top of page
Writer's pictureJonno White

750 Best Leaders Take Responsibility Quotes (2023)

1. “Rarely are opportunities presented to you in a perfect way. In a nice little box with a yellow bow on top. ‘Here, open it, it’s perfect. You’ll love it. ’ Opportunities – the good ones – are messy, confusing and hard to recognize. They’re risky. They challenge you. ” —Susan Wojcicki, CEO of Youtube


2. All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership. —John Kenneth Galbraith


3. “Not the cry, but the flight of a wild duck, leads the flock to fly and follow.” Chinese Proverb


4. If you would not be forgotten, as soon as you are dead and rotten, either write things worth reading, or do things worth the writing. —Benjamin Franklin


5. “The true test of leadership is how well you function in a crisis.” Brian Tracy


6. “Accountability is the key to a successful life.” – Unknown


7. “Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility… in the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have is the ability to take on responsibility.” – Michael Korda


8. “A leader who takes accountability for their mistakes earns the respect of their team.” – Peter Drucker


9. “Leadership is not so much about technique and methods as it is about opening the heart. Leadership is about inspiration — of oneself and of others. Great leadership is about human experiences, not processes. Leadership is not a formula or a program, it is a human activity that comes from the heart and considers the hearts of others. It is an attitude, not a routine.” Lance Secretan


10. “With great power comes great responsibility.” – Voltaire


11. “The thing you fear most has no power. Your fear of it is what has the power. Facing the truth really will set you free.” Oprah Winfrey


12. “True leadership stems from individuality that is honestly and sometimes imperfectly expressed… Leaders should strive for authenticity over perfection. ” —Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook


13. “Ninety percent of leadership is the ability to communicate something people want.”


14. “The greatest reward for taking accountability is the ability to trust yourself.” – Unknown


15. “Accountability separates the wishers in life from the action-takers that care enough about their future to account for their daily actions.” – John Di Lemme


16. “If you take responsibility for yourself, you will develop a hunger to accomplish your dreams.” – Les Brown


17. “If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulder of giants. ” —Isaac Newton, English mathematician, physicist, and astronomer


18. “If you want to be trusted, be honest. If you want to be honest, be true. If you want to be true, be yourself.” – Anonymous


19. “Responsibility equals accountability equals ownership. And a sense of ownership is the most powerful weapon a team or organization can have. ”


20. “Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower. ” —Steve Jobs, chairman of Apple


21. The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant. —Max DePree


22. “All blame is a waste of time. No matter how much fault you find with another, and regardless of how much you blame him, it will not change you.”


23. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work. ” —Thomas A. Edison, American inventor


24. A good plan violently executed now is better than a perfect plan executed next week. –George Patton


25. “The outward expression of empathy is courtesy.” Stewart Butterfield


26. “The only way to move forward is to take accountability for your past.” – Unknown


27. “The best kind of accountability on a team is peer-to-peer. Peer pressure is more efficient and effective than going to the leader, anonymously complaining, and having them stop what they are doing to intervene. ” - Patrick Lencioni


28. “A person always doing his or her best becomes a natural leader, just by example. ” —Joe DiMaggio, former New York Yankees outfielder & Hall of Fame baseball player


29. “Great companies have high cultures of accountability, it comes with this culture of criticism I was talking about before, and I think our culture is strong on that. ” - Steve Ballmer


30. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.”


31. “Do not wait; the time will never be “just right.” Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.” Napoleon Hill


32. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. ” —John Quincy Adams, former U. S. President


33. “Accountability is a key concept in moving an organization forward, especially in a challenging business climate.” – Cindy Tucker


34. “There’s no one-size-fits-all solution to leadership, but there is one thing that every leader needs – accountability.” – John C. Maxwell


35. “True leadership stems from individuality that is honestly and sometimes imperfectly expressed… Leaders should strive for authenticity over perfection.”


36. Become the kind of leader that people would follow voluntarily; even if you had no title or position. —Brian Tracy


37. “The price of greatness is responsibility.”—Winston Churchill


38. So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for people to work. —Peter Drucker


39. “Taking responsibility for your actions is the first step toward success.” – Zig Ziglar


40. “The reason people blame things on the previous generation is that there's only one other choice.”


41. “If you hang around with losers you become a loser. ”


42. “As long as you are going to be thinking anyway, think big. ”


43. “If you are building a culture where honest expectations are communicated and peer accountability is the norm, then the group will address poor performance and attitudes. ”


44. “Leadership is something you earn, something you’re chosen for. You can’t come in yelling, ‘I’m your leader!’ If it happens, it’s because the other guys respect you. ” —Ben Roethlisberger, quarterback, Pittsburgh Steelers


45. When I give a minister an order, I leave it to him to find the means to carry it out. —Napoleon Bonaparte


46. “Responsibility is not a burden, it is a privilege. It is a rare privilege to be alive and in charge of your own life.” – Osho


47. “Accountability is the hallmark of a great leader.” – D.A. Abrams


48. “When you take responsibility for your life, you will become the architect of your destiny.” – Brian Tracy


49. “Your life is your own responsibility. Don’t allow others to blame you for their shortcomings and inadequacies.” – Uzoma Nnadi


50. “Entrepreneurial leadership requires the ability to move quickly when opportunity presents itself.” Brian Tracy


51. “Leaders are made, they are not born. They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.”


52. Don't necessarily avoid sharp edges. Occasionally they are necessary to leadership. —Donald Rumsfeld


53. “It only takes one person to mobilize a community and inspire change. Even if you don’t feel like you have it in you, it’s in you. You have to believe in yourself. People will see your vision and passion and follow you.” Teyonah Parris


54. “The greatness of a man is not in how much wealth he acquires, but in his integrity and his ability to affect those around him positively.” Bob Marley


55. “The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born-that there is a genetic factor to leadership. This myth asserts that people simply either have certain charismatic qualities or not. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born."


56. “An organization’s ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.”


57. Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality. —Warren Bennis


58. “Leadership should be more participative than directive, more enabling than performing. ” —Mary D. Poole, author


59. “A good leader is a person who takes a little more than his share of the blame and a little less than his share of the credit. ” —John Maxwell, author, speaker, and pastor


60. “You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself. That is something you have charge of..”


61. “The price of greatness is responsibility.”


62. “I must follow the people. Am I not their leader?”


63. “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand.”


64. “Today a reader, tomorrow a leader. ” —Margaret Fuller, American journalist and editor


65. “The key to success is not information, it’s accountability.” – Anonymous


66. “If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate.” Richard Branson


67. “You are not here merely to make a living. You are here in order to enable the world to live more amply, with greater vision, with a finer spirit of hope and achievement. You are here to enrich the world, and you impoverish yourself if you forget the errand.”


68. The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men, the conviction and the will to carry on. —Walter Lippman


69. “A year from now you will wish you had started today. ” —Karen Lamb, author


70. “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.”


71. “Change will not come if we wait for some other person, or if we wait for some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek. ” —Barack Obama, former US President


72. “Of all the things I’ve done, the most vital is coordinating those who work with me and aiming their efforts at a certain goal.”


73. What you do has far greater impact than what you say. —Stephen Covey


74. “A leader is best when people barely know he exists when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.”—Lao Tzu


75. As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others. —Bill Gates


76. “Leaders who take accountability for their actions are respected and admired by their team.” – John Wooden


77. “Experience taught me to listen to your gut, no matter how good something sounds on paper. ”


78. “If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, then, you are an excellent leader.”


79. “Leading people is the most challenging and, therefore, the most gratifying undertaking of all human endeavors. ” —Jocko Willink, American author, podcaster, and retired United States Navy Officer


80. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”


81. “If you spend too much time thinking about a thing, you’ll never get it done."


82. “Leadership is about the team – the culture they keep and embrace; it’s about empathy for your customers, clients, employees and the communities where you do business; it’s about doing the right thing for the right reasons, being confident enough to take risks and responsible enough to think of those who your decisions and risks may affect. ” —Kat Cole, COO & President of FOCUS Brands


83. “I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.”


84. “Only getting bigger”: How Mama Rentals is building a sustainable maternity dress hire business


85. “Sometimes by losing a battle you find a new way to win the war. ”


86. Leadership is unlocking people's potential to become better. —Bill Bradley


87. “All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.”


88. “Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.”


89. “You don’t lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case.”


