Jim Yong Kim Quotations

One of the lessons of leadership worth emphasizing is that you want to get to know other great leaders and take their advice. At some point in your development, it's only people who've been in the seat of having to be leaders who can help you in a deep way.

Water and sanitation has not had the same kind of champion that global health, and even education, have had.

No matter how good you think you are as a leader, my goodness, the people around you will have all kinds of ideas for how you can get better. So for me, the most fundamental thing about leadership is to have the humility to continue to get feedback and to try to get better - because your job is to try to help everybody else get better.

One of the most important things about leadership is that you have to have the kind of humility that will allow you to be coached.

Economic development and poverty alleviation are so complicated that I don't think there's a single background or a single discipline that is sufficient to tackle these great human problems.

I want to eradicate poverty. I think that there's a tremendous passion for that inside the World Bank.

A lot of young people don't think they can make a difference. That's really what I am at Dartmouth to do. I'm there to tell the young people, 'Look, a few committed souls can change the world.'

If you look at three diseases, the three major killers, HIV, tuberculosis and malaria, the only disease for which we have really good drugs is HIV. And it's very simple: because there's a market in the United States and Europe.

We will never end poverty if we don't tackle climate change.

I think one of the main challenges that the World Bank faces is creating an organizational structure that doesn't get in the way of its staff. We have fantastic staff. People told me as I was coming into the organization that the greatest asset of the World Bank Group is its staff, and I think there's no question that that's the case.

Social media has changed the world forever. We're not going to go backwards. People are not going to accept being poor, accept being excluded anymore.

What I learned from my work as a physician is that even with the most complicated patients, the most complicated problems, you've got to look hard to find every piece of data and evidence that you can to improve your decision-making. Medicine has taught me to be very much evidence-based and data-driven in making decisions.

What happens when corn and wheat prices rise is that we see real increases in malnutrition and under-nutrition. And when children are malnourished, their brain development actually slows down and is affected. So this is not just a short-term impact.

In my own view, the life expectancy of Native Americans in the United States is one of the really great moral crises that we face.

World Bank is a bank that's focused on economic development and poverty alleviation.

Institutionalized discrimination is bad for people and for societies. Widespread discrimination is also bad for economies. There is clear evidence that when societies enact laws that prevent productive people from fully participating in the workforce, economies suffer.

I feel like I'm calmer, I'm kinder, I'm more patient the more I do my own meditation.

I like to change people's sense of what's possible.

I've always been engaged in social protection programmes.

The relationship between the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala fundamentally changes with meditation.

The water issue is critically related to climate change. People say that carbon is the currency of climate change. Water is the teeth.

Growing economies are critical; we will never be able to end poverty unless economies are growing. We also need to find ways of growing economies so that the growth creates good jobs, especially for young people, especially for women, especially for the poorest who have been excluded from the economic system.

Look at the problem of drug-resistant TB in the world. Look at HIV in the world. What's going to be required for everybody in the long run is the ability to do complex health interventions in poor settings.

My father came by himself across the North Korean border when he was seventeen. And hasn't seen his brothers or sisters or parents since then. And he died some time ago, but never saw any of his relatives. My mother was a refugee in war-torn Korea.

One of the things I had to really work on is, when you're the leader of an organization, people look at the expression on your face. Your mood has a lot to do with how people think the whole organization is doing.

What we have found is that because of smartphones and access to media, and because everybody knows how everyone else lives, you have no idea where the next huge social movement is going to erupt.

Haiti's economy cannot be built by and benefit just a privileged few. It must be built by and benefit all Haitians.

We are watching things happen with one degree changes in ocean temperature that we thought wouldn't happen until there were two or three degree changes in ocean temperature. These are facts.

I've spent my entire life working to invest in human beings and human communities, to help them move down the path of economic development.

If I care about poverty, I have to care a lot about investments in the private sector. The private sector creates the vast majority of jobs in the world, and social protection only goes so far.

If we do not act to curb climate change immediately, we will leave our children and grandchildren an unrecognizable planetIt is the poor, those least responsible for climate change and least able to afford adaptation, who would suffer the most.

We need to have a plan equal to the challenge.

We have to find climate-friendly ways of encouraging economic growth. The good news is we think they exist

I want to eradicate poverty. I think that theres a tremendous passion for that inside the World Bank.

Today there are a lot places where people say they're just hopeless. If I can come from a hopeless country, get an education, become a hyphenated American and become president of the World Bank, it's my moral duty to make sure that every single person on the planet has that opportunity.

Carbon is the currency of how you measure climate change, but water will be the teeth.

Why is it that when it comes to our most cherished social goal [health care], we not only tolerate poor execution, sometimes we even celebrate it?

When you're working on development issues, optimism is not always based on rational analysis, often it is a moral choice.

There will be water and food fights everywhere.

Unless you invest in people, you are not going to see growth in the long term, the medium term, and maybe even the short term.

Ending poverty and ensuring sustainability are the defining challenges of our time. Energy is central to both of them.

A lot of young people dont think they can make a difference. Thats really what I am at Dartmouth to do. Im there to tell the young people, Look, a few committed souls can change the world.