Have you ever asked yourself how drop out billionaires such as Bill Gates and Larry Ellison managed to build giant businesses and lead thousands of employees, customers, business associates and investors? Even without a college degree, these great men rose to become business leadership giants. How did they attain that status? You are going to find out in this article.

Today, we will be sharing with you 50 Famous Leadership Quotes from Successful Entrepreneurs and Business Leaders of our time. This article is strictly for those that want to achieve exceptional leadership in business.

We a lot of famous leadership quotes to share with you but I will prefer you learn directly from the leadership titans of the business world. We are talking about business leaders such as Aliko Dangote; the richest black man in the world, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Larry Ellison, Warren Buffett, Ingvar Kamprad, Li Ka Shing, John D. Rockefeller, Mukesh Ambani and Lakshmi Mittal.

Without wasting much of your time, below are 50 Famous Leadership Quotes from Successful Entrepreneurs and Business Leaders.

50 Famous Leadership Quotes from Successful Entrepreneurs

1. “If there is such a thing as good leadership, it is to give a good example. I have to do so for all the IKEA employees.” – Ingvar Kamprad

2. “The speed of the leader determines the speed of the gang.” – Mary Kay Ash

3. “People problems must sometimes be dealt with harshly. When you make an example of someone, make sure everyone knows what the lesson is. Punish one, teach a hundred.” – The Mafia Manager

4. “Sometimes, I think my most important job as a CEO is to listen for bad news. If you don’t act on it, your people will eventually stop bringing bad news to your attention and that is the beginning of the end.” – Bill Gates

5. “Kindness is more powerful than compulsion.” – Charles Schwab

6. “There are no working hours for leaders.” – James Cardinal Gibbons

7. “Don’t encourage overtime. Tell your people that the best way to impress you is to do a great job in the time allotted for it and then go home and relax.” – The Mafia Manager

8. “A real leader faces the music even when he doesn’t like the tune.” – Arnold H. Glassgow

9. “A little thing is a little thing but faithfulness in a little thing is a great thing.” – Hudson Taylor

10. “Be as careful as to the books you read as of the company you keep; for your habits and character will be as much influenced by the former as the latter.” – Poxton Hood

11. “Beware of those who stand aloof and greet each venture with reproof. The world would stop if things were run by men who say ‘it can’t be done.” – Samuel Glover

12. “Be great in little things.” – St. Francis Xavier

13. “Be a life long student, read as many books as possible.” – Nelson Mandela

14. “Calamity is the test of integrity.” – Samuel Richardson

15. “Your arrows do not carry, observed the master; because they do not reach far enough spiritually.” – Zen Master

16. “Cowards die many times before their death. The valiant never taste death but once.” – William Shakespeare

17. “You are in a war. You must plan to take the other guy down first and do it. Winning is not the best thing; it’s the only thing. If it were not, no one would keep score. To win the war, you must take charge. You must set the organization’s objectives, establish a chain of control, delegate, appraise performance, adjust and act.” – The Mafia Manager

18. “Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others.” – Winston Churchill

19. “When somebody challenges you, fight back. Be brutal, be tough.” – Donald Trump

20. “To win one hundred battles in one hundred victories is not the ACME of skills. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the ACME of skill.” – Sun Tzu

21. “The ability to deal with people is as purchasable as a commodity as sugar or coffee and I will pay more for that ability than for any other thing under the sun.” – John D. Rockefeller

22. “Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak. Courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.” – Winston Churchill

23. “To lead people, walk behind them.” – Lao Tzu

24. “If you see a snake, just kill it. Don’t appoint a committee on snakes.” – Henry Ross Perot

25. “The most important thing in your business relationships is your reputation for honesty. If you can genuinely and sincerely fake honesty, you will be a success. Never doubt it.” – The Mafia Manager

26. “Punishing honest mistakes stifles creativity. I want people moving and shaking the earth and they are going to make mistakes.” – Henry Ross Perot