90. “As you enter positions of trust and power, dream a little before you think. ” —Toni Morrison, author


91. You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do. —Eleanor Roosevelt


92. “Ninety-nine percent of all failures come from people who have a habit of making excuses. ”


93. He who has learned how to obey will know how to command. —Solon


94. “A leader who is accountable is a leader who is trustworthy.” – John C. Maxwell


95. “Leadership is about empathy. It is about having the ability to relate to and connect with people for the purpose of inspiring and empowering their lives.” Oprah Winfrey


96. “Leaders set high standards. refuse to tolerate mediocrity or poor performance.” Brian Tracy


97. “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be. ” —Rosalynn Carter, former First Lady, American writer, and activist


98. “If you take responsibility for yourself you will develop a hunger to accomplish your dreams.” – Les Brown


99. “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails.” John Maxwell


100. “A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus. ” —Martin Luther King Jr. , civil rights activist


101. “Real leadership is leaders recognizing that they serve the people that they lead.” Pete Hoekstra


102. “I think one of the keys to leadership is recognizing that everybody has gifts and talents. A good leader will learn how to harness those gifts toward the same goal. ” —Ben Carson, U. S. Secretary of Housing and Urban Development


103. The greatest leaders mobilize others by coalescing people around a shared vision. —Ken Blanchard


104. “He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot, will be victorious."


105. “To lead people, walk beside them … As for the best leaders, the people do not notice their existence. The next best, the people honor and praise. The next, the people fear; and the next, the people hate … When the best leader's work is done the people say, ‘We did it ourselves!”


106. “Leaders don’t force people to follow – they invite them on a journey. ” —Charles S. Lauer, author and businessman


107. “Take ownership of your mistakes, and you will grow stronger.” – Simon Sinek


108. The growth and development of people is the highest calling of leadership. —Harvey Firestone


109. “Accountability is the highest form of leadership.” – John G. Miller


110. “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.” Abraham Lincoln


111. “In times like the present, men should utter nothing for which they would not willingly be responsible through time and eternity.”


112. “I have never met a successful person that was a quitter. Successful people never, ever, give up!”


113. “The leaders who work most effectively, it seems to me, never say “I.” And that's not because they have trained themselves not to say “I.” They don't think “I.” They think “we”; they think “team.” They understand their job to be to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don't sidestep it, but “we” gets the credits. This is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done.”


114. “Great leaders are willing to sacrifice their own personal interests for the good of the team.” – John Wooden


115. “If you pick the right people and give them the opportunity to spread their wings — and put compensation as a carrier behind it — you almost don’t have to manage them.” Jack Welch


116. “The mark of a great man is one who knows when to set aside the important things in order to accomplish the vital ones. ” —Brandon Sanderson, author


117. “If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea."


118. “Accountability is the essential ingredient for success.” – Simon Sinek


119. “Sheer persistence is the difference between success and failure. ”


120. “When somebody challenges you, fight back. Be brutal, be tough. ”


121. “You have to see yourself as victorious. ”


122. Earn your leadership every day. –Michael Jordan


123. “Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. ” —Peter F. Drucker, Austrian-American management consultant, educator, and author


124. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.”


125. “‘Restore connection’ is not just for devices, it is for people too. If we cannot disconnect, we cannot lead. ” —Arianna Huffington, founder & CEO, Thrive Global


126. “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.”


127. “A leader who doesn’t hold themselves accountable cannot expect their team to do the same.” – John C. Maxwell


128. “To be a leader, you have to make people want to follow you, and nobody wants to follow someone who doesn’t know where he is going.”


129. My responsibility is getting all my players playing for the name on the front of the jersey, not the one on the back. –Unknown


130. “Accountability is the cornerstone of any successful endeavor.” – Sam Silverstein


131. “As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.”


132. “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be.” Rosalynn Carter


133. “All of the great leaders have had one characteristic in common: It was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership. ” —John Kenneth Galbraith, economist and diplomat


134. “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.”


135. “A leader is one who sees more than others see, who sees farther than others see, and who sees before others see. –Leroy Eimes


136. “We need to think of the future and the planet we are going to leave to our children and their children. ” —Kofi Annan, Ghanaian diplomat


137. “Make yourself accountable and your employees will hold themselves to a high standard. ”


138. Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them. —John C. Maxwell


139. “There is always an alternative to the present urgency—and it's not a vacation, it's acknowledging deeper responsibility.”


140. “The best kind of accountability on a team is peer-to-peer. Peer pressure is more efficient and effective than going to the leader, anonymously complaining, and having them stop what they are doing to intervene. ” – Patrick Lencioni


141. “Dealing with complexity is an inefficient and unnecessary waste of time, attention, and mental energy. There is never any justification for things being complex when they could be simple.” Edward de Bono


142. “People who take a long view of their lives and careers always seem to make much better decisions about their time and activities than people who give very little thought to the future.” Brian Tracy


143. “Mastery is great, but even that is not enough. You have to be able to change course without a bead of sweat, or remorse."


144. “We are all faced with a series of great opportunities brilliantly disguised as impossible situations. ” —Chuck Swindoll, Christian pastor and radio preacher


145. “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” William Arthur Ward.


146. The very essence of leadership is that you have to have a vision. It's got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet. —Reverend Theodore Hesburgh


147. “A duty dodged is like a debt unpaid; it is only deferred, and we must come back and settle the account at last. ”


148. “You can’t lead anyone else further than you have gone yourself.” – Gene Mauch


149. “My experience is that accountability is an extremely powerful tool to align an organization toward its objectives.” – Susan Gomez


150. “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the water to create many ripples. ” —Mother Teresa, Albanian-Indian Roman Catholic nun and missionary


151. “You cannot swim for new horizons until you have courage to lose sight of the shore.” William Falkner


152. If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader. —John Quincy Adams


153. “Without accountability, there can be no trust, and without trust, there can be no meaningful collaboration.” – Patrick Lencioni


154. “No one is going to make you a leader. Take the reins, create your own opportunity, and build the career that you deserve.” Devin Bramhall


155. “You don’t get any medal for trying something, you get medals for results."


156. “What matters is where you want to go. Focus in the right direction!”


157. “If the highest aim of a captain were to preserve his ship, he would keep it in port forever. ” —Thomas Aquinas, Italian philosopher


158. “I won’t take no for an answer. ”


159. “A leader is someone who holds her- or himself accountable for finding the potential in people and processes.”


160. “The true mark of a leader is the willingness to stick with a bold course of action — an unconventional business strategy, a unique product-development roadmap, a controversial marketing campaign — even as the rest of the world wonders why you’re not marching in step with the status quo. In other words, real leaders are happy to zig while others zag. They understand that in an era of hyper-competition and non-stop disruption, the only way to stand out from the crowd is to stand for something special.” Bill Taylor


161. “Accountability separates the wishers in life from the action-takers that care enough about their future to account for their daily actions. ”


162. “When it comes to privacy and accountability, people always demand the former for themselves and the latter for everyone else. ”


163. “In the old days, words like sin and Satan had a moral certitude. Today, they're replaced with self-help jargon, words like dysfunction and antisocial behavior, discouraging any responsibility for one's actions.”


164. “If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy can totally transform one million realities. ” —Maya Angelou, civil rights activist and poet


165. “Open collaboration encourages greater accountability, which in turn fosters trust.” – Ron Garan


166. “Accountability is the glue that ties commitment to the result.” – Bob Proctor


167. “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be.”


168. “The first step towards success is taking responsibility for your actions.” – John C. Maxwell


169. “When you take responsibility for your life, you become the master of your fate.” – Les Brown


170. “Accountability is not just for others, it’s for yourself.” – Unknown


171. “If ‘leadership’ has come to be known as something much bigger than us, aligned to changing the world, then we are spending way too much time celebrating things that hardly anyone can do and not celebrating things we can do every day.”


172. “Get going. Move forward. Aim High. Plan a takeoff. Don't just sit on the runway and hope someone will come along and push the airplane. It simply won't happen. Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you'll love it up here. ”


173. “If Hillary Clinton can’t satisfy her husband what makes her think she can satisfy America?”


174. “The great leaders are like the best conductors – they reach beyond the notes to reach the magic in the players.” – Blaine Lee


175. “Practice Golden Rule Management in everything you do. Manage others the way you would like to be managed.” Brian Tracy


176. “You don’t need a title to be a leader. ” —Unknown


177. “Restoring responsibility and accountability is essential to the economic and fiscal health of our nation. ”


178. “It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent.”


179. “The art of leadership is saying no, not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes. ” —Tony Blair, British politician


180. “Intentions do not insulate us from the consequences of our actions. ”


181. “The best leaders take full responsibility for their actions, good or bad.” – John C. Maxwell


182. “Great leaders don’t just take responsibility for their team’s success, they also take responsibility for their failures.” – D.A. Abrams


183. “If you don’t have a positive attitude in business and in life, you will never, ever be successful. ”


184. “What counts in life is not the mere fact that we have lived. It is what difference we have made to the lives of others that will determine the significance of the life we lead.”


