I am often asked if leaders are born or made. The answer, of course, is both. Some characteristics, like IQ and energy, seem to come with the package. On the other hand, you learn some leadership skills, like self-confidence, at your mother's knee, and at school, in academics and sports. And you learn others at work-trying something, getting it wrong and learning from it, or getting it right and gaining the self-confidence to do it again, only better.

The team with the best players usually does win - this is why you need to invest the majority of your time and energy in developing your people.

Lack of candor blocks smart ideas, fast action, and good people contributing all the stuff they've got. It's a killer.

In order to lead a country or a company, you've got to get everybody on the same page and you've got to be able to have a vision of where you're going. America can't have a vision of health care for everybody, green economy, regulations - can't have a bunch of piece - meal activities. It's got to have a vision.

In any bad situation you can not let yourself be a victim.

An overburdened, overstretched executive is the best executive, because he or she doesn't have the time to meddle, to deal in trivia, to bother people.

Strategy is not a lengthy action plan. It is the evolution of a central idea through continually changing circumstances.