wisdom to win

 Wisdom to Win
search bar left
search bar right
 

Management Quotes


Top 50 Management Quotes

 

No 1 (Best quote!)Management Quotes

The simple part is knowing what to do. The part that is not easy is getting others to do it,

- Peter Drucker, pictured right, (1909-2005), American management writer.

 

So Drucker says in On The Profession Of Management (2003 edition):

Management is about human beings. Its task is to make people capable of joint performance, to make their strengths effective and their weaknesses irrelevant.

 Management Quotes

Therefore, Lee Iacocca, pictured right, the American boss of Chrysler 1978-92, says:

Management is nothing more than motivating other people.


 

 

No  2Management Quotes

To manage is to forecast and plan, to organize, to command, to co-ordinate and to control,

- Henri Fayol, pictured right, General and Industrial Management (1916).

 

 

No  3Management Quotes

Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly, and they will show themselves great,

- Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American writer and philosopher, pictured right.


Management Quotes

Confucius (551-479 BC),, pictured right, the Chinese philosopher, also says:

Be sincere and men will trust you.

 

Management Quotes

But Voltaire (1694-1778), pictured right, the French writer and philosopher, warns:

It is a vice to trust all and equally a vice to trust none.

 

 

No  4Management Quotes

The job of management is not supervision, but leadership.

- W. Edwards Deming, pictured right, Out of the Crisis (1982)

 

Management Quotes

 

Jim Collins, pictured right, in Good to Great (2001) agrees:

The best people don’t need to be managed. Guided, taught, led - yes. But not tightly managed.

 

 

No  5Management Quotes

The ultimate test of management is performance.

- Peter Drucker, pictured right, in Management: Tasks, Responsibilities, Practices (1973)

There is the same quote referring to “business performance” in Drucker’s The Practice of Management, 1954.

 

 

No  6Management Quotes

It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.

- Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962), American human rights campaigner, pictured right.


Management Quotes

Sophocles (496-406 BC), the Greek playwright, pictured right, also comments:

What you cannot enforce, do not command.

 

 

No  7Management Quotes

Management is a practice that has to blend a good deal of craft (experience) with a certain amount of art (insight) and some science (analysis).

- Henry Mintzberg, pictured right, in Managers, Not MBA’s (2005)

 

So Mintzberg said in his 1987 Harvard Business Review article, Crafting Strategy:

Managers are craftsmen and strategy is their clay

 

 

No  8Management Quotes

The deepest principle in human nature is the craving to be appreciated.

- William James (1842–1910) American philosopher, pictured right.

 

 

No  9Management Quotes

I think that business practices would improve immeasurably if they were guided by ‘feminine’ principles—qualities like love and care and intuition.

- Anita Roddick (1942–2007), founder of the British cosmetics retailer, The Body Shop, pictured right.

 Management Quotes

 

 

No 10Management Quotes

Managers are the people who do things right and leaders are people who do the right thing.

- Warren Bennis, pictured right above, and Burt Nanus, pictured right, in Leaders (1985).

 

Management Quotes

Stephen Covey  (pictured right) in The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People (1989) says something similar:

Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines if the ladder is leaning against the right wall.

 

Management Quotes

 

 

No 11

The best minute I spend is the one I invest in people.Management Quotes

- Kenneth Blanchard, pictured right above, and Spencer Johnson, pictured right, The One Minute Manager (1982).

 

 

No 12Management Quotes

People do not like to be ordered even to take a holiday.

- Mary Parker Follett, pictured right , Dynamic Administration (1941)

 

 

No 13Management Quotes

It’s great therapy for the troops to see their manager as a human being,

- Ken Matejka, pictured right, in Why This Horse Won’t Drink (1991)

 

 

No 14Management Quotes

If the needs and motives of his subordinates are different, they must be treated differently

- Edgar Schein, pictured right, in Organizational Psychology (1965)

 

 Management Quotes

Marcus Buckingham, pictured right in his book, The One Thing You Need To Know (2005) agrees:

The great manager bets that he will prevail by magnifying, emphasizing and capitalizing on each employee’s uniqueness.

 

 

No 15Management Quotes

The principal object of management should be to secure the maximum prosperity for the employer, coupled with the maximum prosperity of each employee.

- Frederick Winslow (F. W.) Taylor, pictured right, in The Principles of Scientific Management (1911)

 

 

No 16Management Quotes

The best managers think of themselves as playing coaches.

Robert (Bob) Townsend, pictured right, Up the Organization (1970)

 

 

No 17Management Quotes

The test of a first rate intelligence is to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

(from the 1945 collection of essays The Crack-Up)

- Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940), pictured right, American writer.


 

 

No 18Management Quotes

Speed, simplicity and self-confidence.

(three attributes of good managers)

- Jack Welch, pictured right, American boss of General Electric 1981-2001, pictured right 

 

 

No 19Management Quotes

The people to fear are not those who disagree with you, but those who disagree with you and are too cowardly to let you know.

- Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821),ruler of France, pictured right.

 

 

No 20Management Quotes

Measure what is measurable, and make measurable what is not so.

-Galileo (1564-1642), Italian scientist, pictured right.

 

 

No 21Management Quotes

Respect...implies the absence of exploitation.

- Erich Fromm (1900-80), German-born American psychiatrist and philosopher, pictured right

 

Fromm also comments:

To respect a person is not possible without knowing him.

 

 

No 22Management Quotes

The most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do least damage – management.