185. “We are made to persist. That’s how we find out who we are.” – Tobias Wolff


186. “The first and foremost responsibility of a leader is to create an environment in which everyone can take accountability for their actions.” – Jocko Willink


187. “Accountability is the first step to success.” – Unknown


188. “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” – Martin Luther King Jr.


189. “The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly. ” —Jim Rohn, American entrepreneur, author, and motivational speaker


190. “He who has great power should use it lightly.”


191. “Sometimes your best investments are the ones you don’t make. ”


192. “I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers. ” —Ralph Nader, American political activist, author, lecturer, and attorney


193. “Live so that when your children think of fairness, caring, and integrity, they think of you.” H. Jackson Brown, Jr.


194. “Don’t waste your energy trying to educate or change opinions; go over, under, through, and opinions will change organically when you’re the boss. Or they won’t. Who cares? Do your thing, and don’t care if they like it. ” —Tina Fey, actress, comedian, and writer


195. “A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men. ” —Stephen King, author


196. “Ninety-nine percent of all failures come from people who have a habit of making excuses.”


197. “You are the only one responsible for your life. Take ownership and make it great.” – Les Brown


198. “Leaders inspire accountability through their ability to accept responsibility before they place blame. ”


199. “Leadership: the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.”


200. “When you blame others, you give up your power to change.” – Dr. Robert Anthony


201. “Accountability is not just doing the right thing, it’s owning up to when you do the wrong thing.” – Unknown


202. No man is good enough to govern another man without that other's consent. —Abraham Lincoln


203. “The price of greatness is responsibility.” — Winston Churchill


204. “The only way to achieve success is to take responsibility for your life.” – T. Harv Eker


205. “In times of change, learners inherit the Earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”


206. “Optimism is the faith that leads to achievement. Nothing can be done without hope and confidence."


207. “When you have momentum going, play the momentum. ”


208. “The price of greatness is responsibility. ”


209. “Accountability is not just a word, it’s a way of life for successful leaders.” – Ken Blanchard


210. “The key responsibility of leadership is to think about the future. No one else can do it for you.” Brian Tracy


211. “You pray for the hungry. Then you feed them. That's how prayer works.”


212. “When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.”


213. “When you take accountability for your actions, you earn respect.” – Unknown


214. “There are two ways of being creative. One can sing and dance. Or one can create an environment in which singers and dancers flourish. ” —Warren Bennis, American scholar, organizational consultant, and author


215. “Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well. ” —Dwight D. Eisenhower, former U. S. President


216. “Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.” Ralph Waldo Emerson


217. “True leaders hold themselves accountable for their actions and decisions.” – John C. Maxwell


218. “I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure, which is: Try to please everybody. ” —Herbert Swope, American editor and journalist


219. “If you’re going to be truly successful, then set yourself apart from everyone else. Go beyond the limits of what classifies the average person and be exceptional. ”


220. “The only way to become a better person is to take responsibility for your actions.” – Brendon Burchard


221. “The only way to truly succeed is to take ownership of your mistakes.” – Unknown


222. “Accountability is not an option, it’s a requirement.” – Unknown


223. “Good leaders build products. Great leaders build cultures. Good leaders deliver results. Great leaders develop people. Good leaders have vision. Great leaders have values. Good leaders are role models at work. Great leaders are role models in life."


224. “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way. ” —John Maxwell, author, speaker, and pastor


225. “You may believe that you are responsible for what you do, but not for what you think. The truth is that you are responsible for what you think, because it is only at this level that you can exercise choice. What you do comes from what you think.”


226. ““Liberty means responsibility. That is why most men dread it.”


227. “Ownership: ‘A commitment of the head, heart, and hands to fix the problem and never again affix the blame. ”


228. You manage things; you lead people. —Rear Admiral Grace Murray Hopper


229. “The best way to take responsibility for your life is to take ownership of your thoughts.” – Robin Sharma


230. “The best way to predict your future is to create it.” – Peter Drucker


231. “People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, and the boss drives.” — President Theodore Roosevelt


232. “A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.” John C. Maxwell


233. “Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.”


234. “Earn your leadership every day.” Michael Jordan


235. “Power isn’t control at all—power is strength, and giving that strength to others. A leader isn’t someone who forces others to make him stronger; a leader is someone willing to give his strength to others that they may have the strength to stand on their own. ” —Beth Revis, author


236. “Today a reader, tomorrow a leader.”


237. “The moment you take responsibility for your life is the moment you become free.” – Tony Robbins


238. “Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much. ” —Helen Keller, author, activist, and lecturer


239. “Sadly the American dream is dead. ”


240. “Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better. ” —Bill Bradley, American politician and former professional basketball player


241. “Accountability is not about blame, it’s about taking ownership of your actions.” – Unknown


242. Leadership is solving problems. The day soldiers stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them. They have either lost confidence that you can help or concluded you do not care. Either case is a failure of leadership. —Colin Powell


243. “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.” Warren Bennis


244. “Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. ” —Muriel Strode, poet


245. “The best leaders are those most interested in surrounding themselves with assistants and associates smarter than they are. They are frank in admitting this and are willing to pay for such talents.” – Antos Parrish


246. “Understanding the true meaning of accountability makes us strong and enables us to learn”


247. “Leadership is not a person or a position. It is a complex moral relationship between people based on trust, obligation, commitment, emotion, and a shared vision of the good. ” —Joanne Ciulla, American philosopher


248. “As a leader, it’s a major responsibility on your shoulders to practice the behavior you want others to follow. ” —Himanshu Bhatia, CEO of Chesterfield


249. ”Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to high sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. ” Peter Drucker


250. “Obstacles are things a person sees when he takes his eyes off his goal. ” —E. Joseph Cossman, inventor and businessman


251. “Remember, if you don’t promote yourself, then no one else will! Likewise, believe in yourself – or no one else will either. ”


252. No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit for doing it. - Andrew Carnegie


253. “Accountability is not just something you do. It’s a way of being.” – Marshall Goldsmith


254. “Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago. ” —Warren Buffett, investor


255. “A leader is a dealer in hope. ” —Napoleon Bonaparte, French military and political leader


256. “Take accountability… Blame is the water in which many dreams and relationships drown. ”


257. “I learned to always take on things I’d never done before. Growth and comfort do not coexist. ” —Ginni Rometty, Executive Chairman of IBM


258. “The glue that holds all relationships together–including the relationship between the leader and the led–is trust, and trust is based on integrity.” Brian Tracy


259. A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go, but ought to be. —Rosalynn Carter


260. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader.” John Quincy Adams


261. “You don’t have to hold a position in order to be a leader.”


262. People buy into the leader before they buy into the vision. —John Maxwell


263. “The only way to achieve greatness is to take responsibility for your life.” – Brendon Burchard


264. “A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.”


265. “Show me someone without an ego, and I’ll show you a loser – having a healthy ego, or high opinion of yourself, is a real positive in life!”


266. “The pride of man hopes but to blame God for the evils of the world, and to praise himself for the good. ”


267. “Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that’s more productive. ”


268. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things. ” —Peter F. Drucker, author and educator


269. “Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground”.


270. “The way to achieve your own success is to be willing to help somebody else get it first. ” —Iyanla Vanzant, American inspirational speaker, author, and lawyer


271. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.“— John Quincy Adams


272. “Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.”


273. The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born-that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That's nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born. —Warren Bennis


274. “We are all accountable for our actions; their affect and influence on our lives and the lives of others


275. “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry


276. “What you do, tells me everything about you. ”


277. “You have to look at your career and personal life at the big-picture level: it’s a marathon, not a sprint. Doing that helps me feel OK during the weeks when one part of my life overwhelms the other. ” —Joanna Horsnail, partner at Mayer Brown LLP


278. “You gain strength, courage and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing you think you cannot do.”


279. “A true leader doesn’t blame others for their mistakes, they take accountability and learn from them.” – Stephen Covey


280. “Success doesn’t just happen. It starts for those who take action. ”


281. “I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people. ” —Mahatma Gandhi, Indian Independence Movement leader


282. “Great leaders know that they are ultimately responsible for their team’s success or failure.” – Brian Tracy


283. “Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them.” John C. Maxwell


284. In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock. —Thomas Jefferson


285. “Example is not the main thing in influencing others, it is the only thing.”


