Credibility is lost when there are big discrepancies between what leaders say and what they do. ... Increasing credibility requires openness. Hidden agendas will destroy trust.

Schools are generally feminine places, institutions where conformity is valued, taught largely by conformist women.

The best worst example of making people feel unappreciated today lies in the casualness, indeed indifference with regard to massive lay-offs even when there isn't a financial crisis. That is a message to employees that they are expendable, interchangeable, easily dismissed and replaced, often by younger, less experienced and cheaper employees. The essential message being conveyed to people is, You are worthless. What an incredibly dumb thing that is for management to say!

Very few people are ambitious in the sense of having a specific image of what they want to achieve. Most people's sights are only toward the next run, the next increment of money.

Trust is perhaps the most critical single building block underlying effectiveness. Without trust leaders do not have followers. Without trust, leaders are impotent despite great rhetoric or splendid ideas. Trust rests on the belief among followers that the leader is transparent: What you see is what there is. Trust means followers believe there is no duplicity; no manipulation just to satisfy the leader's ego. Very simply: The effective leader is transparent; that's why that person is trusted.

motivation is highest when the probability of success is 50 percent: We don't get involved if the task is too easy or too hard.

Women's self didn't die; it had never been born. And when women insisted on their right to have a self, they weren't understood even by their husbands who cried, Haven't I given you enough? And by their parents who joined the crowd who deemed them selfish and responsible for all the problems in their marriage. I remember it all too well.