The first half of the decade is almost over. To celebrate, here are 12 leadership quotations that were published between 2011 and 2015. Author quotations include L. David Marquet, Simon Sinek, James M. Kouzes & Barry Z. Posner, James C. Hunter, David S. Alberts & Richard E. Hayes, Joseph Grenny (including co-authors Kerry Patterson, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, & Al Switzer), Pierre Gurdjian, Thomas Halbeisen, & Kevin Lane, and John Cleese.

1. 12 Leadership Quotations from the
First Half of the Decade: 2011-15
These author quotations exemplify how leadership is
changing and illustrates how 21st Century Leadership
is radically different from the traditional approach

2. #1 Leadership Is about Getting Everyone Thinking
Leadership is not about getting people to
do stuff. It’s about getting people to think…I
believe that what’s going to win in the 21st
Century…and in the future is organizations
that allow everyone in their organization to
think. Get everybody thinking — not doing.
— L. David Marquet

3. #2 Anyone Can Practice Leadership But Not All Executives Do
Leadership is a choice. It is not a rank. I
know many people at the senior-most
levels of organizations who are absolutely
not leaders...And I know many people who
are at the bottom of organizations who
have no authority and they are absolutely
leaders, and this is because they have
chosen to look after the person to the left
of them, and they have chosen to look after
the person to the right of them. This is what
a leader is.
— Simon Sinek

4. #3 Leadership Is Tactical and Not Strategic
Sometimes leadership is imagined to be
something majestic and awe inspiring.
Grand visions, world-changing initiatives,
transforming the lives of millions — all are
noble possibilities, but real leadership is in
the daily moments.
— James M. Kouzes
Barry Z. Posner

5. #4 Knowing About Leadership Is Different From Knowing Leadership
Only a very small percentage of people
actually make sustainable changes after
attend leadership seminars or reading
books. There is a world of difference
between knowing about something and
knowing it. You can learn about leadership
reading books and attending seminars, but
you will never know leadership doing those
things.
— James C. Hunter

6. #5 Command and Control should Be Shared
Traditional approaches to Command and
Control aren’t up to the challenge. Simply
stated, they lack the agility required in the
21st Century....
Command and Control applies to
endeavors undertaken by collections of
individuals and organizations of vastly
different characteristics and sizes for many
different purposes.
—David S. Alberts
Richard E. Hayes

7. #6 Importance Of Autonomy And Choice
When you swap coercive methods with
personal choices, you open up the
possibility of influencing even the most
addictive and highly entrenched behaviors
by gaining access to one of the most
powerful human motivations, the power of
the committed heart.
— Joseph Grenny
Kerry Patterson
David Maxfield
Ron McMillan
Al Switzer

8. #7 Ego Discourages Creativity
If the people in charge are very egotistical,
then they want to take credit for everything
that happens, and they want to feel like
they are in control of everything that
happens. And that means, consciously or
unconsciously, they will discourage
creativity in other people.
— John Cleese

9. #8 Influencing Motivation Alone May Not Be Enough
Motivation and ability are linked at the hip.
They aren’t separate entities. More often
than not, they blend into one another.
— Kerry Patterson
Joseph Grenny
David Maxfield
Ron McMillan
Al Switzer

10. #9 Selective Listening
We may even believe that we are good
listeners, but what we are often doing is
listening selectively, making judgments
about what is being said, and thinking of
ways to end the conversation or redirect the
conversation in ways more pleasing to
ourselves.
— James C. Hunter

11. #10 Sacrificing to Help Others
Leaders are the ones who are willing to give
up something of their own for us. Their
time, their energy, their money, maybe even
the food off their plate. When it matters,
leaders choose to eat last.
— Simon Sinek

12. #11 Delegating Decision Making
The result of increased technical
competence is the ability to delegate
increased decision making to the employees.
Increased decision making among your
employees will naturally result in greater
engagement, motivation, and initiative. You
will end up with significantly higher
productivity, morale, and effectiveness.
— L. David Marquet

13. #12 Leadership Development and Discomfort
Just as a coach would view an athlete’s
muscle pain as a proper response to training,
leaders who are stretching themselves
should also feel some discomfort as they
struggle to reach new levels of leadership
performance … Identifying some of the
deepest, “below the surface” thoughts,
feelings, assumptions, and beliefs is usually a
precondition of behavioral change — one too
often shirked in development programs.
— Pierre Gurdjian
Thomas Halbeisen
Kevin Lane

14. About Gary A. DePaul, PhD, CPT
“I help organizations become more
effective at leadership development”
Speaker, Author, Leadership Advisor
https://www.garyadepaul.com
http://blog.garyadepaul.com
Gary DePaul is the expert on leadership experts. He
analyzes the best of what leadership books have to
offer and writes about the critical leadership patterns
discovered among the books. The process is called
meta-analysis and is an effective technique to examine
leadership holistically.
Dr. DePaul used this technique his highly praised book,
Nine Practices of 21st Century Leadership: A Guide for
Inspiring Creativity, Innovation, and Engagement.

15. References
1. Marquet, David. Live Event: Turn the Ship Around! How to Create Leadership at Every Level.
Skillsoft Books24x7, 2014. http://sp8-
1.skillport.com/skillportfe/main.action#summary/VIDEOS/RW$9227:_ss_video:65944.
Accessed January 10, 2015.
2. TED, Simon Sinek: How Great Leaders Inspire Action.
http://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action. Accessed December
24, 2014.
3. Kouzes, James M., and Barry Z. Posner. The Leadership Challenge: How to Make Extraordinary
Things Happen in Organizations, 5th edn. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, 2012. Pages 342-43.
4. Hunter, James C. The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of Leadership. New York:
Crown Business, 2012. Page xxiv.
5. Alberts, David S., and Richard E. Hayes. Understanding Command And Control: The Future of
Command and Control. Washington, DC: CCRP, 2011. Pages 2 & 8.
6. Grenny, Joseph, Kerry Patterson, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzer. Influencer: The
New Science of Leading Change, 2nd edn. New York: McGraw Hill Education, 2013. Page 90.
7. AuthenticEductaion. John Cleese on Creativity (Video from a Training), 2012.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMpdPrm6Ul4. Accessed October 5, 2014.
8. Patterson, Kerry, Joseph Grenny, David Maxfield, Ron McMillan, and Al Switzer. Crucial
Accountability: Tools for Resolving Violated Expectations, Broken Commitments, and Bad
Behavior, 2nd edn. New York: McGraw Hill Education, 2013. Page 138.

16. References
9. Hunter, James C. The Servant: A Simple Story About the True Essence of Leadership. New York:
Crown Business, 2012. Page 150.
10. Sinek, Simon. Leaders Eat Last: Why Some Teams Pull Together and Others Don’t. New York:
Penguin Group, 2014. Page 66.
11. Marquet, L. David, Captain, US Navy (Retired). Turn the Ship Around! A True Story Turning
Followers into Leaders. New York: Penguin Group, 2012. Page 132.
12. Gurdjian, Pierre, Thomas Halbeisen, and Kevin Lane. Why leadership-development programs fail.
McKinsey Quarterly, 2014.
http://www.mckinsey.com/insights/leading_in_the_21st_century/why_leadership-
development_programs_fail. Accessed January 10, 2015.