286. Take the Accountability Scorecard


287. “Accountability and self-responsibility are critical to our success in personal, professional and public life. However, we often look for those character traits in others, rather than inculcating them in ourselves. ”


288. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently. ” —Warren Buffett, investor


289. “Never ever ever give up. You can change and move around but NEVER ever give up. ”


290. “There is a difference between being a leader and being a boss. Both are based on authority. A boss demands blind obedience; a leader earns his authority through understanding and trust.” Klaus Balkenhol


291. The supreme quality of leadership is integrity. –Dwight Eisenhower


292. “We need to accept that we don’t always make the right decisions, that we’ll screw up royally sometimes. Understand that failure is not the opposite of success, it’s part of success. ” —Arianna Huffington, founder & CEO, Thrive Global


293. “What you do has far greater impact than what you say.” Stephen Covey


294. Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it's amazing what they can accomplish. —Sam Walton


295. “A leader’s greatest responsibility is to define reality and provide hope.” – Napoleon Bonaparte


296. “The supreme quality for leadership is unquestionably integrity. Without it, no real success is possible, no matter whether it is on a section gang, a football field, in an army, or in an office.” Dwight D. Eisenhower


297. “When you take responsibility for your actions, you are in control of your life.” – Tom Hopkins


298. “A leader who doesn’t take accountability for their actions is like a ship without a captain.” – John C. Maxwell


299. “Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.” George Patton


300. True leadership lies in guiding others to success. In ensuring that everyone is performing at their best, doing the work they are pledged to do and doing it well. —Bill Owens


301. “Accountability is not about punishment, it’s about growth.” – Unknown


302. “Leaders think and talk about the solutions. Followers think and talk about the problems.” Brian Tracy


303. “Leadership is the ability to guide others without force into a direction or decision that leaves them still feeling empowered and accomplished. ” —Lisa Cash Hanson, author and entrepreneur


304. “The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt


305. “If you’re not willing to be held accountable for your actions, you’re not ready for success.” – Unknown


306. “Always choose the future over the past. What do we do now?” Brain Tracy


307. “I think leadership comes from integrity – that you do whatever you ask others to do. I think there are non-obvious ways to lead. Just by providing a good example as a parent, a friend, a neighbor makes it possible for other people to see better ways to do things. Leadership does not need to be a dramatic, fist in the air and trumpets blaring, activity.”


308. “Accountability is the foundation of all leadership.” – Brian Tracy


309. “I believe that accountability is the basis of all meaningful human achievement.” – Sam Silverstein


310. I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure, which is: Try to please everybody. —Herbert Swope


311. Lead and inspire people. Don’t try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be led. —Ross Perot


312. “All leaders are readers. ” —Jim Rohn, American entrepreneur


313. “A clear vision, backed by definite plans, gives you a tremendous feeling of confidence and personal power.” Brian Tracy


314. A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves. —Lao Tzu


315. “If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, then, you are an excellent leader. ” —Dolly Parton, musician


316. “When you take responsibility for your life, you will have the power to change it.” – Tony Robbins


317. Never give an order that can't be obeyed. —General Douglas MacArthur


318. “Accountability is not about being perfect, it’s about being responsible.” – Unknown


319. “A true leader takes responsibility for the success or failure of the team.” – Simon Sinek


320. “You must take responsibility for your actions, thoughts, and feelings if you want to achieve your goals.” – Jim Rohn


321. “On one side of accountability is courage, on the other is freedom. ”


322. There are three essentials to leadership: humility, clarity and courage. —Fuchan Yuan


323. “The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” Martin Luther King, Jr.


324. “A leader is one who sees more than others see, who sees farther than others see, and who sees before others see.” — Leroy Eimes


325. “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has. ” —Margaret Mead, anthropologist


326. “Good leaders organize and align people around what the team needs to do. Great leaders motivate and inspire people with why they’re doing it.” Marillyn Hewson


327. “Accountability is the key to achieving success and maintaining it.” – Unknown


328. “Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off.”


329. “I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles; but today it means getting along with people.”


330. “The worst thing that can happen to you as a young person, is to refuse to grow up. You refuse to grow up when you believe that someone else must take responsibility for your life and life circumstances. ”


331. “Leadership is about making others better as a result of your presence, and making sure that impact lasts in your absence. ” —Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook


332. “Accountability is the measure of a leaders height. ”


333. “I believe in a quiet, strong and grounded leadership. I think some of the best leaders are those whose work is widely known and respected but who, themselves, are relatively unknown. ” —Rachael Chong, founder and CEO of Catchafire


334. “Integrity is the most valuable and respected quality of leadership. Always keep your word.” Brian Tracy


335. “Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility. ”


336. Leaders think and talk about the solutions. Followers think and talk about the problems. —Brian Tracy


337. “Take responsibility for your actions, and you will become a leader.” – John C. Maxwell


338. “He that is good for making excuses is seldom good for anything else. ”


339. “Accountability breeds response-ability.” – Stephen Covey


340. “You're going to mess up. So instead of trying to be perfect, learn how to be accountable." – Whitney Goodman


341. It is absurd that a man should rule others, who cannot rule himself. —Latin Proverb


342. The leader has to be practical and a realist yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist. —Eric Hoffer


343. “For most people, blaming others is a subconscious mechanism for avoiding accountability. In reality, the only thing in your way is YOU. ”


344. “People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, and the boss drives. –President Theodore Roosevelt


345. “A leader who takes accountability for their decisions earns the trust and respect of their team.” – John C. Maxwell


346. “We all have a responsibility to do our part in making the world a better place.” – Les Brown


347. “Ninety percent of leadership is the ability to communicate something people want. ” —Dianne Feinstein, Senior United States Senator


348. The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly. —Jim Rohn


349. “With responsibility comes power, the power to create, to love, and to influence others positively.” – Maxime Lagacé


350. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Maya Angelou


351. “The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly.”


352. “Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it.” General Dwight Eisenhower


353. “It is the responsibility of leadership to provide opportunity, and the responsibility of individuals to contribute.” – William Pollard


354. “Think BIG and always focus on the positive. ”


355. “Become the kind of leader that people would follow voluntarily; even if you had no title or position.” Brian Tracy


356. “You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change yourself.”


357. “Individuals and teams have a sense of ownership, and are focused, disciplined and collaborative, while holding each other accountable for outcomes.” – Di Worrall


358. “Stay connected to feel empathy, compassion, and understanding for yourself and others.” Vanessa Tucker


359. “Manage the downside; the upside will take care of itself. ”


360. “In the end, we are our choices. Build yourself a great story.” – Jeff Bezos


361. “Education is the most powerful weapon, which you can use to change the world.”


362. “Measure your impact in humanity, not in the likes, but the lives you touch; not in popularity, but in the people you serve. I found that my life got bigger when I stopped caring about what other people thought about me. You will find yours will too. Stay focused on what really matters. There will be times when your resolve to serve humanity will be tested. Be prepared. People will try to convince you that you should keep your empathy out of your career. Don’t accept this false premise.” Tim Cook


363. “Leadership is not just about giving energy… it’s unleashing other people’s energy. ” —Paul Polman, Dutch businessman


364. “Becoming a leader is synonymous with becoming yourself. It is precisely that simple and it is also that difficult.”


365. “On good teams coaches hold players accountable, on great teams players hold players accountable. ”


366. “Stop blaming others and take responsibility for your life.” – Grant Cardone


367. “Don’t be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own backyard.” General Colin Powell


368. I must follow the people. Am I not their leader? —Benjamin Disraeli


369. “Average leaders raise the bar on themselves; good leaders raise the bar for others; great leaders inspire others to raise their own bar.” Orrin Woodward


370. “Do what you feel in your heart to be right – for you'll be criticized anyway. You'll be damned if you do, and damned if you don't.“


371. “Learning is not a one-time event or a periodic luxury. Great leaders in great companies recognize that the ability to constantly learn, innovate, and improve is vital to their success.” Amy Edmondson


372. “The moment you accept responsibility for everything in your life is the moment you gain the power to change anything in your life.” – Hal Elrod


373. “It is my daily mood that makes the weather. I possess tremendous power to make life miserable or joyous. I can be a tool of torture or an instrument of inspiration, I can humiliate or humor, hurt or heal. In all situations, it is my response that decides whether a crisis is escalated or de-escalated, and a person is humanized or de-humanized. If we treat people as they are, we make them worse. If we treat people as they ought to be, we help them become what they are capable of becoming.”


374. “Show me someone without an ego, and I’ll show you a loser. ”


375. “Vision remains vision until you focus, do the work, and bring it down to earth where it will do some good. ”


376. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.”


377. “Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.”


378. “To be accountable means that we are willing to be responsible to another person for our behavior and it implies a level of submission to another’s opinions and viewpoints. ”


379. “Become the kind of leader that people would follow voluntarily, even if you had no title or position. ” —Brian Tracy, Canadian-American motivational public speaker


380. “The first step toward success is taking responsibility for your actions.” – Mark Cuban


381. “I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.”


