Leadership Profiles

“[D]evelop a very clear vision of where you’re trying to go and what it is you’re trying to get done.”

“Courageous leadership looks at it and says, “This does not look possible,” you know, like, there’s any way to do this. But you get up every day and you still step figuring out how to do it the best you can. ”

“I think I come to that definition of leadership because if you actually look at the word introduction, introducer. And that word actually breaks down to meaning “to lead within,” or “to lead inside.” So I thought, huh, if an introduction means to lead inside, those who are introducing are actually demonstrating some form of leadership.”

“When I talk about a mission and a goal of trying to do that, the motivation behind all of that is trying to put the organization in the best position to help people. And even in the meantime, trying to be in the best position to help those individuals who are actually working with me in that mission.”

“Leadership training programs should take a very close look at not just how Latino leadership principles show up, you know, how are they different. But I think they need to take, also, a good look at the way we implement leadership at the community level.”

“So, how do I define leadership, that’s a beautiful question. I would say, for me, that leadership is bringing people together. Sometimes it is a naturally formed group, and other times you become an initiator to help people come together around a specific issue or need that they want to address.”

“You have to recognize that there’s going to be criticism irrespective of what you do and how you do it and you can’t please all the people and if you pleased all the people you wouldn’t be getting anything done.”

“[R]epresent the institution with integrity and be accountable for it and be willing to stand up and personally exhibit the strength on behalf of that institution to protect its integrity.”

“Leadership is taking initiative on behalf of shared values and the common good”

“An effective leader inspires others to take their own initiative, not follow, but to take their own initiative”

“At any one time, the most important thing I think is to say, given the arena in which I'm seeking to be a leader, what are the three or four key things that I really want to get done and that are important to get done, they're top priorities.”

“A leader is a servant, a servant of the people who are doing the work with your assistance.”

“Aristotle would talk about this, that sometimes you have to do things and then reflect on what you just did and learn from the mistakes and the successes. I think leadership has got a lot of that practice aspect to it. You have to do it and then think, well, it looked like something that happened last week, but the response is completely different, so maybe I need to rethink; maybe there isn’t a kind of universal model of stuff in here; maybe I need to be more aware of the particular context and how that operates.”

“[I]f you’ve got the vision to see and the courage to do that’s leadership.”

“Leadership is a matter of how to be, not how to do.”

“At the Jepson School, we decided to get out of that whole process, and we decided to identify something that we call a family resemblance among all definitions of leadership. So instead of defining it, we said that definitions of leadership identify the fact that it’s a process that involves leaders and followers who are moving together toward a common goal. Those are elements in common among definitions, but we don’t try to define the word itself, and we’re fine with it.”

“Let me start with that. I’m going to start with one sentence, and then I’ll be done. At the end of the day, what is it that leaders do? Leaders mess with people’s hearts and minds. That’s it. And I use the word ‘mess’, but I don’t mean it in a negative sense. Leadership is, the essence of leadership is influencing other people towards something. ”

“Now, that’s why, when I’m outside of Canada and the United States, and I’m dealing with leaders, I always start out discussion on leadership about the culture of the country. Because to me, leadership has to be contextualized.”

“I think, at its core, leadership is about accomplishing important objectives and organizing people, groups, to do that.”

“My definition of leadership is if person A can get person B to do what A wants them to do, whether or not B wants to do it, whether or not B shares A’s values, whatever, whatever, if A can get B to do what A wants B to do, then A is leading.”

“[Y]ou have to realize I was born during the war, and it was a very difficult period in Holland. That's probably why my interest in leadership is related to that because I've written initially in the first part of my career quite a bit on the darker side of leadership" ”

“I knew that I would want to be that kind of administrator, leader, counselor, person in my career. And as it got more intentional and I learned more about leadership, I realized I was bringing people into leadership by doing that because it was affirming their qualities that made them effective working with others that they may not see ”

“I used the term earlier, philosophy of leadership, because I’ve come to see leadership as how you enact the philosophies that you hold about it. And I think there’s something to unpack about that more than I have. ”

“Mostly I’m saying to people, know what gifts and talents you’re bringing to a group, and make sure that those are contributed, and then help others see theirs, and build a good community. And then people will see you doing that and value and appreciate your contribution.”

“Grounded theory is a research methodology and qualitative methods that the outcome then becomes the methods that one uses primarily interviewing. Around having purpose of sampling of some kind around what you then engage in, some series of interviews, and usually over a long duration, like, might be three, couple-hour each interviews, so you’re developing that over time.”

“I just think of it as a perceptual process that results in increased influence for the person being perceived and moves a group towards its common goals.”

“I define leadership by having vision—that is, to be able to try to see what’s going on presently, but likewise the potential future, trying to create the abilities that could lead one to make a difference.”

“ I think you've got to know the rules and play by the rules.”

“For me, leadership is getting good things done with the help of others.”

“[M]y definition of a leader is simply a person who sees either an opportunity or a problem and does something about it.”

“Leadership, for me, is inspiring and catalyzing others to work together for a common purpose, to achieve organizational mission in a world that keeps changing.”

“[T]he leaders are the ones who have the vision, have the ideas, and can communicate it in such a way that your managers understand what you want and your employees do too.”

“One of the things you said I agree with is, is this somebody that people will be willing to follow, and will they be able to try to all go in the same direction about getting something done? ”

“I’m arguing that you don’t create a leader in a classroom. You can take people with leadership and management capabilities and enhance those by giving them some tips and some advice and so on, largely by enabling them to reflect on their own experience...leadership really comes from the challenge of difficult jobs and being moved around and having challenges at critical points in your career. That’s how you train leadership. But I think a lot of leadership is kind of born or probably established by the age of five, anyway. ”