119 Quotes by John P. Kotter

At any one time the world has a very limited number of Steve Jobs or Winston Churchills or Thomas Watson the firsts. These are wonderful people and we can learn much from them, but praying for a few more of them to solve the world's problems is not a great idea.

If you're overbooked, you can't manage pressing problems or even recognize they're pressing until too late.

Innovation is kind of a sub-piece of change.

Over the years I have become convinced that we learn best - and change - from hearing stories that strike a chord within us.

In terms of getting people to experiment more and take more risk, there are at least three things that immediately come to my mind. Number one, of course, is role-modeling it yourself. Number two is, when people take intelligent, smart risks and yet it doesn't work out, not shooting them. And number three, being honest with yourself.

Congress is full of people who get reelected and reelected. How can you have urgency when there are all of those safe seats?

Leadership is always about change: it's not about mobilising people to do what they've always done well to continue to do it well.

The dry academic tomes I wrote very early in my career were earnest reflections of the research I conducted, the analysis I applied and the conclusions I drew. And they had few readers, mostly other academics. I learned along the way and started including more and more stories in my work.

I am always looking for stories that will shed light on how companies define themselves - for better or for worse. When shared with others, such stories can have an enormous impact on how well we move forward in the changing world around us.