27. “After loyalty come ability, skill and competence. Promote only able people (and the occasional humbler). You find able people by testing them.” – The Mafia Manager

28. “Do not fear when your enemies criticize you. Beware when they applaud.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

29. “Effort and courage are not enough without purpose and direction.” – John F. Kennedy

30. “Fire is the test of gold, adversity of strong men.” – Seneca

31. “Good leadership consists of showing average people how to do the work of superior people.” – John D. Rockefeller

32. “Be prepared for betrayal from anyone on your staff, but especially from those you have the most trust in. Every betrayal must be repaid as quickly and as publicly as possible. If you should let a betrayal go unpunished, you are through as a leader.” – The Mafia Manager

33. “When people are placed in positions slightly above what they expect, they are apt to excel.” – Richard Branson

34. “Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgments.” – Dr Warne W. Dyer

35. “He who establishes his argument by noise is weak and command shows that his reason is weak.” – Montaigne

36. “He who believes is strong; he who doubt is weak. Strong convictions precede great action.” – J. F. Clarke

37. “At meetings, have someone else float your newest ideas. Watch the reaction of the rest of your staff. Note who opposes, who supports, who links up with whom. See who responds with an open mind, whose mind is already made up, one way or the other. If you are going to walk on water, you have to know where the rocks are.” – The Mafia Manager

38. “Giving people self confidence is by far the most important thing that I can do because then they will act.” – Jack Welch

39. “It takes character and control to be understanding and forgiving.” – Dale Carnegie

40. “Before making an important decision, get as much as you can of the best information available and review it carefully, analyze it and draw up worst case scenarios. Add up the plus or minus factors, discuss it with your team and do what your guts tell you to do.” – The Mafia Manager

41. “The people who are doing the work are the moving force behind the Macintosh. My job is to create a space for them, to clear out the rest of the organization and keep it at bay.” – Steve Jobs

42. “Inventories can be managed but people must be led.” – Henry Ross Perot

43. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and only five Minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you will do things differently.” – Warren Buffett

44. “Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.” – Sam Walton

45. “Don’t be too familiar with your followers; it may at first inspire affection but eventually, like all familiarity; it will breed contempt.” – The Mafia Manager

46. “I hire people brighter than me and I get out of their way.” – Lee Iacocca

47. “It’s alright to be Goliath but always act like David.” – Philip Knight

48. “If you want to be great and successful, choose people who are great and successful and walk side by side with them.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

49. “If you hear a voice within you saying ‘you are not a painter’ then by all means paint and that voice will be silenced.” – Vincent Van Gogh

50. “There will be times when you will have to be abrasive, even brutal to members of your staff. Don’t worry that your people will say bad things about you because of this. They already have. But in general, try to be pleasant and accommodating. Try to please the greatest number who work for you that you can; antagonize the fewest. Blow smoke.” – The Mafia Manager.

culled from: http://www.9jabuzz.com/?p=8954, article by: Oluwasean

5 Signs You're Not Leadership Material

Success is a matter of signaling. 

To Sylvia Ann Hewlett, that signaling is a matter of "Executive Presence," which is the title of her new book. Hewlett says executive presence is a matter of "communicating that you have what it takes."

It's that it quality that draws people — and job offers, promotions, and opportunities — toward you. But getting it wrong can repel people. 

In an earlier post we looked at those positive signals, which were identified by Hewlett and her team at the Center for Talent Innovation in their survey of 4,000 professionals in the U.S. 

Here are a few of the behaviors to avoid. 

1. Not having emotional intelligence. 

If you want to lose an election, be tone-deaf toward people's emotional lives. 

Cut to: Mitt Romney.

"That he could say things like 'binders full of women,' that 43% of the population are losers — it gave a real sense of a man in a bubble who was clueless to how real people live," Hewlett says. "Obviously that did him no good in the election." 

Such an ire-drawing insensitivity can find its way into the workplace, like with racist or sexist language. Hewlett's research finds that those are reliable ways to look like you're not to be trusted with responsibility.

