Quotes on Leadership

The history of the world is full of men who rose to leadership, by sheer force of self-confidence, bravery and tenacity.

Too many leaders act as if the sheep.. their people.. are there for the benefit of the shepherd, not that the shepherd has responsibility for the sheep.

The wicked leader is he who the people despise. The good leader is he who the people revere. The great leader is he who the people say, 'We did it ourselves.'

If a man is respectful he will not be treated with insolence. If he is tolerant he will win the multitude. If he is trustworthy in word his fellow men will entrust him with responsibility. If he is quick he will achieve results.

If you have a sense of purpose and a sense of direction, I believe people will follow you. Democracy isn't just about deducing what the people want. Democracy is leading the people as well.

Successful charitable fund-raising has much in common with managing a business: It requires leadership, persistence, and creativity.

A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.

Educators take something simple and make it complicated. Communicators take something complicated and make it simple.

So in many ways for me, having lived through what I've lived through, and endured what I've endured, I've got more confidence that I can do the next bit - and there's something sustaining about that.

I have more influence now than when I had the power.

But the people of the disaster area fundamentally needed to understand that the rest of Australia had noticed their misery and their stoicism and their intense sense of community and determination to arise from the sodden wreckage of their homes, and that Australians would dig deep to help. I helped to describe the community ethos which quickly triumphed over incipient despair. It is this mobilisation of the unifying spirit that thrills us all, even as we mourn.

We are at last being recognised as the indigenous people of this country whom must share in its future. This is not a day of national mourning for us. We must leave history behind us and look forward.

I want to be a positive role model, especially for kids and Aboriginal people... When people see me, often all they see is another Australian athlete having a go. It isn't until they see the full Cathy Freeman picture that they realise how proud I am of my ancestry and heritage. I'd like a little more tolerance and acceptance of my culture and all the differing cultures that make up Australia.

In sum, the truth is that we luxuriate in the comfortable assertion that women enjoy equality. We have salved our consciences by eliminating the more obvious discriminations like unequal rates of pay for work of equal value. But, in fact, we have not eliminated the inheritance of the millennia that women are lesser beings, an inheritance which still manifests itself in a whole range of prejudice and other forms of discrimination.

The ruler attains wholeness in the correct governance of the people.

A good leader gets people to follow him because they want to, not because he makes them.

We believed it was not our formations that made us good, but rather how we played.

There's a difference between making incremental improvements and making sweeping changes that take you away from your core values.

A big man is one who makes us feel bigger when we are with him.

Sport is not about being wrapped up in cotton wool. Sport as about adapting to the unexpected and being able to modify plans at the last minute. Sport, like all life, is about taking risks.

Leaders become great, not because of their power, but because of their ability to empower others.