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It is more important to know who you are than where you are going, for where you are going will change as the world around you changes.

James C. Collins

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James C. Collins
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: January 25
Author
Businessperson
Journalist
Writer
Boulder
Colorado
Changes
Around
Change
Important
Going
World

More quotes by James C. Collins

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Not one of the good-to-great companies focused obsessively on growth.
James C. Collins
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If you have a charismatic cause you don't need to be a charismatic leader.
James C. Collins
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Consider the idea that charisma can be as much a liability as an asset. Your strength of personality can sow the seeds of problems, when people filter the brutal facts from you.
James C. Collins
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It's what you do before you are in trouble, so that you can be strong when people most need you.
James C. Collins
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Focusing solely on what you can potentially do better than any other organization is the only path to greatness.
James C. Collins
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You can't manufacture passion or motivate people to feel passionate. You can only discover what ignites your passion and the passions of those around you.
James C. Collins
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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
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The x factor of a great leader is humility combined with will.
James C. Collins
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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
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Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice, and discipline.
James C. Collins
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The essence of profound insight is simplicity.
James C. Collins
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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
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The critical question is not whether you'll have luck, but what you do with the luck that you get.
James C. Collins
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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
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Building a visionary company requires one percent vision and 99 percent alignment.
James C. Collins
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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
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I've never found an important decision made by a great organization that was made at a point of unanimity. Significant decisions carry risks and inevitably some will oppose it. In these settings, the great legislative leader must be artful in handling uncomfortable decisions, and this requires rigor.
James C. Collins
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If we allow the celebrity rock-star model of leadership to triumph, we will see the decline of corporations and institutions of all types. The twentieth century was a century of greatness, but we face the very real prospect that the next century will see very few enduring great institutions.
James C. Collins
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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
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How can you succeed by helping others succeed? We succeed at our very best only when we help others succeed.
James C. Collins