382. “Taking responsibility for your life is the first step toward living your dreams.” – Les Brown


383. “Take responsibility for your actions, and you will be successful.” – Jim Rohn


384. “The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born—that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born. ” —Warren Bennis, American scholar, organizational consultant, and author


385. “True leaders accept responsibility for the outcomes of their decisions and actions.” – John Wooden


386. “You are the reason of your own good-luck and bad-luck; success and failure; happiness and pain. Your choices are responsible for your present. Don’t blame someone else for your sufferings or failures. ”


387. “It took me quite a long time to develop a voice, and now that I have it, I am not going to be silent. ” —Madeleine Albright, former U. S. Secretary of State


388. “The best leaders have a high consideration factor. They really care about their people” Brian Tracy


389. “It is wrong and immoral to seek to escape the consequences of one’s acts. ”


390. “Accountability is the ultimate key to happiness.” – Unknown


391. “The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born-that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.”


392. “The test of leadership is, is anything or anyone better because of you?” —Mark Sanborn, author, professional speaker, and entrepreneur


393. “My own definition of leadership is this: the capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence. ” —General Montgomery, British Army Officer


394. “Wise leaders generally have wise counselors because it takes a wise person themselves to distinguish them.” Diogenes of Sinope


395. “Eventually we all have to accept full and total responsibility for our actions, everything we have done, and have not done.”


396. “The most important thing you can do for yourself is to take responsibility for your life.” – Les Brown


397. “When you take accountability, you take control of your destiny.” – Unknown


398. “Surround yourself with the best people you can find, delegate authority, and don’t interfere as long as the policy you’ve decided upon is being carried out.” Ronald Reagan


399. “Success is a choice, and it begins with taking responsibility for your life.” – Jack Canfield


400. Education is the mother of leadership. —Wendell Willkie


401. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that count."


402. “You may believe you are responsible for what you do, but not for what you think. The truth is that you are responsible for what you think, because it is only at this level that you can exercise choice.” – A Course in Miracles


403. The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground. —Sir Winston Churchill


404. “He who would accomplish little must sacrifice little; he who would achieve much must sacrifice much; he who would attain highly must sacrifice greatly."


405. “I cannot give you the formula for success, but I can give you the formula for failure: which is: Try to please everybody.”


406. “If you always put a limit on everything you do, physical or anything else, it will spread into your work and into your life. There are no limits. There are only plateaus, and you must not stay there, you must go beyond them.” Bruce Lee


407. “Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.”


408. A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together. —Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe


409. “Accountability is a mindset, not a set of rules.” – Pat Summitt


410. We live in a society obsessed with public opinion. But leadership has never been about popularity. —Marco Rubio


411. “The first thing the secretary types is the boss. ”


412. I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers. —Ralph Nader


413. “Leadership is the capacity to transform vision into reality.” Warren G. Bennis


414. “A good objective of leadership is to help those who are doing poorly to do well and to help those who are doing well to do even better.” Jim Rohn


415. “Leaders, true leaders, take responsibility for the success of the team and understand that they must also take responsibility for the failure.”


416. “You are what you do, not what you say you’ll do.” Carl Jung


417. “Having authority implies accountability. If you reject the blame for failures under your watch, people reject your leadership.” – Rick Warren


418. “Leaders don't inflict pain, they share pain.”


419. A leader is a dealer in hope. —Napoleon Bonaparte


420. “Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.” Stephen Covey


421. I am reminded how hollow the label of leadership sometimes is and how heroic followership can be. —Warren Bennis


422. The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority. —Kenneth Blanchard


423. Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall. —Stephen Covey


424. “The only safe ship in a storm is leadership. ” —Faye Wattleton, American reproductive rights activist


425. I am endlessly fascinated that playing football is considered a training ground for leadership, but raising children isn't. —Dee Dee Myers


426. “In any moment of decision, the best thing you can do is the right thing. The worst thing you can do is nothing.” – Theodore Roosevelt


427. “The things we fear most in organizations–fluctuations, disturbances, imbalances–are the primary sources of creativity.”


428. “I have three precious things, which I hold fast and prize. The first is gentleness; the second is frugality; the third is humility, which keeps me from putting myself before others. Be gentle and you can be bold; be frugal and you can be liberal; avoid putting yourself before others and you can become a leader among men.”


429. “Leadership is a series of behaviors rather than a role for heroes. ” —Margaret Wheatley, writer, teacher, and speaker


430. “Leaders inspire accountability through their ability to accept responsibility before they place blame. ”― Courtney Lynch


431. “The power behind taking responsibility for your actions lies in putting an end to negative thought patterns. You no longer dwell on what went wrong or focus on whom you are going to blame. You don’t waste time building roadblocks to your success. Instead, you are set free and can now focus on succeeding.” – Lorii Myers


432. “The key to success is taking responsibility for your actions.” – Brian Tracy


433. “Work hard. Someone’s always watching. ”


434. Do what you feel in your heart to be right–for you’ll be criticized anyway. —Eleanor Roosevelt


435. “One of the criticisms I’ve faced over the years is that I’m not aggressive enough or assertive enough or maybe somehow, because I’m empathetic, it means I’m weak. I totally rebel against that. I refuse to believe that you cannot be both compassionate and strong. ” —Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand


436. A ruler should be slow to punish and swift to reward. —Ovid


437. “No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it.”


438. “Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility. ”


439. “When you delegate work to a member of the team, your job is to clearly frame success and describe the objectives.” Steven Sinofsky


440. “Leadership is about taking responsibility, not making excuses.” – Mitt Romney


441. “Don’t be intimidated by what you don’t know. That can be your greatest strength and ensure that you do things differently from everyone else. ” —Sara Blakely, founder & CEO of Spanx


442. “Change your attitude and gain some altitude. Believe me, you’ll love it up here. ”


443. “Leadership is an action, not a position. ” —Donald McGannon, broadcasting executive


444. “Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better.” Bill Bradley


445. “You steadily grow into becoming your best as you choose to be accountable and accept responsibility for improvement. ”


446. “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” Jack Welch


447. “There is no investment you can make which will pay you so well as the effort to scatter sunshine and good cheer through your establishment.”


448. “Develop success from failures. Discouragement and failure are two of the surest stepping stones to success.”


449. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” – Winston Churchill


450. “The task of leadership is not to put greatness into people, but to elicit it, for the greatness is there already.”


451. Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do and they will surprise you with their ingenuity. —General George Patton


452. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”


453. “In matters of style, swim with the current; in matters of principle, stand like a rock.”


454. “Accountability is the key to driving results.” – Jocko Willink


455. “Tell me and I forget. Teach me and I remember. Involve me and I learn.” Benjamin Franklin


456. “Leaders aren’t born, they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work. And that’s the price we’ll have to pay to achieve that goal, or any goal.” Vince Lombardi


457. “The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.”


458. “Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results. ” —George Patton, general in the United States Army


459. “Leadership is not just what happens when you’re there, it’s what happens when you’re not.” – Ken Blanchard


460. “The best way to predict your future is to create it.” – Abraham Lincoln


461. “The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep from meddling with them while they do it.”


462. “The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely to be the one who dropped it.”


463. Men make history and not the other way around. In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better. —Harry S. Truman


464. “The key to success is action.” Brian Tracy


465. “Taking responsibility for your life is the first step toward living a life of purpose.” – Les Brown


466. “The first step to accountability is owning your mistakes.” – Ken Blanchard


467. Leadership is a potent combination of strategy and character. But if you must be without one, be without the strategy. —Norman Schwarzkopf


468. “A leader is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all along they are being directed from behind. ” —Nelson Mandela, revolutionary, statesman, and philanthropist


469. “The manager accepts the status quo; the leader challenges it. ” —Warren Bennis, American scholar, organizational consultant, and author


470. “Everything in life is luck. ”


471. “What separates the winners from the losers is how a person reacts to each new twist of fate. ”


472. Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes. —Peter Drucker


473. “The willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own life is the source from which self-respect springs.” – Joan Didion


474. Leaders aren't born, they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work. And that's the price we'll have to pay to achieve that goal, or any goal. —Vince Lombardi


475. “Average leaders raise the bar on themselves; good leaders raise the bar for others; great leaders inspire others to raise their own bar. ” —Orrin Woodward, entrepreneur and author


476. “Do the difficult things while they are easy and do the great things while they are small. A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. ” —Lao Tzu, philosopher and writer


477. “See the good in people and help them.” — Mahatma Gandhi


478. “When we fail to set boundaries and hold people accountable, we feel used and mistreated. This is why we sometimes attack who they are, which is far more hurtful than addressing a behavior or a choice.” - Brené Brown


479. “Great leaders don’t blame others for their mistakes, they take accountability and learn from them.” – Brian Tracy


480. “Aim High, Drive hard. ”


481. “Accountability is the measure of a person’s credibility.” – Unknown


482. “When people feel accountable and included, it is more fun. ” – Alan Mulally


483. “If someone is going down the wrong road, he doesn’t need motivation to speed him up. What he needs is education to turn him around.” Jim Rohn


484. A good general not only sees the way to victory; he also knows when victory is impossible. —Polybius


485. “Men who reject the responsibility of thought and reason can only exist as parasites on the thinking of others.”


