24 Inspirational Leadership Quotes and How I Got Inspired From Post-It Notes

One of your many leadership responsibilities is to motivate and inspire your team.  If you keep this as one of your focuses, you’ll soon realize that you will get an incredible return on your investment.  If fact, if inspiring and supporting your team is one of your true priorities, you will find that you in turn will be inspired by the people you lead.

One of the stores that I oversee as a District Manager had a very trying and chaotic month in retail.  They went through a renovation while staying open and were visited by several executives on a weekly basis.  As you may have experienced, being visited by executives can put a lot of pressure on a team.  To top this off, they had to manage several unexpected emergencies.  As a District Manager, I tried to support them as best as I could.  As part of my style, I often coach and try to inspire by communicating quotes or messages adapted to the situation.  My objective was to guide them through the obstacles and help them find their own solutions.  It was what I believed, a natural part of my job and my responsibilities.

Last Friday, I arrived at my office to take a conference call.  As I was approaching my door, I noticed about a dozen or so Post-It notes on the window of my door.  I was humbled when I was close enough to read the messages.  The Store Manager and Assistant Manager of the store that went through a tough month, took the time to drive to my office and thank me in a simple but powerful way.  They plastered my door with words of appreciation and quotes that I had communicated to them during our discussions and my visits.  The photo above is the picture I took of my office door.

Some of the post-it notes reads (translated from French):

“Thank You for your Energy”

“Aim for the Moon, Achieve the Stars”

“Thank you for your Confidence”

“Thank you for your Support”

“Thank you for Listening”

“We climb a mountain, One Step at a Time”

I started this post by saying that one of our many responsibilities as a leader is to inspire our teams.  There are moments however, when it is them that inspires us.

“When you take care of your team, they will take care of you.”

This was an example of the impact a leader can have on their team and how much a team needs a leader’s support.  How did they perform during last month’s difficult challenges?  They finished at 24% over last year.

There are so many inspirational quotes and inspirational heroes essay examples that you can add during your leadership rallies.

Here are 24 Inspirational Leadership Quotes To Help You Inspire Or Get Inspired:

1. “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” -Maya Angelou

2.   “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” -Henry Ford

3.  “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.” -Vince Lombardi

4.  “Life is 10 percent what happens to me and 90 percent of how I react to it.” -Charles Swindoll

5.  “I can’t change the direction of the wind, but I can adjust my sails to always reach my destination.” -Jimmy Dean

6.  [tweetthis]”Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.” -Napoleon Hill [/tweetthis]

7.  “I’ve missed more than 9000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.” -Michael Jordan

8.  “Strive not to be a success, but rather to be of value.” -Albert Einstein

9.  [tweetthis]”I am not a product of my circumstances. I am a product of my decisions.” -Stephen Covey[/tweetthis]

10.  “The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me.” -Ayn Rand

11.  “Build your own dreams, or someone else will hire you to build theirs.” -Farrah Gray

12.  “Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.” -Dalai Lama

13.  “A person who never made a mistake never tried anything new.” -Albert Einstein

14.  “When one door of happiness closes, another opens, but often we look so long at the closed-door that we do not see the one that has been opened for us.” -Helen Keller

15.  “The only person you are destined to become is the person you decide to be.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson

16.  “Everything you’ve ever wanted is on the other side of fear.” -George Addair

17.  “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” -Theodore Roosevelt

18.  [tweetthis]”What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.” -Plutarch[/tweetthis]

19.  “Control your own destiny or someone else will.” – Jack Welch

20.  “The only safe ship in a storm is leadership.” — Faye Wattleton, Alvarez & Marsal

21.  “I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.” — Estée Lauder

22.  “Leadership is a series of behaviors rather than a role for heroes.” — Margaret Wheatley, writer

23.  “My father had a simple test that helps me measure my own leadership quotient: When you are out of the office, he once asked me, does your staff carry on remarkable well without you?” — Martha Peak, AMA magazines

24.  “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be.” — Rosalynn Carter, former First Lady

Have you ever been inspired by your team?  Which leadership quote inspires you?