2. Checking your phone incessantly.

Projecting capability requires you to look like you're actually in the room — not sucked into your phone. 

"We found that constant device checking was a huge piece of resentment amongst bosses and a big black mark for up and comers who did not have the courtesy to focus," Hewlett says. 

It's not enough to know your facts, she says; you have to have the body language of being present. Since body language is one of the strongest forms of communication, being alert and attentive to your colleagues is one of the easiest ways to evidence your ability to get things done. 

3. Looking physically sluggish. 

"There's a real premium on fitness and looking as though you exercised recently," Hewlett says, "and that is much more important than the size of your waist." 

Again, she says, it's a matter of signaling: showing that you can take care of your body demonstrates that you can take care of whatever responsibility might be headed your way. It goes for men and women equally, whether they're 28 or 40. Hewlett says we're all under scrutiny to look physically able. 

4. Getting into sex scandals. 

If people are going to trust you with power, you need to appear trustworthy. For this reason, Hewlett says that "sexual impropriety takes some kind of prize as a career killer." 

For a few examples, notice the word "former" for all these one-time headliners:

• former congressman Anthony Weiner,
• former New York governor Eliot Spitzer,
• former CIA director David Petraeus,
• former International Monetary Fund head Dominique Strauss-Kahn,
• former Best Buy CEO Brian Dunn. 

Extramarital, intra-organizational dalliances are such career killers since they call into questions people's judgment, Hewlett says, and their very ability to lead. 

5. Not having spontaneity. 

To signal that you're able, you need to show that you have a deep knowledge of your subject area. For example, notice how Elon Musk and Marissa Mayer drill into any pitches that come their way. To Hewlett, spontaneity is a natural outgrowth of that understanding. 

"When my first big book came out I was overwhelmingly boring," Hewlett says. She had been a college professor for years, she said, which trained her in not telling stories, hiding behind podiums, and generally going over "like a lead balloon" in public settings.

The solution is to be overwhelmingly prepared — so you can improvise when you're overwhelmed, like the best TED speakers do. 

"You have to know the arc of what you want to say so that it comes out even when you're super nervous," Hewlett says.

The takeaway: signaling that your capable — showing that you have executive presence — is a lot like a duck gliding across the water. Above the surface it looks relaxed, but take a look underneath, and those feet are pedaling hard.

author:  DRAKE BAER  

10 Life Lessons From A Navy Seal. I Will Always Remember #4.

Here’s his amazing Commencement Address at University of Texas at Austin 2014 from Business Insider.

AP Photo/The University of Texas at Austin, Marsha Miller

The University’s slogan is,

“What starts here changes the world.”

I have to admit—I kinda like it.

“What starts here changes the world.”

Tonight there are almost 8,000 students graduating from UT.

That great paragon of analytical rigor, Ask.Com says that the average American will meet 10,000 people in their lifetime.

That’s a lot of folks.

But, if every one of you changed the lives of just ten people—and each one of those folks changed the lives of another ten people—just ten—then in five generations—125 years—the class of 2014 will have changed the lives of 800 million people.

800 million people—think of it—over twice the population of the United States. Go one more generation and you can change the entire population of the world—8 billion people.

If you think it’s hard to change the lives of ten people—change their lives forever—you’re wrong.

I saw it happen every day in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A young Army officer makes a decision to go left instead of right down a road in Baghdad and the ten soldiers in his squad are saved from close-in ambush.

In Kandahar province, Afghanistan, a non-commissioned officer from the Female Engagement Team senses something isn’t right and directs the infantry platoon away from a 500 pound IED, saving the lives of a dozen soldiers.

But, if you think about it, not only were these soldiers saved by the decisions of one person, but their children yet unborn—were also saved. And their children’s children—were saved.

Generations were saved by one decision—by one person.

But changing the world can happen anywhere and anyone can do it.

So, what starts here can indeed change the world, but the question is… what will the world look like after you change it?

