. Inventories get depleted. Technology becomes obsolete. Brand loyalty is the only sound foundation on which business leaders can build enduring, profitable growth.

Social media requires that business leaders start thinking like small-town shop owners. This means taking the long view and avoiding short-term benchmarks to gauge progress. It means allowing the personality, heart and soul of the people who run all levels of the business to show.

Make your product easier to buy than your competition, or you will find your customers buying from them, not you.

Failure is not the opposite of success; it's part of success.

Statistics suggest that when customers complain, business owners and managers ought to get excited about it. The complaining customer represents a huge opportunity for more business.

Sometimes when you innovate, you make mistakes. It is best to admit them quickly, and get on with improving your other innovations.

A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.

Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.

Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.

Business leaders cannot be bystanders.

There is only one boss. The customer.

Just because you are CEO, don't think you have landed. You must continually increase your learning, the way you think, and the way you approach the organization. I've never forgotten that.

The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.

Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.