486. “If you want to make a change, you have to take accountability for your actions.” – Unknown


487. Where there is no vision, the people perish. —Proverbs 29:18


488. “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others. ” —Jack Welch, American business executive, chemical engineer, and writer


489. If one is lucky, a solitary fantasy can totally transform one million realities. —Maya Angelou


490. “Open collaboration encourages greater accountability, which in turn fosters trust. ” – Ron Garan


491. “It is impossible to imagine anything which better becomes a ruler than mercy.”


492. You don’t lead by hitting people over the head—that’s assault, not leadership. –Dwight Eisenhower


493. “Leadership is not a person or a position. It is a complex moral relationship between people based on trust, obligation, commitment, emotion, and a shared vision of the good. ” —Joanne Ciulla, author and educator


494. “The more accountability you take, the more control you have over your life.” – Unknown


495. Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has. —Margaret Mead


496. “Leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking charge and being accountable.” – Marcia Wieder


497. “The very essence of leadership is that you have to have a vision. It’s got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet.” Reverend Theodore Hesburgh


498. The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it. —Theodore Roosevelt


499. “Conscience is the root of all true courage; if a man would be brave let him obey his conscience.” James Freeman Clark


500. “Anyone can possess, anyone can profess, but it is an altogether different thing to confess. ”


501. “When you take accountability, you take responsibility for your life.” – Unknown


502. “Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.”


503. “The quality of a leader is reflected in the standards they set for themselves.”


504. “A leader who lacks accountability is like a ship without a rudder.” – John G. Miller


505. “Have the courage to say no. Have the courage to face the truth. Do the right thing because it is right. These are the magic keys to living your life with integrity.” W. Clement Stone


506. “The ability to accept responsibility is the measure of the man.” – Roy L. Smith


507. “Take chances, make mistakes. That’s how you grow. Pain nourishes your courage. You have to fail in order to practice being brave.” Mary Tyler Moore


508. “No leader sets out to be a leader. People set out to live their lives, expressing themselves fully. When that expression is of value, they become leaders. So the point is not to become a leader. The point is to become yourself, to use yourself completely – all your skills, gifts and energies – in order to make your vision manifest. You must withhold nothing. You must, in sum, become the person you started out to be, and to enjoy the process of becoming. ” —Warren Bennis, American scholar, organizational consultant, and author


509. “Education is the mother of leadership. ” —Wendell Willkie, lawyer


510. “Creating a culture of integrity and accountability not only improves effectiveness, it also generates a respectful, enjoyable and life-giving setting in which to work.” – Tom Hanson


511. “Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision. ” —Peter F. Drucker, Austrian-American management consultant, educator, and author


512. “When you hold yourself accountable, you take the first step towards self-improvement.” – Unknown


513. “Remember, feedback is meant to address the problem, not the person.”


514. “Hire people who are better than you are, then leave them to get on with it … Look for people who will aim for the remarkable, who will not settle for the routine.” David Ogilvy


515. “It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.” — Nelson Mandela


516. “If your business is not a brand, it’s a commodity. ”


517. “Wisdom stems from personal accountability. We all make mistakes; own them… learn from them. Don’t throw away the lesson by blaming others. ”


518. “One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.” Arnold Glasow


519. “A good leader must hate the wrong thing more than they hate the pain of doing the right thing. ” —Angela Jiang, product manager


520. “The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men, the conviction and the will to carry on.”


521. “If you can’t stand the heat, you’d better get out of the kitchen. ”


522. “I start with the premise that the function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.” Ralph Nader


523. “When you take accountability for your actions, you immediately take back control of your life.” – Unknown


524. “Leaders never use the word failure. They look upon setbacks as learning experiences.” Brian Tracy


525. “I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.” Nelson Mandela


526. “Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well.”


527. Leaders inspire accountability through their ability to accept responsibility before they place blame.― Courtney Lynch


528. To have long term success as a coach or in any position of leadership, you have to be obsessed in some way. —Pat Riley


529. “The best way to leapfrog in your career is to get advice from someone who’s done what you’re trying to accomplish. It helps clear all the doubt.”


530. “The only way we succeed as a group is not simply following directions, but in keeping each other accountable for our actions. ”


531. “The ability to take responsibility is the hallmark of the fully mature person.” – Brian Tracy


532. “If you don’t like something, change it. If you can’t change it, change your attitude.” – Maya Angelou


533. He who has great power should use it lightly. —Seneca


534. “Make an effort to exert yourself-everyday. Don’t fail because you never allowed yourself to get started! Don’t avoid success because you think the responsibility might be too much-just focus and get going! You’d be surprised at what intelligent effort can produce. ”


535. “Don’t compromise your principles. ”


536. “A leader who takes responsibility for their actions and decisions inspires trust and loyalty in their team.” – John Wooden


537. “I am a man of fixed and unbending principles, the first of which is to be flexible at all times.”


538. A competent leader can get efficient service from poor troops, while on the contrary an incapable leader can demoralize the best of troops. —John J Pershing


539. “Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes."


540. “Open collaboration encourages greater accountability, which in turn fosters trust. ”


541. “You can make any promises as long as you are not going to be there to fulfill them. ”


542. “If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulder of giants.”


543. Lead me, follow me, or get out of my way. — General George Patton


544. No man will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it. —Andrew Carnegie


545. “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea. ” —Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, French writer, poet, and aristocrat


546. “Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower.”


547. “It’s always good to be underestimated. ”


548. “Without passion, you don’t have any energy, and without energy, you simply have nothing. ”


549. “You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life. ” —Winston Churchill, former British Prime Minister


550. “Make your mistakes work for you by learning from them. ”


551. “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.” – Warren Bennis


552. “A star wants to see himself rise to the top. A leader wants to see those around him rise to the top.” Simon Sinek


553. “You cannot change the past, but you can take responsibility for your future.” – Brian Tracy


554. “A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd. ” —Max Lucado, author and pastor


555. “Leadership is not about being perfect, it’s about taking responsibility when things go wrong.” – John G. Miller


556. A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way. —John Maxwell


557. “Accountability is a sign of maturity and strength.” – Unknown


558. “Courage is more exhilarating than fear and in the long run it is easier. We do not have to become heroes overnight. Just a step at a time, meeting each thing that comes up, seeing it is not as dreadful as it appeared, discovering we have the strength to stare it down.” Eleanor Roosevelt


559. “The budget was unlimited, but I exceeded it. ”


560. “In the future, there will be no female leaders. There will just be leaders. ” —Sheryl Sandberg, American business executive, billionaire, and philanthropist


561. “Leadership is not about men in suits. It is a way of life for those who know who they are and are willing to be their best to create the life they want to live. ” —Kathleen Schafer, CEO of Human Being Store


562. “Responsibility to yourself means refusing to let others do your thinking, talking, and naming for you; it means learning to respect and use your own brains and instincts; hence, grappling with hard work.” – Adrienne Rich


563. “As a leader, it’s a major responsibility on your shoulders to practice the behavior you want others to follow.”


564. “Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other.” John F. Kennedy


565. Accountability breeds response-ability


566. “The greatest leaders mobilize others by coalescing people around a shared vision.” Ken Blanchard


567. “Some want, to be exempt. They do not want to excel, they do not want to exert. They want to be considered excellent, for desiring to be held exempt, from all accountability. ”


568. “Be willing to make decisions. That’s the most important quality in a good leader.”


569. “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.”


570. “When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful. ” —Malala Yousafzai, activist


571. “Superior leaders are willing to admit a mistake and cut their losses. Be willing to admit that you’ve changed your mind. Don’t persist when the original decision turns out to be a poor one.” Brian Tracy


572. The art of leadership is saying no, not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes. —Tony Blair


573. “Nothing is easy, but who wants nothing?”


574. “Take responsibility for your own happiness, never put it in other people’s hands.” – Roy T. Bennett


575. “A good leader leads the people from above them. A great leader leads the people from within them.” M.D. Arnold


576. Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. —Publilius Syrus


577. “Don’t be a bottleneck. If a matter is not a decision for the President or you, delegate it. Force responsibility down and out. Find problem areas, add structure and delegate. The pressure is to do the reverse. Resist it.” Donald Rumsfeld, former Secretary of Defense


578. “I think it’s very important to have a feedback loop, where you’re constantly thinking about what you’ve done and how you could be doing it better. I think that’s the single best piece of advice: constantly think about how you could be doing things better and questioning yourself.”