(the Dilbert Principle),

- Scott Adams, pictured right, The Dilbert Principle (1996)

 

Adams also says in the same book:

Happiness is realizing that we’re all idiots, struggling to work out the idiotic things managers tell us to do.

 

 

No 23Management Quotes

Make the other person happy about doing the thing you suggest,

- Dale Carnegie, pictured right , How to Win Friends and Influence People (1936)

 

 

No 24Management Quotes

The primary function of management is decision making.

- Akio Morita (1921-1999), co-founder of Sony (pictured right).

 

Morita also says:

 A company will get nowhere if all of the thinking is left to management,

 

 

No 25Management Quotes

The one who adapts his policy to the times prospers,

- Niccolo Machiavelli (1469-1527) Italian philosopher, pictured right.

 

 

No 26Management Quotes

The output of a manager is the output of the organizational units under his or her supervision or influence.

Andy Grove (1936- ), pictured right , American boss of Intel,1987-98..

 

 

No 27Management Quotes

 America's organizations have been overmanaged and underled.

- Warren Bennis (1925- ), pictured right, American professor and management writer.

 

 

No 28Management Quotes

Officers are trained to lead soldiers in battle, but unless they fully understand all their problems and gain their confidence, the battle will be lost.

- Bernard Montgomery (1887-1976), pictured right, British World War Two general.

 

 

No 29Management Quotes

Do not hit at all, if it can be avoided, but never hit softly,

- Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919), pictured right, American president.

 

 

No 30Management Quotes

The most important thing about a commander is his effect on morale,

- William Slim (1891-1970), pictured right,  British World War Two general.

 

 

No 31Management Quotes

The secret of success lies not in doing your own work but in recognizing the right man to do it.

- Andrew Carnegie (1835-1919), pictured right, American businessman.

 

 

No 32Management Quotes

Don’t find fault, find a remedy.

- Henry Ford (1863-1947), American car maker, pictured right

 

 

No 33Management Quotes

When you know something’s wrong, nine times out of ten it’s the management – in truth because people aren’t being led right.

- John Harvey-Jones (1924-2008), boss of ICI 1982-7, the British chemicals company, pictured right

 

 

No 34Management Quotes

Manage in good times so that you’re ready for bad times.

- Herb Kelleher (1931-),American boss of Southwest Airlines 1982-2001, pictured right

 

 

No 35Management Quotes

Simplicity is the knife that cuts through the tangled spaghetti of life's problems.

- Terry Leahy (1956-), chief executive of Tesco, 1997-2011, pictured right

 

 

No 36Management Quotes

Give a man a clear-cut job and let him do it.

- Alfred Sloan (1875-1966), American boss of General Motors 1923-46, pictured right.

 

 

No 37Management Quotes

High expectations are the key to everything.

- Sam Walton (1918-1992), American founder Wal-Mart, the world’s biggest retailer (pictured right)

 

 

No 38Management Quotes

If you can’t measure it, you can’t control it.

- Meg Whitman (1957-), chief executive of Hewlett-Packard since 2011, pictured right

 

 

No 39Management Quotes

The inferior man seeks to put the blame on other persons, the superior man seeks the error within himself.

- Lao Tzu (c604-c531 BC), Chinese philosopher, pictured right

 

 

No 40Management Quotes

You must not abandon the ship in a storm because you cannot control the winds….What you cannot turn to good, you must at least make as little bad as you can.

- Thomas More (1477-1535), English philosopher and politician, pictured right

 

 

No 41Management Quotes

You cannot hold a man down without staying down with him.

- Booker T. Washington (1856-1915), African American leader, pictured right

 

 

No 42Management Quotes

Surround yourself with only people who are going to lift you higher.

- Oprah Winfrey (1954-), African American chat show host, pictured right

 

 

No 43Management Quotes

All organization is and must be grounded on the idea of exclusion and prohibition.

(from the 1953 play The Crucible)

- Arthur Miller (1915- 2005), pictured right, American writer, pictured right  

 

 

No 44Management Quotes

I wouldn’t give you two cents for all your fancy rules, if behind them, they didn’t have a little bit of ordinary, everyday human kindness – and a little looking out for the other fella, too.

- Jefferson Smith (James Stewart, pictured right ) in the 1939 film Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.

 

 

No 45Management Quotes

The inculcation of belief in the real existence of a common purpose is an essential executive function.

- Chester Barnard, pictured right (in The Functions of the Executive ,1938)

 

 

No 46Management Quotes

The only way to treat people is how you want them to treat you.

- Stephen Covey, pictured right, Principle-Centred Leadership (1992)

 

Management Quotes

Covey's statement of the Golden Rule contrasts with Joseph Heller's (pictured right) description of Colonel Cathcart in his book, Catch-22:

 Colonel Cathcart had courage and never hesitated to volunteer his men for any target available.

 

 

No 47Management Quotes

Management is the art of compromise.

- Charles Handy, pictured right, in The Gods of Management (1985)

 

 

No 48Management Quotes

The central principle of managerial control is the principle of self-control.

- Douglas McGregor, pictured right, in The Human Side of Enterprise (1960)

 

 

No 49Management Quotes

When the going gets rough, remember to keep calm.

- Horace (65–8 BC), Roman poet, pictured right.

 

 

No 50Management Quotes

Monopoly...is a great enemy to good management.

(from the 1776 book The Wealth of Nations)

- Adam Smith (1723-90), Scottish philosopher (pictured right)

Free Newsletter
Enter your name and e-mail address to receive our free newsletter with analysis of business issues and new business books

Quotes