John P. Kotter Quotes

Putting people before profits is how we've tried to operate from the beginning.

For me, I've learned about what it means to focus on a culture, to build social responsibility, and the idea of a company as a super-organism.

A sour corporate culture can actually make an entire society unhappy. This means that a strong corporate culture can have a positive impact on a society.

A great business has to have a conscience. You have to know who you are and who you are not.

People have come to me over the years and said to me: 'I admire the culture of Starbucks. Can you come give a speech and help us turn our culture around?' I wish it were that easy. Turning a culture around is very difficult to do because it's based on a series of many, many decisions, and the organization is framed by those decisions.

Sustainability includes how you run your business, and my bottom line includes how you treat your people. Sustainability starts with your staff.

It is no longer enough to have a good product. A company's purpose and the way it treats its employees and the global community to which it belongs is also of great importance.

For millennials, conducting business with a purpose that goes beyond making profits is critically important in determining the kind of company they want to work for - and the kind of company with whom they are willing to do business.

I often wonder what the world would be like if more companies were like Apple.

I think CSR, corporate social responsibility, is something that is becoming front and center.

The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has long been used as an effective lens through which to examine the actions business can take toward ensuring mutual long-term well-being and sustainability.

While a fundamental responsibility of business leaders is to create value for shareholders, I think businesses also exist to deliver value to society.

Historically, corporate aversion to politics has at times held firm even under national leadership that threatens the health of the economy, and with it the well-being of every company.

Our culture is the foundation for our company.

Values-based business behavior is no longer simply an interesting option - it's crucial to your survival. Once you understand your mission and values, you have a strong basis for evaluating your practices and aligning them accordingly.

Companies become what they want to become.

A lot of people say that I'm an activist CEO. I just think I'm a responsible leader of a business.

Globalization means that business strategy and business ethics cannot be separated from each other.

I actually am a capitalist, and I believe in shareholders. But I believe in them as a result of what I do, not as a reason for what I'm doing. The same with profits - profits alone cannot be an objective. It has to have a purpose.

CEOs who boldly lean into fulfilling the dual mandate of earning profits and providing societal benefits will find a receptive public.

All business must have a social license to operate.

Business must go on reiterating its absolute commitment to embedding human rights in all it does, driving industry change through collaboration with governments, international organizations, and each other.

When you start to get shareholders, clients, employees, rating agencies, and everybody converging, and then your competitors bad-mouth you, you know you did the right thing.

With the full power of our 360,000 people, we said to the external world, 'This is what we believe at Accenture is the right thing to do, and gender equality is among the business principles which are fundamental for a company, and we want this to be known outside.'

As business leaders, we should not choose between profit or good; rather, we must choose to profit from good. And that requires connecting what we do with a purpose beyond profit - a reason to exist that meets our shared sense of 'doing good.'