579. “No person will make a great business who wants to do it all himself or get all the credit.” Andrew Carnegie


580. Leadership is the art of getting someone else to do something you want done because he wants to do it. —General Dwight Eisenhower


581. Leadership cannot just go along to get along. Leadership must meet the moral challenge of the day. —Jesse Jackson


582. “It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership.” —Nelson Mandela


583. “In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better. ” —Harry Truman, former U. S. President


584. “You’ve got to know when to let go”: founders of FuckUp Nights Melbourne reflect on their journey


585. “You are responsible for your life. You can’t keep blaming somebody else for your dysfunction. Life is really about moving on.” – Oprah Winfrey


586. “The price of greatness is responsibility.” – Winston Churchill


587. “Good men are bound by conscience and liberated by accountability. ”


588. “To get momentum, you must first focus on a specific goal with passion and intensity. ”


589. “We now accept the fact that learning is a lifelong process of keeping abreast of change. And the most pressing task is to teach people how to learn.” Peter Drucker


590. Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others. —Jack Welch


591. “It is not only what we do, but also what we do not do, for which we are accountable. ”


592. “Good leaders build products. Great leaders build cultures. Good leaders deliver results. Great leaders develop people. Good leaders have vision. Great leaders have values. Good leaders are role models at work. Great leaders are role models in life. ” —Adam Grant, American psychologist and author


593. “When we fail to set boundaries and hold people accountable, we feel used and mistreated. This is why we sometimes attack who they are, which is far more hurtful than addressing a behavior or a choice. ”


594. “The right thing to do and the hard thing to do are usually the same.” – Steve Maraboli


595. “A good objective of leadership is to help those who are doing poorly to do well and to help those who are doing well to do even better.”


596. “A lack of realism in the vision today costs credibility tomorrow.”


597. “The ability to learn is the most important quality a leader can have. ” —Padmasree Warrior, CEO & founder of Fable


598. He who has never learned to obey cannot be a good commander. —Aristotle


599. “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires. ” —William Arthur Ward, writer


600. “Once people have a clear idea of what decisions they should and should not be making, holding them accountable for decisions feels fair.” - Gary L. Neilson


601. “You manage things; you lead people. “


602. “Lead and inspire people. Don’t try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be lead.”


603. “Hire character. Train skill. ” —Peter Schutz, former president and CEO of Porsche


604. “Accountability feels like an attack when you're not ready to acknowledge how your behaviors harm others." – Tamara Renaye


605. “In the long run, we shape our lives, and we shape ourselves. The process never ends until we die. And the choices we make are ultimately our own responsibility. Eleanor Roosevelt


606. To do great things is difficult; but to command great things is more difficult. —Friedrich Nietzsche


607. “Leadership is not something that is done to people, like fixing your teeth. Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better.” Bill Bradley


608. “The only way to achieve greatness is to take responsibility for your life.” – Tony Robbins


609. “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things.” Ronald Reagan


610. “Become the kind of leader that people would follow voluntarily; even if you had no title or position.”


611. “We are all responsible and accountable for what we do or say even if those actions occur in our weakest moments.” – Kaitlin Gow


612. “Leadership is the art of giving people a platform for spreading ideas that work."


613. “A body of men holding themselves accountable to nobody ought not to be trusted by anybody. ”


614. “We are made wise not by the recollection of our past, but by the responsibility for our future.”


615. “The potential of the average person is like a huge ocean unsailed, a new continent unexplored, a world of possibilities waiting to be released and channeled toward some great good.” Brian Tracy


616. ”Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better. ” Harry S. Truman


617. “Where there is no accountability, there will also be no responsibility. ”


618. “Lead and inspire people. Don’t try to manage and manipulate people. Inventories can be managed but people must be led.” Ross Perot


619. “Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.” Leo Buscaglia


620. “Being responsible sometimes means pissing people off. ”


621. “When you delegate tasks, you create followers. When you delegate authority, you create leaders.” Craig Groeschel


622. Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out. —Stephen Covey


623. “The first responsibility of a leader is to define reality. The last is to say thank you. In between, the leader is a servant.”


624. “A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus, but a molder of consensus.” Martin Luther King, Jr.


625. “To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart.”


626. “Leaders, true leaders, take responsibility for the success of the team and understand that they must also take responsibility for the failure. ”


627. Not the cry, but the flight of a wild duck, leads the flock to fly and follow. —Chinese Proverb


628. “Accountability breeds response-ability.” – Stephen R. Covey


629. Open collaboration encourages greater accountability, which in turn fosters trust. - Ron Garan


630. “The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me?” —Ayn Rand, author


631. “A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.”


632. “The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.” – Nelson Mandela


633. “Great leaders take responsibility for their actions and empower their team to do the same.” – Robin Sharma


634. Management is about arranging and telling. Leadership is about nurturing and enhancing. —Tom Peters


635. “Leadership is unlocking people’s potential to become better.”


636. “Leaders are innovative, entrepreneurial, and future-oriented. They focus on getting the job done.” Brian Tracy


637. “Leadership is not about titles, positions, or flow charts. It is about one life influencing another.” John C. Maxwell


638. “As a leader, you should always start with where people are before you try to take them where you want them to go.” Jim Rohn


639. “If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more, and become more, you are a leader. –John Quincy Adams


640. “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand. ” —Gen. Colin Powell, former U. S. Secretary of State


641. “When you take responsibility for your life, you become powerful.” – Tony Robbins


642. “Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility… in the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have… is the ability to take on responsibility.” – Michael Korda


643. “Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility. . . . In the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have is the ability to take on responsibility. ”


644. “If I lost everything and had to start again, I would find myself a great network marketing company and get to work!”


645. “Leadership is a matter of having people look at you and gain confidence, seeing how you react. If you’re in control, they’re in control.”


646. “In dreams begin responsibilities.”


647. “When a man points a finger at someone else, he should remember that four of his fingers are pointing at himself. ”


648. “Leaders must be close enough to relate to others, but far enough ahead to motivate them.” – John C. Maxwell


649. “Accountability is the difference between a good leader and a great leader.” – D.A. Abrams


650. “The single biggest way to impact an organization is to focus on leadership development. There is almost no limit to the potential of an organization that recruits good people, raises them up as leaders, and continually develops them.” John Maxwell


651. “As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.” Bill Gates


652. A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd. —Max Lucado


653. “A leader is best when people barely know he exists; when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: We did it ourselves.” Lao Tzu


654. “Leaders think and talk about the solutions. Followers think and talk about the problems.”


655. “Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes.”


656. It is better to lead from behind and to put others in front, especially when you celebrate victory when nice things occur. You take the front line when there is danger. Then people will appreciate your leadership. —Nelson Mandela


657. “The greatest leaders mobilize others by coalescing people around a shared vision.” – Ken Blanchard


658. “The nation will find it very hard to look up to the leaders who are keeping their ears to the ground.”


659. “To function effectively, a business requires leaders who are accountable for driving success.” – Barry Linetsky


660. “Respect is the key determinant of high-performance leadership. how much people respect you determines how well they perform.” Brian Tracy


661. “Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing.” Albert Schweitzer


662. “Don’t be so petty. Sometimes you have to do business with people you don’t like. It doesn’t mean you have to be like them or like them. ”


663. “Accountability is the cornerstone of any effective leadership.” – Gary Hamel


664. Book a complimentary Accountability Assessment


665. “Servant-leadership is all about making the goals clear and then rolling your sleeves up and doing whatever it takes to help people win. In that situation, they don’t work for you, you work for them.”


666. “The price of greatness is responsibility over each of your thoughts.” – Winston Churchill


667. “You can be a leader in your workplace, your neighborhood, or your family, all without having a title. ” —Travis Bradberry, author


668. “Knowing what must be done does away with fear.”


669. “I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions. ” —Stephen R. Covey, American educator


670. “The effective leader recognizes that they are more dependent on their people than they are on them. Walk softly.” Brian Tracy


671. A great leader's courage to fulfill his vision comes from passion, not position. —John Maxwell


672. “If you’re interested in ‘balancing’ work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead make your work more pleasurable. ”


673. Leadership does not always wear the harness of compromise. —Woodrow Wilson


674. “Outstanding leaders go out of the way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish. ” —Sam Walton, founder of Walmart and Sam’s Club


675. “Leaders don’t create followers, they create more leaders.” Tom Peters


676. “If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters.” Harvey Mackay


677. “If ‘leadership’ has come to be known as something much bigger than us, aligned to changing the world, then we are spending way too much time celebrating things that hardly anyone can do and not celebrating things we can do every day. ” —Drew Dudley, founder of Day One Leadership


678. “You have to be burning with an idea, or a problem, or a wrong that you want to right. If you’re not passionate enough from the start, you’ll never stick it out. ” —Steve Jobs, chairman of Apple


679. “Life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent of how I react to it.”


