List of James C. Collins Quotes

If I'm Going Really, Really Fast, I Can Do A Page Of Finished Text A Day, On Average.

A Visionary Company Doesn't Simply Balance Between Idealism And Profitability: It Seeks To Be Highly Idealistic And Highly Profitable.

Consider The Idea That Charisma Can Be As Much A Liability As An Asset. Your Strength Of Personality Can Sow The Seeds Of Problems, When People Filter The Brutal Facts From You.

I Can Just Let My Curiosity Wander Unleashed.

Some Managers Are Uncomfotable With Expressing Emotion About Their Dreams, But It's The Passion And Emotion That Will Attract And Motivate Others.

Throw Leaders Into An Extreme Environment, And It Will Separate The Stark Differences Between Greatness And Mediocrity.

I Am Not Failing - I Am Growing! Do You Have The Ability To Reframe Failure As Growth In Order To Achieve Your Goals?

The Best Ceos In Our Research Display Tremendous Ambition For Their Company Combined With The Stoic Will To Do Whatever It Takes, No Matter How Brutal (within The Bounds Of The Company's Core Values), To Make The Company Great. Yet At The Same Time They Display A Remarkable Humility About Themselves, Ascribing Much Of Their Own Success To Luck, Discipline And Preparation Rather Than Personal Genius.

To Have A Welch-caliber C.e.o. Is Impressive.to Have A Century Of Welch-caliber C.e.o.'s All Grown From The Inside - Well, That Is One Key Reason Why G.e. Is A Visionary Company.

If We Allow The Celebrity Rock-star Model Of Leadership To Triumph, We Will See The Decline Of Corporations And Institutions Of All Types. The Twentieth Century Was A Century Of Greatness, But We Face The Very Real Prospect That The Next Century Will See Very Few Enduring Great Institutions.

Get Keep Right People.

Those Fortunate Enough To Find Or Create A Practical Intersection Of The Three Circles Have The Basis For A Great Work Life.

Indeed, The Real Question Is Not, "why Greatness?" But "what Work Makes You Feel Compelled To Try To Create Greatness?" If You Have To Ask The Question, "why Should We Try To Make It Great? Isn't Success Enough?" Then You're Probably Int He Wrong Line Of Work.

A Great Company Will Have Many Once-in-a-liftetime Opportunities.

If Your Company Disappeared, Would It Leave A Gaping Hole That Could Not Easily Be Filled By Any Other Enterprise On The Planet?

It Took Einstein Ten Years Of Groping Through The Fog To Get The Theory Of Special Relativity, And He Was A Bright Guy.

I Am Completely Socratic.

I See The Baldrige Process As A Powerful Set Of Mechanisms For Disciplined People Engaged In Disciplined Thought And Taking Disciplined Action To Create Great Organizations That Produce Exceptional Results.

If We Only Have Great Companies, We Will Merely Have A Prosperous Society, Not A Great One. Economic Growth And Power Are The Means, Not The Definition, Of A Great Nation.

The People Who Don't Have A Great Life Are The Ones Who Settle For A Good One.

We Must Reject The Idea... Well-intentioned, But Dead Wrong... That The Primary Path To Greatness In The Social Sectors Is To Become "more Like A Business." Most Businesses... Like Most Of Anything Else In Life... Fall Somewhere Between Mediocre And Good.

We Learned That A Former Prisoner Of War Had More To Teach Us About What It Takes To Find A Path To Greatness Than Most Books On Corporate Strategy.

If You Have A Charismatic Cause You Don't Need To Be A Charismatic Leader.

Our Findings Do Not Represent A Quick Fix, Or The Next Fashion Statement In A Long String Of Management Fads, Or The Next Buzzword Of The Day, Or A New 'program' To Introduce. No! The Only Way To Make Any Company Visionary Is Through A Long-term Commitment To An Eternal Process Of Building The Organization To Preserve The Core And Stimulate Progress.