For the last seven years, I’ve attended the Global Leadership Summit (#GLS14), and it has consistently been one of the biggest resources in equipping me for adulthood, the workplace, and life.

This is my fifth year participating in the social media room, which is a wired room shared by about twenty of the most talented bloggers, photographers, and social media specialists in the church world. It’s great being a part of the Online Experience Team (yes, we have a fancy name!), and it’s great to know a lot of them from #BestofSMS.

So I’ll share some of my favorite quotes at the end of this, but I first wanted to talk about my most retweeted tweet.

During a session where Bill Hybels interviewed Jeffrey Immelt (CEO of General Electric), Jeffrey said that his company spends $1 billion on training its staff to make them better. Bill then asked how difficult it must be to put that much into training staff when those people can just leave their jobs. The two then laughed about how tough that it.

When I saw the exchange, I immediately thought of a picture I’d seen online. I found it, tweeted it, and it’s now come to be my most retweeted tweet. Here it is:

I think that message strikes a chord with a lot of people, and it’s great to see people sharing that message because it means that they also understand the importance of investing in staff.

Okay, now here are my quotes from Day 1.

Bill Hybels

“Everything that matters in this world rises and falls on leadership.”
“Often, leaders with the highest level of vision and passion have the lowest level of awareness of the spirit of the team they created.”
“Great leadership is, by definition, relationally developmental.”
“Resourcefulness is the most valuable tool in a leader’s arsenal.”

Carly Fiorina

“Bureaucracy crushes potential.”
“A good manager produces good results in known constraints and conditions. A leader says, ‘I’m going to change these conditions.’ … Leadership is about changing the order of things.”

Jeffrey Immelt

“Leaders, don’t be afraid of accountability.”

Patrick Lencioni

“Leaders shouldn’t go into leadership because it’s good for them.”
“When leaders become leaders for the ROI, it’s not leadership—it’s economics.”