Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.
—Stephen Covey (1932–2012) American Self-help Author
Reduce the layers of management. They put distance between the top of an organization and the customers.
—Donald Rumsfeld (1932–2021) U.S. Secretary of Defense
You don’t need a Harvard MBA to know that the bedroom and the boardroom are just two sides of the same ballgame.
—Stephen Fry (b.1957) English Actor, Writer, Director, Broadcaster
Management must speak with one voice. When it doesn’t management itself becomes a peripheral opponent to the team’s mission.
—Pat Riley (b.1945) American Basketball Player, Coach
Most management-speak is, as Schrijvers points out, Panglossian balderdash designed to lull the weak and credulous
—Anonymous
A good manager doesn’t try to eliminate conflict; he tries to keep it from wasting the energies of his people. If you’re the boss and your people fight you openly when they think that you are wrong—that’s healthy.
—Robert C. Townsend (1920–98) American Businessman
Leadership on the other hand, is about creating change you believe in.
—Seth Godin (b.1960) American Entrepreneur
Things refuse to be mismanaged long.
—Common Proverb
One cannot manage too many affairs: like pumpkins in the water, one pops up while you try to hold down the other.
—Chinese Proverb
I don’t know about you, but where I went to school, Money Management 101 wasn’t offered. Instead we learned about the War of 1812, which of course is something I use every single day.
—T. Harv Eker (b.1954) American Motivational Speaker, Lecturer, Author
A man is known by the company he organizes.
—Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist
Good management is the art of making problems so interesting and their solutions so constructive that everyone wants to get to work and deal with them.
—Paul Hawken (b.1946) American Environmentalist
Management means, in the last analysis, the substitution of thought for brawn and muscle, of knowledge for folklore and superstition, and of cooperation for force…
—Peter Drucker (1909–2005) Austrian-born Management Consultant
When a management team with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.
—Warren Buffett (b.1930) American Investor
If you are the master be sometimes blind, if you are the servant be sometimes deaf.
—Buckminster Fuller (1895–1983) American Inventor, Philosopher
Managing is like holding a dove in your hand. Squeeze too hard and you kill it, not hard enough and it flies away.
—Tommy Lasorda (1927–2021) American Baseball Player, Coach
Just a few words on time management: forget all about it.
—Tim Ferriss (b.1977) American Self-help Author
Good managers have a bias for action.
—Tom Peters (b.1942) American Management Consultant, Author
An executive is someone who talks with visitors so the other employees can get their work done.
—Unknown
Who can direct when all pretend to know?
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Top management is supposed to be a tree full of owls-hooting when management heads into the wrong part of the forest. I’m still unpersuaded they even know where the forest is.
—Robert C. Townsend (1920–98) American Businessman
There is an enormous number of managers who have retired on the job.
—Peter Drucker (1909–2005) Austrian-born Management Consultant
In the words of Max DePree: “Management has a lot to do with answers. But leadership is a function of questions. And the first question for a leader always is: ‘Who do we intend to be?’ Not ‘What are we going to do?’ but ‘Who do we intend to be?’”
—Max De Pree (1924–2017) American Businessman
The secret of successful managing is to keep the five guys who hate you away from the four guys who haven’t made up their minds.
—Casey Stengel (1890–1975) American Sportsperson
In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative, original thinker unless you can also sell what you create.
—David Ogilvy (1911–99) British-American Advertising Executive
When a management with a reputation for brilliance tackles a business with a reputation for bad economics, it is the reputation of the business that remains intact.
—Warren Buffett (b.1930) American Investor
If you’re not uncomfortable in your work as a leader, it’s almost certain you’re not reaching your potential as a leader.
—Seth Godin (b.1960) American Entrepreneur
Incidents should not govern policy; but, policy incidents.
—Napoleon I (1769–1821) Emperor of France
Those that despise people will never get the best out of others and themselves.
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–59) French Historian, Political Scientist
If each one does their duty as an individual and if each one works in their own proper vocation, it will be right with the whole.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
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