Well, I am confident that it will look much, much better, but if you will humor this old sailor for just a moment, I have a few suggestions that may help you on your way to a better a world.

And while these lessons were learned during my time in the military, I can assure you that it matters not whether you ever served a day in uniform.

It matters not your gender, your ethnic or religious background, your orientation, or your social status.

Our struggles in this world are similar and the lessons to overcome those struggles and to move forward—changing ourselves and the world around us—will apply equally to all.

I have been a Navy SEAL for 36 years. But it all began when I left UT for Basic SEAL training in Coronado, California.

Basic SEAL training is six months of long torturous runs in the soft sand, midnight swims in the cold water off San Diego, obstacles courses, unending calisthenics, days without sleep and always being cold, wet and miserable.

It is six months of being constantly harassed by professionally trained warriors who seek to find the weak of mind and body and eliminate them from ever becoming a Navy SEAL.

But, the training also seeks to find those students who can lead in an environment of constant stress, chaos, failure and hardships.

To me basic SEAL training was a life time of challenges crammed into six months.

So, here are the ten lessons I learned from basic SEAL training that hopefully will be of value to you as you move forward in life.

Every morning in basic SEAL training, my instructors, who at the time were all Vietnam veterans, would show up in my barracks room and the first thing they would inspect was your bed.

If you did it right, the corners would be square, the covers pulled tight, the pillow centered just under the headboard and the extra blanket folded neatly at the foot of the rack—rack—that’s Navy talk for bed.

It was a simple task—mundane at best. But every morning we were required to make our bed to perfection. It seemed a little ridiculous at the time, particularly in light of the fact that were aspiring to be real warriors, tough battle hardened SEALs—but the wisdom of this simple act has been proven to me many times over.

If you make your bed every morning you will have accomplished the first task of the day. It will give you a small sense of pride and it will encourage you to do another task and another and another.

By the end of the day, that one task completed will have turned into many tasks completed. Making your bed will also reinforce the fact that little things in life matter.

If you can’t do the little things right, you will never do the big things right.

And, if by chance you have a miserable day, you will come home to a bed that is made—that you made—and a made bed gives you encouragement that tomorrow will be better.

#1. If you want to change the world, start off by making your bed.
During SEAL training the students are broken down into boat crews. Each crew is seven students—three on each side of a small rubber boat and one coxswain to help guide the dingy.

Every day your boat crew forms up on the beach and is instructed to get through the surf zone and paddle several miles down the coast.

In the winter, the surf off San Diego can get to be 8 to 10 feet high and it is exceedingly difficult to paddle through the plunging surf unless everyone digs in.

Every paddle must be synchronized to the stroke count of the coxswain. Everyone must exert equal effort or the boat will turn against the wave and be unceremoniously tossed back on the beach.

For the boat to make it to its destination, everyone must paddle.

You can’t change the world alone—you will need some help— and to truly get from your starting point to your destination takes friends, colleagues, the good will of strangers and a strong coxswain to guide them.

#2. If you want to change the world, find someone to help you paddle.
Over a few weeks of difficult training my SEAL class which started with 150 men was down to just 35. There were now six boat crews of seven men each.

I was in the boat with the tall guys, but the best boat crew we had was made up of the the little guys—the munchkin crew we called them—no one was over about 5-foot five.

The munchkin boat crew had one American Indian, one African American, one Polish American, one Greek American, one Italian American, and two tough kids from the mid-west.

They out paddled, out-ran, and out swam all the other boat crews.

The big men in the other boat crews would always make good natured fun of the tiny little flippers the munchkins put on their tiny little feet prior to every swim.

But somehow these little guys, from every corner of the Nation and the world, always had the last laugh— swimming faster than everyone and reaching the shore long before the rest of us.

SEAL training was a great equalizer. Nothing mattered but your will to succeed. Not your color, not your ethnic background, not your education and not your social status.

#3. If you want to change the world, measure a person by the size of their heart, not the size of their flippers.

