James C. Collins Quotes

Leaders who led their organizations quietly and humbly, were much more effective than flashy, charismatic high profile leaders.

The main point is first get the right people on the bus (and wrong people off the bus) before you figure out where to drive it. The second key point is the degree of sheer rigor in people decisions in order to take a company from Good to Great.

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.

That good is the enemy of great is not just a business problem. It is a human problem.

A visionary company doesn't simply balance between idealism and profitability: it seeks to be highly idealistic and highly profitable.

The only way to remain great is to keep on applying the fundamental principles that made you great.

Recruit entrepreneurial leaders and give them freedom to determine the best path to achieving their objectives. On the other hand, individuals must commit fully to the system you use and be held rigorously accountable for their objectives. You give them freedom, but freedom within a framework.

It is more important to know who you are than where you are going, for where you are going will change as the world around you changes.

The signature of mediocrity is chronic inconsistency.

The only way to deliver to the people who are achieving is to not burden them with the people who are not achieving.

The only mistakes you can learn from are the ones you survive.

You must ask, "What do we mean by great results?" Your goals don't have to be quantifiable, but they do have to be describable. Some leaders try to insist, "The only acceptable goals are measurable," but that's actually an undisciplined statement. Lots of goals-beauty, quality, life change, love-are worthy but not quantifiable. But you do have to be able to tell if you're making progress.

A great company will have many once-in-a-liftetime opportunities.

You absolutely must have the discipline not to hire until you find the right people.

Genuine confidence is what launches you out of bed in the morning, and through your day with a spring in your step.

In an ironic twist, I now see Good to Great not as a sequel to Built to Last, but more of a prequel. Good to Great is about how to turn a good organization into one that produces sustained great results. Built to Last is about how you take a company with great results and turn it into an enduring great company of iconic stature.

Dreams make you click, juice you, turn you on, excite the living daylights out of you. You cannot wait to get out of bed to continue pursuing your dream. The kind of dream I'm talking about gives meaning to your life. it is the ultimate motivator.

Those who build and perpetuate mediocrity...are motivated more by the fear of being left behind.

In determing "the right people," the good-to-great companies placed greater weight on character attributes than on specific educational background, practical skills, specialized knowledge, or work experience.

Level 5 leaders are a study in duality: modest and willful, humble and fearless.

"Growth!" is not a Hedgehog Concept. Rather, if you have the right Hedgehog Concept and make decisions relentlessly consistent with it, you will create such momentum that your main problem will not be how to grow, but how not to grow too fast.

I am not failing - I am growing! Do you have the ability to reframe failure as growth in order to achieve your goals?

Those fortunate enough to find or create a practical intersection of the three circles have the basis for a great work life.

I don't know where we should take this company, but I do know that if I start with the right people, ask them the right questions, and engage them in vigorous debate, we will find a way to make this company great.

People need BHAGs - big hairy audacious goals.

If I'm going really, really fast, I can do a page of finished text a day, on average.

Change your practices without abandoning your core values.

By definition, it is not possible to everyone to be above the average.

Good-to-great companies set their goals and strategies based on understanding; comparison companies set their goals and strategies based on bravado.

Profit is like oxygen, food, water, and blood for the body; they are not the point of life, but without them, there is no life.

No matter what. Wherever your mind wanders, it seems to turn up at the same Field of Dreams. It's the vision you wake up with in the morning, and it's the last thing you picture before you fall asleep. Everytime you think of it, the idea in your head seems to get more vivid, filled in with more detail: You not only want to win a gold medal at the Olympics, you not only can see yourself standing there on the podium, but you can also feel the goose bumps as your national anthem is played; the tears are in your eyes. (That's how real a dream can be and should be)

Resilency, not perfection, is the signature of greatness.

Don't be interesting - be interested.

The signature of mediocrity is not an unwillingness to change. The signature of mediocrity is inconsistency.

In a world of constant change, the fundamentals are more important than ever.

Some managers are uncomfotable with expressing emotion about their dreams, but it's the passion and emotion that will attract and motivate others.

Not every financial company toppled during the 2008 crisis, and some seized the opportunity to take advantage of weaker competitors in the midst of the tumult.

Be rigorous about your HR decisions. There is a difference between rigorous and ruthless.

In the end, it is impossible to have a great life unless it is a meaningful life. And it is very difficult to have a meaningful life without meaningful work. Perhaps, then you might gain that great tranquility that comes from knowing that you've had a hand in creating something of intrinsic excellence that makes a contribution. Indeed, you might even gain that deepest of all satisfactions: knowing that your short time on this earth has been well spent, and that it mattered.

Companies that change best over time know first and foremost what should not change.

You can't manufacture passion or "motivate" people to feel passionate. You can only discover what ignites your passion and the passions of those around you.

There is a sense of exhilaration that comes from facing head-on the hard truths and saying, "We will never give up. We will never capitulate. It might take a long time, but we will find a way to prevail."

Creativity dies in an indisciplined environment.

The kind of commitment I find among the best performers across virtually every field is a single-minded passion for what they do, an unwavering desire for excellence in the way they think and the way they work. Genuine confidence is what launches you out of bed in the morning, and through your day with a spring in your step.

Faith in the endgame helps you live through the months or years of buildup.

It may seem odd to talk about something as soft and fuzzy as "passion" as an integral part of a strategic framework. But throughout the good-to-great companies, passion became a key part of the Hedgehog Concept.

Get the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats...

Mediocrity results first and foremost from management failure, not technological failure.