THE BASICS / FUNDAMENTALS:

 

“Champions are brilliant at the basics.”  -John Wooden

 

“Master the basics. Then practice them every day without fail. Small disciplines repeated with consistency every day lead to great achievements gained slowly over time.”  - John C. Maxwell

 

“Winners don’t just learn the fundamentals, they master them. You have to monitor your fundamentals constantly because the only thing that changes will be your attention to them.”  -Michael Jordan

 

“Excellence is achieved by mastery of the fundamentals.”  -Vince Lombardi

“Success is neither magical nor mysterious. Success is the natural consequence of consistently applying the basic fundamentals.”  -Jim Rohn

 

“There is no shortage of opportunity. There is only a shortage of those who will apply themselves to the basics that success requires.”  -Jim Rohn

 

“The only way you can stay on top is to remember to touch bottom and get back to basics.”  -Shane Black

 

“Common sense as well as common values all lead us. Our future depends upon it and our present is going to be vastly better when we get back to these basics.”  -Joan Blades

 

“One of the things young people always ask me about is what is the secret to success. The secret is there is no secret. It's the basics. Blocking and tackling.”  -Chris Gardner

 

“As adults we try to relax from the never-ending quest for reason and order by drinking a little whiskey or smoking whatever works for us, but the wisdom isn't in the whiskey or the smoke. The wisdom is in the moments when the madness slips away and we remember the basics.”  -Willie Nelson

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SIMPLICITY:

 

"That’s been one of my mantras — focus and simplicity. Simple can be harder than complex: You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple. But it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains." - Steve Jobs

 

“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.”  -Albert Einstein

 

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex... It takes a touch of genius - and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction (simplicity)." - Albert Einstein

 

“Less is more. (simplicity).”  -English Proverb

 

"Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple."  -Dr. Seuss

 

“Keep it simple and focus on what matters. Don't let yourself be overwhelmed.”  -Confucius

 

“To complicate is simple, to simplify is complicated. ... Everybody is able to complicate. Only a few can simplify.”  -Bruno Munari

 

“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.”  -Hans Hofmann

 

“Keep it simple, when you get too complex you forget the obvious.”  -Al McGuire

 

“To innovate does not necessarily mean to expand; very often it means to simplify.”  -M. Russell Ballard

 

“Intelligence complicates. Wisdom simplifies.”  -Mason Cooley

 

“If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough.”  -Albert Einstein

 

“The more one knows, the more one simplifies.”  -Elbert Hubbard

 

“The K.I.S.S. (Keep It Simple, Stupid) principle was pounded into my head in school and I still follow it today in most of my designs. I know that my most successful efforts are the simplest. I always find myself trying to subtract detail from design concepts in an attempt to distill the idea down to the most basic communication tool.”  -Jeff Fisher

 

“I have discovered there are only a handful of good ideas in the whole world. You already know them. You have heard them your entire life. Here are some of the main keys to being more successful: Take personal responsibility. Things change, so be flexible. Work smart and work hard. Serve others well. Be nice to others. Be optimistic. Have goals; want something big for yourself. Stay focused. Keep learning. Become excellent at what you do. Trust your gut. When in doubt, take action. Earn all you can. Save all you can. Give all you can. Enjoy all you've got. Above all keep it simple.”  -Larry Winget

 

HABIT:

 

“Chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too heavy to be broken.”  -Warren Buffett

 

“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”  -Will Durant

 

“I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”  -Bruce Lee

 

“If you do enough small things right, big things can happen.” -John Wooden

 

EXECUTION:

 

Iron rusts from disuse; water loses its purity from stagnation... even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.  -Leonardo da Vinci

 

CONTINUITY / SUSTAINABILITY (Include Accountability & Responsibility):

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Sustainability takes forever. And that's the point.  -William McDonough

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The thing is, continuity of strategic direction and continuous improvement in how you do things are absolutely consistent with each other. In fact, they're mutually reinforcing.  -Michael Porter

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The greatest challenge to organizations is the balance between continuity and change. You need both. At different times, the balance is slightly more over here, or slightly more over there, but you need both. And balance is basically the greatest task in leadership. Organizations have to have continuity, and yet if there is not enough new challenge, not enough change, they become empty bureaucracies, awfully fast.  -Peter Drucker

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Children need continuity as they grow and learn.  -Thomas Menino

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Trust, honesty, humility, transparency and accountability are the building blocks of a positive reputation. Trust is the foundation of any relationship.  -Mike Paul

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Accountability is the glue that ties commitment to the result.  -Bob Proctor

 

On good teams coaches hold players accountable, on great teams players hold players accountable  -Joe Dumars

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Responsibility equals accountability equals ownership. And a sense of ownership is the most powerful weapon a team or organization can have.  -Pat Summitt

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You can't talk about leadership without talking about responsibility and accountability...you can't separate the two. A leader must delegate responsibility and provide the freedom to make decisions, and then be held accountable for the results.  -Buck Rodgers

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Trust is the glue that holds everything together. It creates the environment in which all of the other elements win-win stewardship agreements, self-directing individuals and teams, aligned structures and systems, and accountability can flourish.  -Stephen Covey

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We need, first of all, for there to be accountability, for there to be somebody who is responsible for enforcing standards and holding people's feet to the fire.  -Jennifer Granholm

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People think responsibility is hard to bear. It's not. I think that sometimes it is the absence of responsibility that is harder to bear. You have a great feeling of impotence.  -Henry A. Kissinger

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TEAM:

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An arch consists of two weaknesses which, leaning one against the other, make a strength.  -Leonardo da Vinci

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KNOWLEDGE:

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You don't get into trouble because of the things you don't know. It is the things you don't know you don't know that really get you into a mess.  -Leonardo da Vinci

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Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.  -Miles Kington

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We are drowning in information but starved for knowledge.  -John Naisbitt

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An organization's ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive advantage.  -Jack Welch

 

OTHER:

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“The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits.”  -Albert Einstein

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“Common sense is not so common.” -Voltaire

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I am not poor. Poor are those who desire many things.  -Leonardo da Vinci

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Experience is a truer guide than the words of others.  -Leonardo da Vinci

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Don't settle for mediocrity; never let good enough be good enough.  -Joel Osteen

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Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted.  -John Lennon

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