Several times a week, the instructors would line up the class and do a uniform inspection. It was exceptionally thorough.

Your hat had to be perfectly starched, your uniform immaculately pressed and your belt buckle shiny and void of any smudges.

But it seemed that no matter how much effort you put into starching your hat, or pressing your uniform or polishing your belt buckle—- it just wasn’t good enough.

The instructors would find “something” wrong.

For failing the uniform inspection, the student had to run, fully clothed into the surfzone and then, wet from head to toe, roll around on the beach until every part of your body was covered with sand.

The effect was known as a “sugar cookie.” You stayed in that uniform the rest of the day—cold, wet and sandy.

There were many a student who just couldn’t accept the fact that all their effort was in vain. That no matter how hard they tried to get the uniform right—it was unappreciated.

Those students didn’t make it through training.

Those students didn’t understand the purpose of the drill. You were never going to succeed. You were never going to have a perfect uniform.

Sometimes no matter how well you prepare or how well you perform you still end up as a sugar cookie.

It’s just the way life is sometimes.

#4. If you want to change the world get over being a sugar cookie and keep moving forward.
Every day during training you were challenged with multiple physical events—long runs, long swims, obstacle courses, hours of calisthenics—something designed to test your mettle.

Every event had standards—times you had to meet. If you failed to meet those standards your name was posted on a list and at the end of the day those on the list were invited to—a “circus.”

A circus was two hours of additional calisthenics—designed to wear you down, to break your spirit, to force you to quit.

No one wanted a circus.

A circus meant that for that day you didn’t measure up. A circus meant more fatigue—and more fatigue meant that the following day would be more difficult—and more circuses were likely.

But at some time during SEAL training, everyone—everyone—made the circus list.

But an interesting thing happened to those who were constantly on the list. Over time those students-—who did two hours of extra calisthenics—got stronger and stronger.

The pain of the circuses built inner strength-built physical resiliency.

Life is filled with circuses.

You will fail. You will likely fail often. It will be painful. It will be discouraging. At times it will test you to your very core.

#5. But if you want to change the world, don’t be afraid of the circuses.
At least twice a week, the trainees were required to run the obstacle course. The obstacle course contained 25 obstacles including a 10-foot high wall, a 30-foot cargo net, and a barbed wire crawl to name a few.

But the most challenging obstacle was the slide for life. It had a three level 30 foot tower at one end and a one level tower at the other. In between was a 200-foot long rope.

You had to climb the three tiered tower and once at the top, you grabbed the rope, swung underneath the rope and pulled yourself hand over hand until you got to the other end.

The record for the obstacle course had stood for years when my class began training in 1977.

The record seemed unbeatable, until one day, a student decided to go down the slide for life—head first.

Instead of swinging his body underneath the rope and inching his way down, he bravely mounted the TOP of the rope and thrust himself forward.

It was a dangerous move—seemingly foolish, and fraught with risk. Failure could mean injury and being dropped from the training.

Without hesitation—the student slid down the rope—perilously fast, instead of several minutes, it only took him half that time and by the end of the course he had broken the record.

#6. If you want to change the world sometimes you have to slide down the obstacle head first.

During the land warfare phase of training, the students are flown out to San Clemente Island which lies off the coast of San Diego.

The waters off San Clemente are a breeding ground for the great white sharks. To pass SEAL training there are a series of long swims that must be completed. One—is the night swim.

Before the swim the instructors joyfully brief the trainees on all the species of sharks that inhabit the waters off San Clemente.

They assure you, however, that no student has ever been eaten by a shark—at least not recently.

But, you are also taught that if a shark begins to circle your position—stand your ground. Do not swim away. Do not act afraid.

And if the shark, hungry for a midnight snack, darts towards you—then summons up all your strength and punch him in the snout and he will turn and swim away.

There are a lot of sharks in the world. If you hope to complete the swim you will have to deal with them.

#7. So, if you want to change the world, don’t back down from the sharks.

