Clarity is the preoccupation of the effective leader. If you do nothing else as a leader, be clear.

American culture is CEO obsessed. We celebrate the hard-charging heroes and mythologize the iconoclastic visionaries. Those people are important.

It remains true that great managers recognize individualities and focus on developing strengths rather than weaknesses. Great leaders, in sharp contrast, recognize what is (or could be) shared in common - a vision, a dream, a mission, whatever - and inspire others to join them in the given enterprise.

Everyone can probably do at least one thing better than ten thousand other people.

I do still get extremely nervous before speeches. My biggest fear is that I'll be standing there in front of hundreds of people and be incapable of talking. I'm afraid that I'll make a complete fool of myself and be unable to go on.

Most of my work has been in corporations, studying how you build an organization that helps people to identify and work to their strengths.

People leave managers, not companies