680. “A true leader knows that accountability is the key to success.” – Stephen Covey


681. “A leader is best when people barely know he exists, when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves. ” —Lao Tzu, philosopher and writer


682. “The very essence of leadership is that you have to have vision. You can't blow an uncertain trumpet.”


683. “The pessimist complains about the wind. The optimist expects it to change. The leader adjusts the sails.”


684. “Successful leaders see the opportunities in every difficulty rather than the difficulty in every opportunity.” Reed Markham


685. “Take responsibility for your life, and you will be unstoppable.” – Grant Cardone


686. “You are never too small to make a difference. ” —Greta Thunberg, environmental activist


687. “A leader is a dealer in hope. ” —Napoleon Bonaparte, French military leader and emperor


688. My own definition of leadership is this: The capacity and the will to rally men and women to a common purpose and the character which inspires confidence. —General Montgomery


689. “The reason people blame things on the previous generation is that there’s only one other choice. ”


690. “Action springs not from thought, but from a readiness for responsibility.”


691. “Leadership is a matter of having people look at you and gain confidence, seeing how you react. If you’re in control, they’re in control. ” —Tom Landry, former Dallas Cowboys coach


692. “A leader who takes accountability for their mistakes sets an example for their team to do the same.” – Brian Tracy


693. “It’s okay to admit what you don’t know. It’s okay to ask for help. And it’s more than okay to listen to the people you lead – in fact, it’s essential. ” —Mary Barra, CEO of General Motors


694. “If you want to do a few small things right, do them yourself. If you want to do great things and make a big impact, learn to delegate.” John C. Maxwell


695. “The really expert riders of horses let the horse know immediately who is in control, but then guide the horse with loose reins and seldom use the spurs.” Sandra Day O’Connor


696. “Accountability is not a burden, it’s a privilege.” – Unknown


697. “The greatest leaders mobilize others by coalescing people around a shared vision."


698. Whatever you are, be a good one. —Abraham Lincoln


699. “The essence of Vanderbilt is still learning, the essence of its outlook is still liberty, and liberty and learning will be and must be the touchstones of Vanderbilt University and of any free university in this country or the world. I say two touchstones, yet they are almost inseparable, inseparable if not indistinguishable, for liberty without learning is always in peril, and learning without liberty is always in vain.”


700. You don't lead by pointing and telling people some place to go. You lead by going to that place and making a case. —Ken Kesey


701. “Success on any major scale requires you to accept responsibility . . . . In the final analysis, the one quality that all successful people have is the ability to take on responsibility.”


702. “The three ‘C’s’ of leadership are consideration, caring, and courtesy. Be polite to everyone.” Brian Tracy


703. “People respond well to those that are sure of what they want. ” —Anna Wintour, Editor-in-Chief of Vogue


704. “Accountability is the ultimate measure of a person’s character.” – Unknown


705. “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things. ” —Ronald Reagan, former U. S. President


706. “When people feel accountable and included, it is more fun. ” - Alan Mulally


707. “A leader who shirks accountability is a leader who won’t last long.” – Ken Blanchard


708. To command is to serve, nothing more and nothing less. —Andre Malraux


709. You don’t need a title to be a leader. –Multiple Attributions


710. “One of the most important things for any leader is to never let anyone else define who you are. And you define who you are. I never think of myself as being a woman CEO of this company. I think of myself as a steward of a great institution. ” —Ginni Rometty, Executive Chairman of IBM


711. A good leader is a person who takes a little more than his share of the blame and a little less than his share of the credit. —John Maxwell


712. “Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.”


713. “People buy into the leader before they buy into the vision.”


714. “Each group and each youngster is different. As a leader or coach, you get to know what they need.”


715. “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” – Aristotle


716. “The greatest gift you can give yourself is to take responsibility for your life.” – Brian Tracy


717. “What you do has far greater impact than what you say.”


718. “Watch, listen and learn. You can’t know it all yourself. Anyone who thinks they do is destined for mediocrity. ”


719. “Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody’s going to know whether you did it or not. Oprah Winfrey


720. “Courage is an inner resolution to go forward despite obstacles; Cowardice is submissive surrender to circumstances. Courage breeds creativity; Cowardice represses fear and is mastered by it. Cowardice asks the question, is it safe? Expediency asks the question, is it politic? Vanity asks the question, is it popular? But conscience asks the question, is it right? And there comes a time when we must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because it is right.” Martin Luther King, Jr.


721. Great leaders are not defined by the absence of weakness, but rather by the presence of clear strengths. —John Zenger


722. “Leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking care of those in your charge.” – Simon Sinek


723. “A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men.”


724. “Freedom makes a huge requirement of every human being. With freedom comes responsibility. For the person who is unwilling to grow up, the person who does not want to carry is own weight, this is a frightening prospect.”


725. “Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice.” Bill George


726. “A mature person is one who is does not blame others for their mistakes, but takes responsibility for their actions.” – John C. Maxwell


727. “To handle yourself, use your head; to handle others, use your heart. ” —Eleanor Roosevelt, former First Lady


728. One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency. —Arnold Glasow


729. “Leadership is the ability to get extraordinary achievement from ordinary people.” Brian Tracy


730. A true leader has the confidence to stand alone, the courage to make tough decisions, and the compassion to listen to the needs of others. He does not set out to be a leader, but becomes one by the equality of his actions and the integrity of his intent. —Douglas MacArthur


731. “The moment you take responsibility for everything in your life is the moment you can change anything in your life.” – Hal Elrod


732. “Always try to learn from other people’s mistakes, not your own- it is much cheaper that way!”


733. “Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game. ”


734. “Great companies have high cultures of accountability, it comes with this culture of criticism I was talking about before, and I think our culture is strong on that. ” – Steve Ballmer


735. “Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.” Sam Walton


736. “Leadership distilled down to 3 words: Make a difference. ” —Robin Sharma, Canadian writer


737. Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate, and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand. —General Colin Powell


738. “People respond well to those that are sure of what they want.”


739. “Don’t be afraid of being unique. It’s like being afraid of your best self. ”


740. Leadership is the key to 99 percent of all successful efforts. —Erskine Bowles


741. Leadership is lifting a person's vision to high sights, the raising of a person's performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations. —Peter Drucker


742. “The buck stops here.” – Harry S. Truman


743. “Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be.” Ralph Waldo Emerson


744. Read my book "The Accountability Advantage - Play Your Best Game"


745. “When we take responsibility for our own life, we unleash a power that allows us to make the most of every opportunity.” – Tony Robbins


746. “When people talk, listen completely.”


747. “Accountability is the foundation of trust, without it there can be no real relationship.” – Unknown


748. “Leaders walk a fine line between self-confidence and humility. ” —Stanley McChrystal, retired United States Army General


749. “When you take ownership and responsibility for your life, you will become the master of your destiny.” – Brian Tracy


750. “The man who complains about the way the ball bounces is likely to be the one who dropped it. ”


751. “Emotional intelligence is a way of recognizing, understanding, and choosing how we think, feel, and act. It shapes our interactions with others and our understanding of ourselves. It defines how and what we learn; it allows us to set priorities; it determines the majority of our daily actions. Research suggests it is responsible for as much as 80 percent of the “success” in our lives.” Joshua Freedman


752. “Success is not about luck, it’s about taking responsibility for your life.” – Brian Tracy


753. “A great person attracts great people and knows how to hold them together. ” —Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe, German poet, playwright, and novelist


754. “Accountability is the foundation of trust, and trust is the foundation of success.” – Unknown


755. “Never promise more than you can perform. ”


756. “The best investments you ever make are investments in yourself – and your education. Those investments always pay big dividends. ”


757. Leadership and learning are indispensable to each other. —John F. Kennedy


758. “In looking for people to hire, you look for three qualities: integrity, intelligence, and energy. And if they don’t have the first, the other two will kill you.” Warren Buffet


759. “High sentiments always win in the end, The leaders who offer blood, toil, tears and sweat always get more out of their followers than those who offer safety and a good time. When it comes to the pinch, human beings are heroic.”


760. “Outstanding leaders go out of the way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.”


761. “A leader is best when people barely know he exists when his work is done, his aim fulfilled, they will say: we did it ourselves.” — Lao Tzu


762. A cowardly leader is the most dangerous of men. —Stephen King


763. “Deciding what not to do is as important as deciding what to do.” Jessica Jackley


764. Leadership is influence. —John C. Maxwell


765. “The only way to do great work is to love what you do.” – Steve Jobs

27 views0 comments

Comments


Recent posts

bottom of page