Top 114 Quotes & Sayings by Rosabeth Moss Kanter

Leaders must wake people out of inertia. They must get people excited about something they've never seen before, something that does not yet exist.

Leaders must pick causes they won't abandon easily, remain committed despite setbacks, and communicate their big ideas over and over again in every encounter.

Confidence isn't optimism or pessimism, and it's not a character attribute. It's the expectation of a positive outcome.

Business requires understanding financial matters, but management is different from running the financial aspects of the business - it requires understanding complex systems, how they operate, the nature of organisations, what happens when people interact in groups and how to motivate and guide people.

It's almost impossible to break a losing streak on your own.

One of the symptoms of a losing streak is a turnover of top executives. It's a revolving door.

Nations need to understand their own strengths and weaknesses, and India's tradition of dissent and democratic debate is a positive aspect.

Confidence is contagious, but so is failure. Even the Yankees will lose if you persuade them that they will.

I've found that small wins, small projects, small differences often make huge differences.

Mindless habitual behavior is the enemy of innovation.

Tribalism reflects strong ethnic or cultural identities that separate members of one group from another, making them loyal to people like them and suspicious of outsiders, which undermines efforts to forge common cause across groups.

I see the level of sophistication and knowledge about business growing dramatically. Several decades ago, only a few companies thought about international business.

Cheap labor is not going to be the way we compete in the United States. It's going to be brain power.

The Martha Stewart trial makes clear how far women have risen in the business world. America can be proud of our equal-opportunity prosecution and conviction.

A great idea is not enough.

Power is the ability to get things done.

I was determined to achieve the total freedom that our history lessons taught us we were entitled to, no matter what the sacrifice.

Companies used to be able to function with autocratic bosses. We don't live in that world anymore.

My creative process involves that old saying: It's 90% perspiration and only 10% inspiration.

Some social scientists say that in-group/out-group biases are hard-wired into the human brain. Even without overt prejudice, it is cognitively convenient for people to sort items into categories and respond based on what is usually associated with those categories: a form of statistical discrimination, playing the odds.

Throughout human history, people have developed strong loyalties to traditions, rituals, and symbols. In the most effective organizations, they are not only respected but celebrated. It is no coincidence that the most highly admired corporations are also among the most profitable.

The commune movement is part of a reawakening of belief in the possibilities for utopia that existed in the nineteenth century and exist again today, a belief that by creating the right social institution, human satisfaction and growth can be achieved.

The boomers' biggest impact will be on eliminating the term 'retirement' and inventing a new stage of life... the new career arc.

When you fail at something, the best thing to do is think back to your successes, and try to replicate whatever you did to make them happen.

Friendly people are caring people, eager to provide encouragement and support when needed most.

Too many people let others stand in their way and don't go back for one more try.

We have a large pool of talented and educated women, and yet workplaces haven't necessarily changed to accommodate the reality of their lives.

I've been looking at companies that are on a positive path vs. a negative path and I've come to use the language of sports, winning streaks and losing streaks.

The creative process for me doesn't work as well without an image of an audience in mind.

A vision is not just a picture of what could be; it is an appeal to our better selves, a call to become something more.

Organizational structures that allow divisions and departments to own their turf and people with long tenure to take root creates the same hardened group distinctions as Congressional redistricting to produce homogeneous voting blocs - all of which makes it easier to resist compromise, let alone collaboration.

To stay ahead, you must have your next idea waiting in the wings.

Ambivalence about family responsibilities has a long history in the corporate world.

The goal of winning is not losing two times in a row.

'No' is always an easier stand than 'Yes.'

America can restore its strengths as the world-respected land of opportunity by returning to open-society principles. An open society invests in people and new ideas, rewards talent and hard work, values dialogue and learns from dissent, operates to high standards with transparent information, looks for common ground, sees problems as opportunities for creative change, and encourages those who are fortunate to help others get the same chance, because service is the highest ideal. With such standards in mind, America the Beautiful can return to its admired role as America the Principled.

Passion for a goal doesn't guarantee success, but without it, you can't even begin.

Power is the ability to get things done

Everything looks like a failure in the middle. In neary every change project, doubt is cast on the original vision because problems are mounting and the end is nowhere in sight.

Change is like putting lipstick on a bulldog. The bulldog's appearance hasn't improved, but now it's really angry.

People often resist change for reasons that make good sense to them, even if those reasons don't correspond to organizational goals. So it is crucial to recognize, reward, and celebrate accomplishments.

People who are making decisions about the future often don't have access to some of the best ideas in the company, which may be at the periphery or at lower levels.

Change demands new learning.

The architecture of change involves the design and construction of new patterns, or the reconceptualization of old ones, to make new, and hopefully more productive, actions possible.

The most radical thing we can do is connect people to one another. That starts conversations toward a vision for change.

Change masters are - literally - the right people in the right place at the right time. The right people are the ones with the ideas that move beyond the organization's established practice, ideas they can form into visions. The right places are the integrative environments that support innovation, encourage the building of coalitions and teams to support and implement visions. The right times are those moments in the flow of organizational history when it is possible to reconstruct reality on the basis on accumulated innovations to shape a more productive and successful future.

Creativity is a lot like looking at the world through a kaleidoscope. You look at a set of elements, the same ones everyone else sees, but then reassemble those floating bits and pieces into an enticing new possibility.

"Leadership" is a big topic today. We know that the world - nations and communities in addition to companies - needs more and better leaders. So I wanted to explore how leaders make a difference, how they can shift a negative cycle, turn around a losing organization, propel a team to victory when conditions aren't perfect. I saw that what leaders do is build confidence in advance of victory. Then the confidence they produce makes the hope of success turn into the reality of success, because people behave differently when they are surrounded by a culture of confidence.

A great thinker once described innovative thinkers this way: "Some men see things as they are and say, 'Why?' I dream of things that never were and say, 'Why not?'" Innovative thinkers are constantly asking questions such as these. How can we improve recruiting, hiring and training. How can be add greater value to our products and services by making them even better? How can we do more to nourish the personal as well as professional development of our people? What more can we do as a good citizen where we do business?

... people are capable of more than their organizational positions ever give them the tools or the time or the opportunity to demonstrate.

Leaders is the new organisation do not lack motivational tools, but the tools are different from those of traditional corporate bureaucrats. The new rewards are based not on status but on contribution, and they consist not of regular promotion and automatic pay rises, but of excitement about the mission and a share of the glory of success.

Competition has never been more threatening than it is now. Innovative thinkers challenge the status quo in their organizations. They are often viewed as "troublemakers." They threaten the defenders of the status quo. So competition within an organization can also be brutal. The most effective leaders overcome "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom" by being change agents themselves. They encourage and reward innovative thinking. I have observed that people only resist changes imposed on them by other people.

Leaders are more powerful role models when they learn than when they teach.

Embrace change as an opportunity to learn, to improve, to make a difference in others' lives as well as in your own. Have the courage to challenge the status quo. Remember that preparation and ambition in combination with opportunity equals success. And have fun!

The difference between "winners" and "losers" is not whether they face obstacles and setbacks - we all do, and it is inevitable that plans do not unfold exactly as imagined or that unexpected events surprise us or that a few mistakes happen. The real difference is that "winners" bounce back from a fumble or a loss by refusing to panic, analyzing the situation and looking for positive actions they can take to correct the problem, and then go on to resume winning.

Innovative organizations provide the freedom to act which arouses the desire to act.

Everything looks like a failure in the middle.

Change is a threat when done to me, but an opportunity when done by me.

Our future will be shaped by the assumptions we make about who we are and what we can be.

It is crucial to recognize, reward, and celebrate accomplishments.