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The necessity for leaders to possess optimism and ego serves to answer the age-old question: Are leaders born or are they made? They are born. A leader is born with an optimistic disposition or she is not. If she is not, then no amount of "optimism training" is going to make her view the world in an overwhelmingly positive, opportunistic light.

— Marcus Buckingham The One Thing You Need to Know (2005)

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More quotes by Marcus Buckingham

Each person's greatest room for growth is in the areas of his or her greatest strength.

Now, Discover Your Strengths (2001)

Clarity is the antidote to anxiety, and therefore clarity is the preoccupation of the effective leader. If you do nothing else as a leader, be clear.

The One Thing You Need to Know (2005)

What defines a leader is his preoccupation with the future. In his head he carries a vivid image of what the future could be, and this image drives him on.

The One Thing You Need to Know (2005)

Passion isn't something that lives way up in the sky, in abstract dreams and hopes. It lives at ground level, in the specific details of what you're doing every day.

Many of us feel stress and get overwhelmed not because we're taking on too much, but because we're taking on too little of what really strengthens us.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Marcus Buckingham (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.