Leadership Quotes

“It is not in the still calm of life, or the repose of a pacific station, that great characters are formed,” Abigail Adams wrote to her son John Quincy Adams in the midst of the American Revolution, suggesting that “the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“More and more it seems to me that about the best thing in life is to have a piece of work worth doing and then to do it well.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“the habits of a vigorous mind are formed in contending with difficulties. Great necessities call out great virtues.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“With public sentiment, nothing can fail,” Abraham Lincoln said, “without it nothing can succeed.” Such a leader is inseparably linked to the people. Such leadership is a mirror in which the people see their collective reflection.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Scholars who have studied the development of leaders have situated resilience, the ability to sustain ambition in the face of frustration, at the heart of potential leadership growth. More important than what happened to them was how they responded to these reversals, how they managed in various ways to put themselves back together, how these watershed experiences at first impeded, then deepened, and finally and decisively molded their leadership.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Hit the ground running; consolidate control; ask questions of everyone wherever you go; manage by wandering around; determine the basic problems of each organization and hit them head-on; when attacked, counterattack; stick to your guns; spend your political capital to reach your goals; and then when your work is stymied or done, find a way out.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Lincoln revealed early on a quality that would characterize his leadership for the rest of his life—a willingness to acknowledge errors and learn from his mistakes.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Lincoln never forgot that in a democracy the leader’s strength ultimately depends on the strength of his bond with the people. In the mornings he set aside several hours to hear the needs of the ordinary people lined up outside his office, his time of “public opinion baths.” Kindness, empathy, humor, humility, passion, and ambition all marked him from the start. But he grew, and continued to grow, into a leader who became so powerfully fused with the problems tearing his country apart that his desire to lead and his need to serve coalesced into a single indomitable force. That force has not only enriched subsequent leaders but has provided our people with a moral compass to guide us. Such leadership offers us humanity, purpose, and wisdom, not in turbulent times alone, but also in our everyday lives.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Avoid dull facts; create memorable images; translate every issue into people’s lives; use simple, everyday language; never use big words when small words will do. Simplify the concept that “we are trying to construct a more inclusive society” into “we are going to make a country in which no one is left out.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Early on, Abraham revealed a keystone attribute essential to success in any field—the motivation and willpower to develop every talent he possessed to the fullest.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“no man is superior, unless it was by merit, and no man is inferior, unless by his demerit.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“One evening, Lincoln listened as Stanton worked himself into a fury against one of the generals. “I would like to tell him what I think of him,” Stanton stormed. “Why don’t you,” suggested Lincoln. “Write it all down.” When Stanton finished the letter, he returned and read it to the president. “Capital,” Lincoln said. “Now, Stanton, what are you going to do about it?” “Why, send it of course!” “I wouldn’t,” said the president. “Throw it in the waste-paper basket.” “But it took me two days to write.” “Yes, yes and it did you ever so much good. You feel better now. That is all that is necessary. Just throw it in the basket.” And after some additional grumbling, Stanton did just that.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“When angry at a colleague, Lincoln would fling off what he called a “hot” letter, releasing all his pent wrath. He would then put the letter aside until he cooled down and could attend the matter with a clearer eye. When Lincoln’s papers were opened at the turn of the twentieth century, historians discovered a raft of such letters, with Lincoln’s notation underneath; “never sent and never signed.” Such forbearance set an example for the team. One evening, Lincoln listened as Stanton worked himself into a fury against one of the generals. “I would like to tell him what I think of him,” Stanton stormed. “Why don’t you,” suggested Lincoln. “Write it all down.” When Stanton finished the letter, he returned and read it to the president. “Capital,” Lincoln said. “Now, Stanton, what are you going to do about it?” “Why, send it of course!” “I wouldn’t,” said the president. “Throw it in the waste-paper basket.” “But it took me two days to write.” “Yes, yes and it did you ever so much good. You feel better now. That is all that is necessary. Just throw it in the basket.” And after some additional grumbling, Stanton did just that.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“The surest way to be happy,” Eleanor wrote in an essay at school, “is to seek happiness for others.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Success is not dependent on unique attributes. But ordinary qualities to an extraordinary degree through ambition and hard work.