Michael Seibel Quotes

A C.E.O.'s job is leadership, problem solving, and team building. I've done that my whole career.

Nobody knows how to be a CEO. It's something you have to learn. It's a very lonely job.

I would love to be a general manager just for the challenge.

I would like to have a managerial career as a director.

I think if you want to be a successful president or a manager of a team, you need to understand what the business is all about because you have to deal with the business side of the game to be able to do what you need to do.

A startup is not just about the idea: it's about testing and then implementing the idea. A founding team without these skills is likely dead on arrival.

There's a conventional wisdom that says that strategic thinking is much more important than relationship building, which doesn't seem to be nearly as highly valued as it should be, based on what some of the leaders that I've spoken with have said to me.

What's increasingly clear is that when you are open to a discussion of leadership, and you're relating it to your company, it is much easier to get people to become open.

As the CEO, I have to take care of the short term, mid term and the long term.

I need to aspire to be a great CEO and not just a great product engineer.

Too many managers manage by what the postgame press conference is going to be.

As leader of the effort of the Iraqi Survey Group, I spent most of my days not out in the field leading inspections. It's typically what you do at that level. I was trying to motivate, direct, find strategies.

Rotary provides training at all levels so that those who have been selected for leadership positions have the opportunity to learn and apply leadership principles to their jobs.

Clearly, as a CEO, you have other functions that are managed by other people.

In my own experience as a C.E.O., I would find myself laying awake at 3 A.M. asking questions about my business, and there weren't management books out there that could help me.

When I was a CEO, the books on management that I read weren't very much help after the first few months on the job. They were all designed to give you directions on how not to screw up your company.

As a director, I never feel that I have the answers.

If I look myself as a manager, I have lot more to learn.

A CEO needs to build their own team.

Early in my career, I sometimes found it difficult to make the tough people decisions - I had to learn that. In business, you want to listen. You want to learn. You want to make sure you're not proceeding without information. But if you wait too long, you can actually hurt an organization even more.

Look, you need technical skills to run a company.

I used to think my job as a CEO meant managing metrics and meeting goals, but I've realised now that's it's about managing my board and employees.

I think in any organization you want your manager to have a strong opinion. You don't want them to just say, 'Yes, sir' to things they don't believe in.

The role of leadership is to transform the complex situation into small pieces and prioritize them.

If you're running an engineering or finance company, all companies depend on ideas and ingenuity. I think the principles of creative leadership apply everywhere, whether it's an advertising company or whether you're running a hospital.