As Navy SEALs one of our jobs is to conduct underwater attacks against enemy shipping. We practiced this technique extensively during basic training.

The ship attack mission is where a pair of SEAL divers is dropped off outside an enemy harbor and then swims well over two miles—underwater—using nothing but a depth gauge and a compass to get to their target.

During the entire swim, even well below the surface there is some light that comes through. It is comforting to know that there is open water above you.

But as you approach the ship, which is tied to a pier, the light begins to fade. The steel structure of the ship blocks the moonlight—it blocks the surrounding street lamps—it blocks all ambient light.

To be successful in your mission, you have to swim under the ship and find the keel—the center line and the deepest part of the ship.

This is your objective. But the keel is also the darkest part of the ship—where you cannot see your hand in front of your face, where the noise from the ship’s machinery is deafening and where it is easy to get disoriented and fail.

Every SEAL knows that under the keel, at the darkest moment of the mission—is the time when you must be calm, composed—when all your tactical skills, your physical power and all your inner strength must be brought to bear.

#8. If you want to change the world, you must be your very best in the darkest moment.
The ninth week of training is referred to as “Hell Week.” It is six days of no sleep, constant physical and mental harassment and—one special day at the Mud Flats—the Mud Flats are an area between San Diego and Tijuana where the water runs off and creates the Tijuana slue’s—a swampy patch of terrain where the mud will engulf you.

It is on Wednesday of Hell Week that you paddle down to the mud flats and spend the next 15 hours trying to survive the freezing cold mud, the howling wind and the incessant pressure to quit from the instructors.

As the sun began to set that Wednesday evening, my training class, having committed some “egregious infraction of the rules” was ordered into the mud.

The mud consumed each man till there was nothing visible but our heads. The instructors told us we could leave the mud if only five men would quit—just five men and we could get out of the oppressive cold.

Looking around the mud flat it was apparent that some students were about to give up. It was still over eight hours till the sun came up—eight more hours of bone chilling cold.

The chattering teeth and shivering moans of the trainees were so loud it was hard to hear anything and then, one voice began to echo through the night—one voice raised in song.

The song was terribly out of tune, but sung with great enthusiasm.

One voice became two and two became three and before long everyone in the class was singing.

We knew that if one man could rise above the misery then others could as well.

The instructors threatened us with more time in the mud if we kept up the singing—but the singing persisted.

And somehow—the mud seemed a little warmer, the wind a little tamer and the dawn not so far away.

If I have learned anything in my time traveling the world, it is the power of hope. The power of one person—Washington, Lincoln, King, Mandela and even a young girl from Pakistan—Malala—one person can change the world by giving people hope.

#9. So, if you want to change the world, start singing when you’re up to your neck in mud.
Finally, in SEAL training there is a bell. A brass bell that hangs in the center of the compound for all the students to see.

All you have to do to quit—is ring the bell. Ring the bell and you no longer have to wake up at 5 o’clock. Ring the bell and you no longer have to do the freezing cold swims.

Ring the bell and you no longer have to do the runs, the obstacle course, the PT—and you no longer have to endure the hardships of training.

Just ring the bell.

#10. If you want to change the world don’t ever, ever ring the bell.
To the graduating class of 2014, you are moments away from graduating. Moments away from beginning your journey through life. Moments away from starting to change the world—for the better.

It will not be easy.

But, YOU are the class of 2014—the class that can affect the lives of 800 million people in the next century.

Start each day with a task completed.

Find someone to help you through life.

Respect everyone.

Know that life is not fair and that you will fail often, but if you take take some risks, step up when the times are toughest, face down the bullies, lift up the downtrodden and never, ever give up—if you do these things, then next generation and the generations that follow will live in a world far better than the one we have today and—what started here will indeed have changed the world—for the better.

Thank you very much. Hook ‘em horns.

culled from: www.lifebuzz.com/10-lessons-from-my-navy-seal/#!TzNpi