Share
×
Inspirational Quotes
Authors
Professions
Topics
Tags
Quote
The greatest leaders build organizations that, in the end, don't need them.
James C. Collins
Share
Change background
T
T
T
Change font
Original
TAGS & TOPICS
James C. Collins
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: January 25
Author
Businessperson
Journalist
Writer
Boulder
Colorado
Needs
Organizations
Leaders
Organization
Build
Leader
Greatest
Ends
Need
More quotes by James C. Collins
The most effective leaders of companies in transition are the quiet, unassuming people whose inner wiring is such that the worst circumstances bring out their best. They're unflappable, they're ready to die if they have to. But you can trust that, when bad things are happening, they will become clearheaded and focused.
James C. Collins
First figure out your partners, then figure out what ideas to pursue. The most important thing isn't the market you target, the product you develop or the financing, but the founding team.
James C. Collins
An organization is not truly great, if it cannot be great without you.
James C. Collins
The signature of mediocrity is chronic inconstancy. The signature of greatness is a disciplined and consistent focus on the right things.
James C. Collins
In an ironic twist, I now see Good to Great not as a sequel to Built to Last, but more of a prequel. Good to Great is about how to turn a good organization into one that produces sustained great results. Built to Last is about how you take a company with great results and turn it into an enduring great company of iconic stature.
James C. Collins
Change your practices without abandoning your core values.
James C. Collins
Good-to-great companies set their goals and strategies based on understanding comparison companies set their goals and strategies based on bravado.
James C. Collins
Most people will look back and realize they did not have a great life because it's just so easy to settle for a good life.
James C. Collins
Growth! is not a Hedgehog Concept. Rather, if you have the right Hedgehog Concept and make decisions relentlessly consistent with it, you will create such momentum that your main problem will not be how to grow, but how not to grow too fast.
James C. Collins
Not one of the good-to-great companies focused obsessively on growth.
James C. Collins
If you have a charismatic cause you don't need to be a charismatic leader.
James C. Collins
Just because a company falls doesn't invalidate what we can learn by studying that company when it was at its historical best.
James C. Collins
The inner experience of fallure is totally different than failure. Going to fallure means 100% commitment - you leave nothing in reserve, no mental or physical resource untapped, you never give yourself a psychological out. Failure means making a decision to let go, to be less than 100% committed, when confronted by fear, pain and uncertainty.
James C. Collins
Focusing solely on what you can potentially do better than any other organization is the only path to greatness.
James C. Collins
Genius of AND. Embrace both extremes on a number of dimensions at the same time. Instead of choosing a OR B, figure out how to have A AND B-purpose AND profit, continuity AND change, freedom AND responsibility, etc.
James C. Collins
Comparison, a great teacher once told me, is the cardinal sin of modern life. It traps us in a game that we can't win. Once we define ourselves in terms of others, we lose the freedom to shape our own lives.
James C. Collins
The signature of mediocrity is not an unwillingness to change. The signature of mediocrity is inconsistency.
James C. Collins
Don't take care of your career. Take care of your people. They will take care of your career.
James C. Collins
I am completely Socratic.
James C. Collins
We must reject the idea... Well-intentioned, but dead wrong... That the primary path to greatness in the social sectors is to become more like a business. Most businesses... Like most of anything else in life... Fall somewhere between mediocre and good.
James C. Collins
