Richard M. Daley Quotes

I was immature the way I handled the business. I saw myself as a tribune of the people.

I have an obligation to the people of Illinois, to the Senate and to myself to leave the Senate while I am still eager to serve, not after I tire of serving.

It was difficult to realize, 'I'm lieutenant governor.' And Brown appropriately reminded me of that.

Every man is the architect of his own life. He builds it just the way he wants it. However, after he has built what he wants, he sometimes decides that he doesn't like what he has built and looks for someone or something to blame instead of changing himself.

I think secretly I've realized after my time on the planet that I have no control over what people feel about me or need from me, so I just have a more laid-back approach in my apologies.

It's very important in a leadership role not to place your ego at the foreground and not to judge everything in relationship to how your ego is fed.

I don't choose to analyze what I have done and I think that is the right choice, because then I won't be spending my time creating.

Persistence and determination are incredibly important. But sometimes you need to analyze the situation and understand when you're wrong. You need to be able to cop to being wrong, learn to change, and continue to grow as a human being.

To remain a credible leader, I must always work first, hardest, and longest on changing myself. This is neither easy nor natural, but it is essential.

Things can change only through strong personalities. I am not very good at supporting ignorance and mediocrity, so maybe this leads to arrogant gestures and arrogant responses. So, nobody's perfect.

The last thing I think I am is perfect. I'm just trying to do the best job I can. I'm trying to be the best father I can to my kids. I'm trying to do the best job I can running my business.

One of the things I like enormously about Bob Weinstein is that that he's the only studio head I have ever known who will change his mind and say he was wrong.

Considering I'm a young president, I wouldn't like to make an evaluation of myself. It's not my job to do that.

There is always a time to move on.

I've seen firsthand that being president doesn't change who you are. It reveals who you are.

To change your mind about something is always difficult. I think that people who are big enough to admit they were wrong can be counted on your fingers.

I haven't always made the right decisions.

When I served as prime minister last time, I failed to prioritize my agenda. I was eager to complete everything at once, and ended my administration in failure. After resigning, for six years I traveled across the nation simply to listen.

Even when I retired, there was part of me that didn't want to retire. But once you decide it's time to move on then you have to stick with it.

I had a wonderful time with the Stones but after 31 years, I thought it was time to move on.

I want to spend 100 percent of my time focused on what I think I can make the biggest difference on as the governor of California.

You have to decide when it is time to move on.

Each of us in our time in high office had our ample share of severe critics. But only we actually knew, far better than our worst critics ever dreamed, how truly fallible and all-too-human each of us really was.

Eric Schmidt from Google is one of my favorite mentors. And Eric would always say this very humbling thing that's really true, which is, he would say, 'Good executives confuse themselves when they convince themselves that they actually do things.'

I am not afraid if the criticism concerns what I do wrong, because then I know. Because if you say the King cannot be criticized, it means that the King is not human.