Churchill on Leadership

Ten Great Quotes

Someone observed that history is biography. We can understand history by understanding the men and women who make it. I believe the same can be said of leadership. By studying leaders we can learn leadership practices and principles that apply to any age or organization: nations, companies, armies and churches. As a serious student of both leadership and history I have come to believe that Winston Churchill was the greatest leader of the twentieth century. In the critical events: World War I & II, the Depression, the rise of Nazism and the beginning of the Cold War, he is perhaps the leading figure. This man whose mother was an American has been voted as the “Greatest Brit ever.”

Having been a student of Churchill for the last forty years (I started early) I recently discovered a wonderful work for all lovers and students of The Man of the Century. Richard Langworth, editor of Finest Hour, the newsletter for the Churchill Center, has compiled a book of over 600 pages of quotes from Churchill’s speeches and writings, entitled Churchill By Himself (public Affairs, New York, 2008). Churchill’s daughter, Lady Soames wrote the foreword and Sir Martin Gilbert, Churchill’s official biographer wrote the introduction. It is a unique book compiled by only one of the few people who could have done so.

In this post I will share ten quotes from Churchill that relate to the concept of leadership principles and practice. The meaning of his words are clear and do not need any commentary from me:

1.      “We must be ready, as we always have been ready, to take the rough with the smooth.”         March 17, 1941

 

2.      “How useful it is in great organizations to have a roving eye.”     1952

 

3.      “No one is compelled to serve great causes unless he feels for it, but nothings is more certain than that you cannot take the lead in great causes as a half-timer.”                                                             May 9, 1936

 

4.      “I would sooner be right than consistent.”             1940

 

5.      “There is great danger in trying to have things both ways.”        February 15, 1951

 

6.      “There is no use once again leading other nations up the garden and then running away when the dog growls.”                                  January 8, 1937

 

7.      “It is wonderful what great strides can be made when there is a resolute purpose behind them.”                   May 7, 1947

 

8.      “In life people have first to be taught ‘Concentrate on essentials.’”         1952

 

9.      “To build may have to be slow and laborious task of years. To destroy can be the thoughtless act of a single day.”                September 29, 1959

 

10.   “The great thing is to get the true picture, whatever it is.”          November 24, 1940

 

I pray that these quotations may challenge, inspire, inform and cajole us to be better leaders.