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Growing up in Nigeria, you were either a Manchester United, Arsenal, Chelsea or Liverpool fan. Manchester United was my team back then, and still is. We consumed football for breakfast, lunch and dinner. When we were not glued to the TV screen cheering on our favorite teams, we were in the streets, often barefoot, practicing the skills we had witnessed.
Sir Alex Ferguson was the mastermind behind Manchester United’s successive years of dominance. In his 39 years at the helm, he led Manchester United to 2 Champions League titles, 17 Domestic League titles, 14 Domestic Cups, and 2 Other European titles. I had the pleasure of reading his book, Leading: Learning from Life and My Years at Manchester United, and below are 39 inspiring quotes in honor of his 39 glory years as manager of Manchester United.
Listening
- “If you are leading people, it helps to have a sense of who they are- the circumstances in which they were raised, the actions that will draw out the best in them, and the remarks that will cause them to be spooked. The only way to figure this out is by underrated activities: listening and watching.”
Watching
- “It sounds simple to say you should believe what your eyes tell you, but it is very hard to do. It is astonishing how many biases and preconceived notions we carry around, and these influence what we see, or, more precisely, what we think we see.”
Discipline
- “I always felt that our triumphs were an expression of the consistent application of discipline.”
Work Rate
- “When winning becomes a way of life, true winners are relentless.”
- “In a perfect world I would have filled every team-sheet with 11 men who had as much determination as talent. But life is not like that, and if I had to choose between someone who had great talent but was short on grit and desire, and another player who was good but had great determination and drive, I would always prefer the latter.”
Drive
- “For me drive means a combination of a willingness to work hard, emotional fortitude, enormous powers of concentration and a refusal to admit defeat.”
Conviction
- “I cannot imagine how anyone, without firm conviction and deep inner beliefs, can be an effective leader.”
Preparation
- “…Preparation had a lot more to do with our success than a few fortunate breaks.”
- “The way to win battles, wars and games is by attacking and overrunning the opposing side.”
- “On our own team, the best players tended to be sticklers for preparation. That’s part of the reason why they were good or great.”
Mentorship
- “There is a lot to be said for either picking, or being lucky enough to land, the right mentor. The best ones can change your life.”
Teamwork
- “Each player has to understand the qualities and strengths of their team-mates.”
Excellence
- “Part of the way you develop excellence in an organization is to be careful about the way you define success.”
- “Winning anything requires a series of steps.”
Inspiring
- “You don’t get the best out of people by hitting them with an iron rod. You do so by gaining their respect, getting them accustomed to triumphs and convincing them that they are capable of improving their performance.”
- “Much of leadership is about extracting that extra 5 percent of performance that individuals did not know they possessed.”
- “Unless you understand people, it is very hard to motivate them.”
- “Another crucial ingredient of motivation is consistency. As a leader you can’t run from one side of the ship to the other. People need to feel that you have unshakeable confidence in a particular approach. If you can’t show this, you’ll lose the team very quickly.”
- “Anyone who is in charge of a group of people has got to have a strong personality….a strong personality is an expression of inner strength and fortitude.”
- “People perform best when they know they have earned the trust of their leader.”
Complacency
- “Complacency is a disease, especially for individuals and organizations that have enjoyed success.”
Networking
- “A network takes time to develop. Part comes through the passage of time, part from the way you treat others and part from reciprocity.”
- “It’s easy to forget about the troubles of others but, if you take the time to remember, it goes a very long way.”
Time
- “Don’t lie, don’t steal, and always be early.”
Distractions
- “I have yet to encounter anyone who has achieved massive success without closing themselves off from the demands of others or forgoing pastimes.”
- “If you have two people of equal talent it will be the way in which they marshal their ability that will determine their eventual success.”
- “There’s only one way to enjoy a final and that’s to win it. Nobody ever remembers the losers.”
Failing
- “At some point in my life the desire and need to win outstripped my fear of failure.”
- “There’s some merit in getting defeated – even though I’d never want it to be a habit. Team members who are hungry for victory and take great pride in their performance will be eager to avenge defeat.”
Speaking
- “Whether the audience is one person or 75,000, you need to assemble your thoughts, know what you want to emphasize and just say it.”
Boss
- “The greatest bosses also take pride in making sure that if employees who have served them well choose to leave, they go on to greater and better things.”
Control
- “I just don’t believe that you can get the most out of people if they are perpetually afraid of you.”
Delegation
- “My job was to make everyone understand that the impossible was possible. That’s the difference between leadership and management”
Decision Making
- “When you are in the football world, and I suspect in almost every other setting, you have to make decisions with the information at your disposal, rather than what you wish you might have.”
Salesmanship
- “Any leader is a salesman – and he has to sell to the inside of his organization and to the outside. Anyone who aspires to be a great leader needs to excel at selling his ideas and aspirations to others.”
Compensation
- “Bonuses get spent. Medals are forever.”
Negotiation
- “If you need one person to change your destiny, then you have not built a very solid organization.”
Arriving
- “If you want to build a winning organization, you have to be prepared to carry on building every day. You never stop building – if you do, you stagnate.”
Confidence
- “It’s one thing to have confidence in your own abilities. It’s a completely different challenge to instill confidence in others.”
Nice inspirational piece. Keep posting more like it :))
Thanks Tambu for the kind comments. And thanks for reading! Will keep the good stuff coming.