Here are 20 inspirational leadership quotes to help you discover and develop your inner leader.

20 Inspirational Leadership Quotes

1. “Leadership is not about being in charge. It’s about taking care of those in your charge.” -Simon Sinek
2. “The greatest leader is not necessarily the one who does the greatest things. He is the one that gets the people to do the greatest things.” -Ronald Reagan
3. “A good leader takes a little more than his share of the blame, a little less than his share of the credit.” -Arnold H. Glasow
4. “The function of leadership is to produce more leaders, not more followers.” -Ralph Nader
5. “Leadership is the capacity to translate vision into reality.” -Warren Bennis
6. “A leader Is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.” -John Maxwell
7. “Leadership and learning are indispensable from each other.” -John F. Kennedy
8. “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” -Jack Welch
9. “The most dangerous leadership myth is that leaders are born—that there is a genetic factor to leadership. That’s nonsense; in fact, the opposite is true. Leaders are made rather than born.” -Warren Bennis
10. “Leadership is not a person or a position. It is a complex moral relationship between people based on trust, obligation, commitment, emotion, and a shared vision of the good.” -Joanne Ciulla
11. “The challenge of leadership is to be strong, but not rude; be kind, but not weak; be bold, but not bully; be thoughtful, but not lazy; be humble, but not timid; be proud, but not arrogant; have humor, but without folly.” -Jim Rohn
12. “If your actions create a legacy that inspires others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, then, you are an excellent leader.” -Dolly Parton
13. “In periods where there is no leadership, society stands still. Progress occurs when courageous, skillful leaders seize the opportunity to change things for the better.” -Harry Truman
14. “I alone cannot change the world, but I can cast a stone across the water to create many ripples.” -Mother Teresa
15. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.” -Warren Buffett
16. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.” -Peter F. Drucker
17. “Leadership consists of nothing but taking responsibility for everything that goes wrong and giving your subordinates credit for everything that goes well.” -Dwight D. Eisenhower
18. “True leadership stems from individuality that is honestly and sometimes imperfectly expressed… Leaders should strive for authenticity over perfection.” -Sheryl Sandberg
19. “Leadership is a matter of having people look at you and gain confidence, seeing how you react. If you’re in control, they’re in control.” -Tom Landry
20. “Great leaders are almost always great simplifiers, who can cut through argument, debate and doubt to offer a solution everybody can understand.” -Colin Powell

I hope these inspirational leadership quotes have impacted you as they have for me over the years.

The post Inspirational Leadership Quotes appeared first on Matt Mayberry.

How to Become a More Effective Leader

1. Understand the Responsibility

Leadership is a privilege and a tremendous responsibility. If you want to know how to become a better leader in the workplace, you must keep this in mind at all times. This is not something to take lightly. As a leader, you have an opportunity to change someone’s life forever, both professionally and personally.

2. Forget the Title

Despite what some may believe, a person’s job title has very little to do with whether or not they are able to be an effective leader. It is all about your influence and impact on another human being that matters most. The title will eventually come, chase influence and impact first.

3. Be Authentic

It’s important to learn from others and have mentors in your life, but never forget that the most powerful force in the world is bringing your authentic self to work each day. Being an effective leader requires living and leading with authenticity, and your impact will soar as a result.

4. Lead From the Heart with Hope and Kindness

Bring your whole heart to work each day, not just when it is convenient. When you lead from the heart, you don’t just go through the motions. You devote kindness, hope, and wisdom in every ounce of energy that you have towards doing the absolute best you can, regardless of how minuscule the task is. This is a hallmark of every effective leader.

5. Lead with a Servant Mentality

We have all heard about servant leadership before, but very few actually lead others with a servant mentality on a consistent basis. It’s human nature to think about ourselves and what we will receive in return. Ignore this temptation. Serve others and serve them well. Over and over, again. Those who serve the greatest prosper the most. It is fundamental to becoming an effective leader.

6. Never Stop Learning

Those who are effective leaders never stop learning, regardless of their position or prior accomplishments. They understand that it is impossible for them to know everything, and their ego never gets in the way of their desire to learn and get better. Dedicating yourself to becoming a lifelong learner will pay off in every area of your life.

7. Overcommunicate

It is nearly impossible for a leader to communicate too much. You have to understand that the first five times you communicate something of importance, the majority of people will forget everything you say. Find creative ways to say the same thing, over and over again, whether that is sharing a story, role-playing, watching a relevant video, or using symbols to drive home key points. This is a communication habit every effective leader should develop.

8. Focus on Purpose

If you want to be an effective leader who is also an excellent communicator, don’t just talk about the goals and objectives of your team or organization. Highlight the purpose of your organization. How does that purpose fit into the personal context of every team member within the organization? Focus on purpose, talk about purpose, and build a purpose driven organization every chance you get.

