Seth Godin Quotes

Organization charts and fancy titles count for next to nothing.

I am a collaborator with everyone who agrees that I need to be in control. I happily collaborate with my loyalists.

The key to successful leadership today is influence, not authority.

I was put in a position with a man that, whenever he would call me at work or at home, work-related, he would say jump and I'd say how high and I would jump.

It's the people who are more insecure who feel the need to control and micromanage. But that's true of any profession and hierarchy with a boss. You have people who know you are competent enough to do your job, and then you have the ones that just hover around.

Xavier McDaniel made me respect him. I thought I could do anything I wanted to. He grabbed me one time and almost choked me out. He said, 'You're going to do this. You're going to go get coffee. You're going to go get doughnuts.' It's a game of respect.

Show respect for those in power, but do not follow them blindly.

Personally I have never been able to understand why the head of a big business, whether it be the Nation, the State or the Army, or Navy should not desire to have very strong and positive people under him.

The mistakes (of leaders) are amplified by the numbers who follow them without question. Charismatic leaders tend to build up followings, power structures and these power structures tend to be taken over by people who are corruptible. I don't think that the old saw about 'power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely' is accurate: I think power attracts the corruptible.

I advance with obedience to the work, ready to retire from it whenever you become sensible how much better choice it is in your power to make.

A government at bottom is nothing more than a group of men, and as a practical matter most of them are inferior men. ... Yet these nonentities, by the intellectual laziness of men in general ... are generally obeyed as a matter of duty (and) assumed to have a kind of wisdom that is superior to ordinary wisdom.

You may have your suspicions, your fears, you may even believe there is something, somewhere, terribly, drastically wrong, but because someone else is in charge, because there is a part of the system above you which you don't know, you don't question it, you even distrust your own doubts.

Directors are like generals, political dictators, aggressive people...And everyone in the film is always grateful if you can tell them what to do.

A man must keep an eye on his servants, if he would not have them rule him.

A substantial proportion of people do what they are told to do, irrespective of the content of the act, and without pangs of conscience, so long as they perceive that the command comes from a legitimate authority.

It is a bitter dose to be taught obedience after you have learned to rule.

It's very hard to be perceived as a boss, and behaving like a boss or wanting to be treated like one.

My relationship to power and authority is that I'm all for it.

Sir, in carrying on your government, why should you use killing at all? Let your evinced desires be for what is good, and the people will be good. The relation between superiors and inferiors is like that between the wind and the grass. The grass must bend, when the wind blows across it.

As in the presence of the Master, the Servants are equall, and without any honour at all; So are the Subjects, in the presence of the Soveraign. And though they shine some more, some lesse, when they are out of his sight; yet in his presence, they shine no more than the Starres in presence of the Sun.

Does the commandment 'Thou Shalt Not Kill' mean nothing to us? Are we to interpret it as meaning 'Thou shalt not kill except on the grand scale,' or 'Thou shalt not kill except when the national leaders say to do so'?

Naturally we all have an inclination to command, and a great aversion to obey; and yet it is certain that it is more for our good to obey than to command; hence perfect souls have always had a great affection for obedience, and have found all their joy and comfort in it.

Obtain power, then, by all means; power is the law of man; make it yours.

I am not blaming those who are resolved to rule, only those who show an even greater readiness to submit.

Distinguish between power and control, delegate, be decisive - and always remember people's first names.