Jim Webb Quotes

September 11 was horrific, but I've been through enough crises before that I had my own pattern as to how to collect facts, what a leader should do, how to communicate with people, how to set up operating mechanisms to work our way through it.

Before becoming a college president, I helped over a dozen organizations find strategies to get through some very ugly crises.

Collaborative decision-making is very poor in crises.

The greatest presidents have been those who demonstrated astute judgment in times of crisis - often despite the advice they were getting.

I think these movies are as much for people of that time as for people who weren't born. For people who weren't born, they see how leaders must act under a crisis situation, not trying to be re-elected or not trying to check polls, that they go from their gut check.

Good leaders need a positive agenda, not just an agenda of dealing with crisis.

One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.

What you say and do in a crisis matters.

We've got to be judged by how we do in times of crisis.

One mediocre general is better than two good ones.

The actions you plan to take and the actions you actually decide to take [in a crisis] are not always the same.

I’ve worked as a leader for many years and I’ve always trained myself to be prepared for the worst.

American government has usually been pretty good in a crisis and pretty lousy at all other times.

Unilateralism in secret is sometimes necessary at the height of a crisis.

When you're a leader at any level of any scale, leaders are defined at times of crisis.

I have been a soldier and a commander for many years and know how to differentiate between things - not to be busy all the time with the most sensitive matters and to give everything its due attention without having the issues that cause concern to constantly be troubling or worrisome.

In tumultuous times, it's important to have a very mature leader.

When there is a crisis, how you handle the crisis is just as important as the crisis.

I've always been calm, and I'm very good in a crisis.

When you lead, you have to lead from the front.

The only thing I don't think people don't understand about good leaders is that they're both good and lucky. A lot of it is timing.

My theory on an existing crisis is that you have to be very strategic about each case's unique elements. If a crisis involves a legal component, you need a communication strategy that complements the company's legal objective. A strategy for a plea deal is different than a case going to trial.

That's the art of leadership. To make sure that what shouldn't happen, doesn't happen.

I think you either have to have a very strong decisive person at the top or else a really brilliant staff command.

Caution is an important quality in a leader, but it has to be caution followed by decision. Caution followed by ambivalence can be a weakness.