9. Obsess About Culture Building

Nothing will drive your impact as a leader to enhance team or organizational performance more than intentionally building a more connected and high-performing culture. Don’t just talk about core values or express the importance of culture. Highlight specific behaviors required to win and most importantly, make sure you are living the culture yourself. Every effective leader I’ve ever met understood that culture is at the heart of team and organizational success.

10. Become a Coaching Leader

The leaders that get the most out of team members are the ones who coach others. Coaching leaders never miss an opportunity to guide their teams and do it in “real time” instead of waiting for quarterly or year-end reviews. This is one of the defining traits of an effective leader.

11. Show Your Face

Get out and visit with key customers. Lead from the front. Sitting in an office and never showing your face, whether with internal or external people, benefits absolutely no one. Make it a priority to be seen and schedule specific days on your calendar to devote entire days doing so. Being visible plays a huge role in making you an effective leader.

12. Prioritize Training

If you don’t do anything else this year other than prioritize training, I am fine with that. Building a solid foundation to develop and train your people on the competencies and capabilities that will drive the greatest impact on the business has to be an organizational imperative. It amazes me how many businesses still don’t place a strong emphasis on training. Your favorite sports team doesn’t just wing it and accidentally win a championship. They constantly train. You need to do the same if you want to become an effective leader.

13. Engage Your Team Often

Whether it is during team meetings or one-on-one meetings, consistently engage team members. Ask them how they are feeling and what you can do better as a leader to help them do their job better. Don’t assume you know what someone thinks or how they feel. Engage them early and often, because that’s what effective leaders do.

14. Provide Clear Expectations

A huge barrier when it comes to moving with more speed and navigating through the complexities of a constantly changing environment is a lack of clear expectations. Share what’s expected of team members and then have them recite back to you those expectations. It is alarming how many employees have been with their employer for a decade but still don’t clearly know what’s expected of them and what their role consists of. What seems like common sense is often not commonly practiced. Clarity is essential for any effective leader.

15. Practice Being Vulnerable

Displaying vulnerability as leader doesn’t mean you are weak or will come across in a negative way. As a matter of fact, it does the exact opposite. When you as a leader displays vulnerability, you let the rest of your team know that it is completely fine to not have it all figured out and speak up. Vulnerability builds trust, and trust allows you to become an effective leader.

16. Don’t Place a Strong Emphasis on the Competition

A common and significant mistake most rookie leaders make is spending way too much time on the competition. Thinking about the competition and constantly talking about the competition elevates the competition, not the performance of your team. Placing a strong emphasis on innovation over competition is a mindset shift that defines an effective leader.

17. Be Fanatical About Driving Alignment

We as business leaders often have the tendency to make simple matters way more complex than they need to be. When an organization is extremely aligned on who is responsible for what and what the overall objectives are and those are communicated frequently, the clarity created improves decision making and speed. Be fanatical about driving alignment in everything you do. It will always pay off for an effective leader.

18. Become More Self-Aware

Increasing your self-awareness as a leader is crucial in maximizing your overall impact. A practical way to become more self-aware around the behaviors that will make the biggest difference with your team is to conduct a self 360 analysis. This is accomplished by anonymously asking team members what you excel at as a leader, what you can improve upon, and let them provide one or two action items you can immediately start doing. Instead of wondering about the impact you are having on your team, ask them. This provides valuable feedback from your team that can help you grow into an even more effective leader.

19. Increase the Frequency of Performance Reviews

If you are conducting performance reviews only once or twice a year, you are missing a massive opportunity. Your team members deserve to know every month exactly what you think of their current performance, where they stand, and what they can do differently to improve. Shortening the feedback gap and providing monthly touchpoints can help you evolve into a more effective leader.

20. Put Your People First

A people-first approach is one of the most effective strategies for how to become a better leader in the workplace. When you treat your team with compassion and understanding, they will perform at their best. When customers and key stakeholders come before your team members, it may seem like you are doing the right thing, but it will eventually backfire. Who is in charge of delivering an incredible experience for your customers and hitting the numbers each month? Your people are. When you treat them better, with compassion and understanding, they will treat your customers better in return. This is a business and leadership strategy that will set you apart as an effective leader.

21. Control What You Can Control

As a leader, the challenges that you will experience are endless. But strictly focusing on the challenging events or problems will never provide the solutions that you are looking for in order to move forward. Focus on what you can control. You can’t control pandemics and most external factors, but you can control how you and your team decide to show up, adapt, and respond in the face of adversity.

22. Take Decisive Action

Many talented leaders have grand ideas and bold plans for the future, but they often become paralyzed by overthinking the situation or deciding where to start. To achieve anything of significance, you don’t need to be perfect to start, but you must start. Make a decision and then take decisive action. A focus on relentless implementation is far greater than a list of bold and wishful ideas.

Making a firm decision and committing to yourself is the first step in how to become a better leader in the workplace. It all comes down to doing the little things better than everyone else and consistently showing up with a desire to make a difference.

The post 22 Ways to Become a More Effective Leader appeared first on Matt Mayberry.