Max De Pree - Leadership Jazz (1991)

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A leader protects unusual persons from the bureaucracy and legalism so ensconced in our organizations. A leader remains vulnerable to real surprise and to true quality.

Max De Pree
History can't be left to fend for itself. For when it comes to history and beliefs and values, we turn our future on the lathe of the past.

Max De Pree
From a leader's perspective, the most serious betrayal has to do with thwarting human potential, with quenching the spirit, with failing to deal equitably with each other as human beings.

Max De Pree
Integrity in all things precedes all else. The open demonstration of integrity is essential.

Max De Pree
Change without continuity is chaos. Continuity without change is sloth-and very risky.

Max De Pree
Preparation for leadership does not come from books. Books sometimes give you an insight or an outline, but real preparation consists of hard work and wandering in the desert, much feedback, much forgiveness, and the yeast of failure.

Max De Pree
If we choose beauty and harmony, we give ourselves a unique, competitive advantage.

Max De Pree
Leadership can never stop at words. Leaders must act, and they do so only in the context of their beliefs. Without action or principles, no on can become a leader.

Max De Pree
I've often asked myself, 'Are the poorest sandlot baseball players chosen last because they commit so many errors? Or do they commit errors because they're chosen last?

Max De Pree
Vulnerability in a leader enables others to do their best and to be fully accountable. And, of course, being vulnerable to the strengths of other people also makes the leader vulnerable to their weaknesses.

Max De Pree
Leaders must speak to followers; we must let them know where and how we stand on important issues. We constantly make decisions and evaluate results in light of what we believe.

Max De Pree
A jazz band is an expression of servant leadership. The leader of the band has the beautiful opportunity to draw the best out of other musicians. We have much to learn from jazz-band leaders, for jazz, like leadership, combines the unpredictability of the future with the gifts of individuals.

Max De Pree
Leadership is... not a position but a job. It's also a serious meddling in other people's lives. One examines leadership beginning not with techniques but rather with premises, not with tools but with beliefs, and not with systems but with understandings.

Max De Pree
Corporations, colleges, and hospitals can become sustaining institutions like tribes. The can be the source of belonging; they can be the locus of achievement; they can be a real life- and work-support system.

Max De Pree
The lore of life, the way to one's voice, comes more from mistakes than achievements, more from listening than talking, more from these teachers and enablers than from one's own understanding.

Max De Pree
As I see it, delegation requires a form of dying, a separation of issue from self. We must surrender or abandon ourselves to the gifts that other people bring to the game. We must become vulnerable to every person's need to do her best.... This means to me that we must go beyond learning a single skill or specific knowledge to acquiring the art and grace of a job.

Max De Pree
A leader's voice is the expression of one's beliefs.... A leader's touch demonstrates competence and resolve.

Max De Pree