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“This acute sense of timing, one journalist observed, was the secret to Lincoln’s gifted leadership: “He always moves in conjunction with propitious circumstances, not waiting to be dragged by the force of events or wasting strength in premature struggles with them.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Nothing so much marks a man as bold imaginative expressions,” Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote in his diary, speaking of Socrates and the golden sayings of Pythagoras: “A complete statement in the imaginative form of an important truth arrests attention and is respected and remembered.” Such oratory “will make the reputation of a man.” The way Lincoln had learned to use language, the collective story he told, and the depth of his conviction marked a turning point in his reputation as both a man and a leader.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“he argued that a “very large part of the rancor of political and social strife” springs from the fact that different classes or sections “are so cut off from each other that neither appreciates the other’s passions, prejudices, and, indeed, point of view.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Refuse to let past resentments fester; transcend personal vendettas.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Great necessities call out great virtues.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“From his early twenties, Lyndon Johnson had operated upon the premise that if “he could get up earlier and meet more people and stay up later than anybody else,” victory would be his.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Establish a clear purpose; challenge the team to work out details; traverse conventional departmental boundaries; set large short-term and long-term targets; create tangible success to generate accelerated growth and momentum.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“American philosopher William James wrote of the mysterious formation of identity, “that the best way to define a man’s character would be to seek out the particular mental or moral attitude in which, when it came upon him, he felt himself most deeply and intensely alive and active. At such moments, there is a voice inside which speaks and says, ‘This is the real me!”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“The art of communication, Lincoln advised newcomers to the bar, “is the lawyer’s avenue to the public.” Yet, Lincoln warned, the lawyer must not rely on rhetorical glibness or persuasiveness alone. What is well-spoken must be yoked to what is well-thought. And such thought is the product of great labor, “the drudgery of the law.” Without that labor, without that drudgery, the most eloquent words lack gravity and power. Even “extemporaneous speaking should be practiced and cultivated.” Indeed, “the leading rule for the lawyer, as for the man of every other calling, is diligence. Leave nothing for tomorrow that can be done to-day.” The key to success, he insisted, is “work, work, work.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“If “defeat is an orphan,” the old saying goes, “victory has a thousand fathers,”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“What had become of the singular ascending ambition that had driven young Roosevelt from his earliest days? What explains his willingness, against the counsel of his most trusted friends, to accept seemingly low-level jobs that traced neither a clear-cut nor a reliably ascending career path? The answer lies in probing what Roosevelt gleaned from his crucible experience. His expectation of and belief in a smooth, upward trajectory, either in life or in politics, was gone forever. He questioned if leadership success could be obtained by attaching oneself to a series of titled positions. If a person focused too much on a future that could not be controlled, he would become, Roosevelt acknowledged, too “careful, calculating, cautious in word and act.” Thereafter, he would jettison long-term career calculations and focus simply on whatever job opportunity came his way, assuming it might be his last. “Do what you can, with what you have, where you are,” he liked to say. In a very real way, Roosevelt had come to see political life as a succession of crucibles—good or bad—able to crush or elevate. He would view each position as a test of character, effort, endurance, and will. He would keep nothing in reserve for some will-o-the-wisp future. Rather, he would regard each job as a pivotal test, a manifestation of his leadership skills.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“If Roosevelt were given another chance to lead the country, he intended to make the Republican Party once more the progressive party of Abraham Lincoln, to restore “the fellow feeling, mutual respect, the sense of common duties and common interests which arise when men take the trouble to understand one another, and to associate for a common object.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“If the continuing problems created by the Industrial Age were not addressed, he warned, the country would eventually be “sundered by those dreadful lines of division” that set “the haves” and the “have-nots” against one another.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Johnson insisted, “I don’t want this symposium to come here and spend two days talking about what we have done, the progress has been much too small. We haven’t done nearly enough. I’m kind of ashamed of myself that I had six years and couldn’t do more than I did.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times

“Until we address unequal history, we cannot overcome unequal opportunity.” Until blacks “stand on level and equal ground,” we cannot rest. It must be our goal “to assure that all Americans play by the same rules and all Americans play against the same odds.”
― Doris Kearns Goodwin, Leadership: In Turbulent Times