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I have never seen a good organization where the standards weren’t high.

Colin Powell

Surround yourself with people who take their work seriously, but not themselves, those who work hard and play hard.
COLIN POWELL

Hard Work People Play Serious Work
Give me the right people and I don’t much care what organization you give me. Good things will happen. Give me the wrong people and it doesn’t matter what you do with the organization. Bad things will happen.
COLIN POWELL

Care Goodness Organization People Right Yourself
Don’t be afraid to challenge the pros, even in their own backyard.
COLIN POWELL

Advantage Afraid Challenge
The best way to create a winning team is to train them, give them everything they need to get the job done and second, make sure they know what the job is and what the job will be. So you connect strategy to resources.
COLIN POWELL

Best Connection Creation Job Resources Team Training Way Yourself
Treat people kindly. When you are kind to somebody and I don’t mean necessarily “buddy-buddy”, just show kindness and consideration. Show that people are worthy and you respect them and you are glad they’re with you.
COLIN POWELL

Happiness Kindness Necessary People Treat Worth Yourself
If you get the dirty end of the stick, sharpen it and turn it into a useful tool.
COLIN POWELL

Dirty End Tools Yourself
I think whether you’re having setbacks or not, the role of a leader is to always display a winning attitude.
COLIN POWELL

Attitude Leadership Role Thinking Win
The most important thing I learned is that soldiers watch what their leaders do. You can give them classes and lecture them forever, but it is your personal example they will follow.
COLIN POWELL

Follow Forever Important Learning Personal Soldier
I regret that the presentation I made at the UN turned out to be wrong. It was wrong on the stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, but pretty much right on intentions and capabilities.
COLIN POWELL

Capability Intention Myself Presentation Regret Weapon Wrong
You can’t make someone else’s choices. You shouldn’t let someone else make yours.
COLIN POWELL

Choice Control Yourself
Maybe we don’t put our young people in situations often enough where they’re allowed to fail. When you fail you gain experience, and with enough experience, you don’t fail as often.
COLIN POWELL

Allow Enough Experience Failure People Situation Young Yourself
You don’t know what you can get away with until you try.
COLIN POWELL

Ability Let Go Try Yourself
First you train the followers to accomplish the mission. Second, you resource them: Make sure that they have the tools to do the job. Third, you reward them: You give them medals or bonuses.
COLIN POWELL

Accomplishment Follow Job Medal Reward Tools Training Yourself
Pissing people off doesn’t mean you’re doing the right things, but doing the right things will almost inevitably piss people off.
COLIN POWELL

People Perspective Right Yourself
When you wrestle with a pig, he has fun, and you just end up dirty.
COLIN POWELL

Animal Dirty End Fight Yourself
There is no such thing as an unimportant person in an organization.
COLIN POWELL

Important Organization Person Value Worth

I have never seen a good organization where the standards weren’t high.

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I have never seen a good organization where the standards weren’t high.

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