25 Awesome Leadership Quotes

by Jason Evanish, CEO Get Lighthouse, Inc.

While managing and leading your team is a set of tasks and challenges that can carry many nuances, some of the best advice is surprisingly simple.  That's why today, we're bringing you a collection of some of the best leadership quotes we've found over the last year that capture a key lesson or inspiration.

"I apologize for the length of this letter; I didn't have time to make it shorter.” - Mark Twain

I've always loved this quote by the ever-quotable, Mark Twain. I've caught myself many times getting over verbose in an email or blog post, that when investing more time made it more effective, and shorter. The beauty of Twitter is it forces exactly those kinds of condensed, poignant thoughts.

Take a moment to read and really contemplate these lessons; there's truly deep insights in many of them. Also, consider following the authors; many of them are brilliant leaders whose tweets we've been enjoying and learning from on a regular basis. (Note: If you're a Lighthouse blog subscriber, click to read the post on our site; the tweets renders much nicer on our blog than your email.)

25 Leadership Quotes to Inspire You

I've organized these quotes into a few categories that are commonly on the mind of most managers and leaders: retaining your team, being successful, growing your people, giving feedback, and leading effectively in the modern world.  I hope you enjoy them.

Retention Secrets

It's no secret that it's expensive to lose a member of your team (we've calculated it at costing over $65,000 to replace an employee.)  There are a lot of reasons why people leave jobs, but there are a few key concepts that can help you think of how to keep your best people for a long time. We also couldn't help but include Joe Stump's tweet showing a clever recruiting hack that can help you think about all these tweets as ways to consider how you can recruit because someone's manager is not following this advice.

https://twitter.com/joestump/status/437979959379132416

Keys to Success

We all want to be successful, but what does that really mean? I've personally invested a lot of time in reading books and blog posts on the subject trying to crack the code. What I found was that it's actually a handful of simple things not that far from the Golden Rule combined with a strong work ethic. These tweets capture a number of key aspects of it.

Leadership is about serving your people!

What is the difference between management and leadership? That's a question worthy of a deep dive of its own post, but here we look at a key aspect of the difference: Leaders focus on their people.  These sets of tweets show all the ways you should focus, invest, and listen to your people.

Essentials for Feedback

Whether you're giving feedback up the chain in your company, to a peer, or to someone on your team, it's important to have empathy for the other person's views. You also have to seek out feedback from your people so you can help them, see what they see, and not miss anything important. No leader can fix a problem they're not aware of, so consider these essential feedback concepts for your company.

https://twitter.com/gwestr/status/573607988516122625

Growing Your People

No company survives without growth. The same can be said for the modern worker; if you're not growing and learning new skills, not only are you less likely to be happy, you run the risk of your skills become outdated.  As a leader, you must help your team achieve their goals for the sake of both the survival of your company and to keep your best people happy and motivated. Consider these quotes when you want to make the key investment every leader must make: growing their people.

https://twitter.com/alexmcclafferty/status/600787135919169537

https://twitter.com/cap/status/584150863897358337

The Modern Leader

Leading today is different than it's ever been before. Whether it's a desire for more feedback, Gallup's report showing high levels of disengagement, or the latest on managing Millennials from Mary Meeker, it's clear new approaches are needed. These quotes capture well the mindsets you need to be a great modern leader.

 

These are just a few leadership quotes I've found on Twitter that I felt captured well the challenges and skills needed to be a great leader.  What are your favorite? Leave a link in a comment below.

Jason Evanish

Jason Evanish

As the founder and CEO of Get Lighthouse, Inc, Jason and the Lighthouse team have helped managers grow their leadership skills in dozens of countries around the world. They’ve worked with a variety of companies from non-profits to high growth startups, and government organizations to well known, publicly traded companies. Jason has also been featured in publications including NPR, the Wall Street Journal, and Fast Company.

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