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It's an intolerable abuse of power to have employees who are supposed to be advancing the public interest actually working on political campaigns.

Authority figures are so irritating. Because they always tell you to do things for reasons that aren't very good. That sums up what authority is about for me.

The real damper on employee engagement is the soggy, cold blanket of centralized authority. In most companies, power cascades downwards from the CEO. Not only are employees disenfranchised from most policy decisions, they lack even the power to rebel against egocentric and tyrannical supervisors.

Does it follow that I reject all authority? Perish the thought. In the matter of boots, I defer to the authority of the boot-maker.

In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to his level of incompetence.

Leaders who are kind of insecure or egocentric, they basically sabotage themselves.

Typically, when there are corporate habits that undermine individuals, it has emerged without any sort of central planning. Nobody sits down and says, 'I'm going to create an evil habit for this corporation.'

There's a time that may come in an organization where leading by influence is not enough. When things are not going the way they need to go, there's a time when one has to step up... to set the organization back on the right direction.

It's better to grow your employees, steer them into a place that they can learn and succeed, and want to work hard and be loyal, than to have a revolving door of employees. That's demoralizing.

In most cases, it's slight and often unintentional gaps in integrity that hold leaders, their employees, and their companies back. Despite their potential, these leaders harm their employees and themselves.