“Goethe recommended, “Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and you help them become what they are capable of becoming.”

“Occasionally someone will ask me about how ego fits into the leadership equation. They’ll want to know what keeps a leader from having a huge ego. I think the answer lies in each leader’s pathway to leadership. If people paid their dues and gave their best in obscurity, ego is usually not a problem.”

“A leader is great, not because of his or her power, but because of his or her ability to empower others.”

“Create a Sense of Anticipation.”

“be sure your communication goes beyond words. How can you do that? By connecting on four levels: visually, intellectually, emotionally, and verbally.”

“The bookends of success are starting and finishing.”

“There isn’t anyone you couldn’t learn to love once you’ve heard their story.” —Fred Rogers”

“Your values are the soul of your leadership, and they drive your behavior.”

“Several years ago Dr. Maxwell Maltz’s book, Psycho-Cybernetics, was one of the most popular books on the market. Dr. Maltz was a plastic surgeon who often took disfigured faces and made them more attractive. He observed that in every case, the patient’s self-image rose with his and her physical improvement. In addition to being a successful surgeon, Dr. Maltz was a great psychologist who understood human nature. A wealthy woman was greatly concerned about her son, and she came to Dr. Maltz for advice. She had hoped that the son would assume the family business following her husband’s death, but when the son came of age, he refused to assume that responsibility and chose to enter an entirely different field. She thought Dr. Maltz could help convince the boy that he was making a grave error. The doctor agreed to see him, and he probed into the reasons for the young man’s decision. The son explained, “I would have loved to take over the family business, but you don’t understand the relationship I had with my father. He was a driven man who came up the hard way. His objective was to teach me self-reliance, but he made a drastic mistake. He tried to teach me that principle in a negative way. He thought the best way to teach me self-reliance was to never encourage or praise me. He wanted me to be tough and independent. Every day we played catch in the yard. The object was for me to catch the ball ten straight times. I would catch that ball eight or nine times, but always on that tenth throw he would do everything possible to make me miss it. He would throw it on the ground or over my head but always so I had no chance of catching it.” The young man paused for a moment and then said, “He never let me catch the tenth ball—never! And I guess that’s why I have to get away from his business; I want to catch that tenth ball!”

“There’s only one thing more contagious than a good attitude—and that’s a bad attitude.”

“Will the reader turn the page?”

“You can’t take the team to the next level when you haven’t mastered the skills it takes to succeed on a personal level. It just doesn’t happen.”

“If you always do what you've always done, then you will always get what you've always gotten.”

“Improvement is impossible without change.”

“Do you know the difference between leaders, followers, and losers? Leaders stretch with challenges. Followers struggle with challenges. Losers shrink from challenges.”