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I define a leader as anyone who takes responsibility for finding the potential in people and processes, and who has the courage to develop that potential.

Brene Brown • Dare to Lead: Brave Work. Tough Conversations. Whole Hearts.

“We are only leading when we are centered on making others better.”

Superhuman

“Great leadership has many different attributes, but it starts with knowledge of a particular pursuit, because without the knowledge and mastery of that particular pursuit, I don’t think you have the authority to convey it with conviction to others. It usually is associated with an obsession, because to be a great leader, you have to be obsessed by

Those who lead are able to do so because those who follow trust that the decisions made at the top have the best interest of the group at heart. In turn, those who trust work hard because they feel like they are working for something bigger than themselves.

Simon Sinek • Start with Why: How Great Leaders Inspire Everyone to Take Action

Create an organizational system whose foundation is managers-as-teachers who apply and teach lean thinking, manage to improve, promote stop-and-fix, and who practice Go See. Add the two pillars of respect for people and continuous challenge-the-status-quo improvement mindset.

Bas Vodde • Large-Scale Scrum: More with LeSS (Addison-Wesley Signature Series (Cohn))

If you are in a leadership position, make sure you have a circle of people who can tell you the truth, and to whom you can speak the truth. Bring others into shared leadership with you, and/or collaborate with other formations so you don’t get too enamored of your singular vision.

Adrienne Maree Brown • Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds (Emergent Strategy, 0)

community leaders are natural influencers.

Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company. It’s not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious—but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.

Jim Collins • Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap...And Others Don't

The most interesting debate about leadership, then, is between those (like Machiavelli) who believe that leaders make (and overcome) history, and those (like Marx, and like the author of King David’s story) who believe that history makes (and constrains) leaders.