These are all commodity-focused issues. The old conceit of a retailer was that if you offered the right products at a fair price in a convenient location, you’d do fine if you watched your expenses. Today, the issues are totally different.
- Seth Godin
Notable Quotables
When you own your choices, you own their consequences.
- Jack Welch
The most obvious market segment in email-based payments was the millions of emigrants still using Western Union to wire money to their families back home. Our product made that effortless, but the transactions were too infrequent.
- Peter Thiel
How can I create something that critics will criticize?
- Seth Godin
In the simplest terms, a leader is one who knows where he wants to go, and gets up and goes.
- John Erskine
To succeed at selling a losing product, you must develop seriously superior sales techniques. In addition, you have to be massively competitive and incredibly hungry to survive in that environment.
- Ben Horowitz
Put all excuses aside and remember this: YOU are capable.
- Zig Ziglar
Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man’s character, give him power.
- Abraham Lincoln
In the beginning, I was so chintzy I really didn’t pay my employees well.
- Sam Walton
I never get the accountants in before I start up a business. It’s done on gut feeling, especially if I can see that they are taking the mickey out of the consumer.
- Richard Branson
It’s true that I run a multi-national group but I have no interests in India. So please tell me, what should my identity be?
- Lakshmi Mittal
I believe that visualization is one of the most powerful means of achieving personal goals.
- Harvey Mackay
I actually thought that it would be a little confusing during the same period of your life to be in one meeting when you’re trying to make money, and then go to another meeting where you’re giving it away. I mean is it gonna erode your ability, you know, to make money? Are you gonna somehow get confused about what you’re trying to do?
- Bill Gates
I hate recording all the shows for the week in one day, because I want to be able to mention current events and pop culture. If Madonna punches Britney in the face today, I want to reference that on ‘Wine Library TV’ tomorrow. Monday’s episode is always the best, because it’s hot off the press.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
To me, we’re marketing hope.
- Joel Olsteen
Wrong Selection of A Mate In Marriage.
- Napoleon Hill
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
- Mark Twain
It’s obviously tricky to convert cellulose to a useful biofuel. I think actually the most efficient way to use cellulose is to burn it in a co-generation power plant. That will yield the most energy and that is something you can do today.
- Elon Musk
Whenever you have an efficient government, you have a dictatorship.
- Harry Truman
Risk is a part of God’s game, alike for men and nations.
- Warren Buffett
Exceed your customer’s expectations. If you do, they’ll come back over and over. Give them what they want – and a little more.
- Sam Walton
I have a particular relationship with Vinod Khosla because he’s got a lot of very interesting science-based energy startups.
- Bill Gates
A person’s life is over in 50, 100 years. But a company lives on through the people it is composed of, and SoftBank group has to survive even after I’m gone.
- Masayoshi Son
You will need to find ways to do less and less to make more and more.
- Robert Kiyosaki
Successful leadership calls for mastery of details of the leader’s position.
- Napoleon Hill
If you focus on diversification instead of single-minded pursuit of the very few companies that can become overwhelmingly valuable, you’ll miss those rare companies in the first place.
- Peter Thiel
The possibilities of creative effort connected with the subconscious mind are stupendous and imponderable. They inspire one with awe.
- Napoleon Hill
Backed by our conviction, we remain committed to investing wholeheartedly to improve the people’s living conditions, regardless of all uncertainties.
- Cheng Yu-tung
My model for business is The Beatles. They were four guys who kept each other’s kind of negative tendencies in check. They balanced each other and the total was greater than the sum of the parts. That’s how I see business: great things in business are never done by one person, they’re done by a team of people.
- Steve Jobs
Everyone needs a coach. It doesn’t matter whether you’re a basketball player, a tennis player, a gymnast or a bridge player.
- Bill Gates
High expectations are the key to everything.
- Sam Walton
[On only having 4-6 hours for sleep in guiding two companies in June 2011.] Most people have major positions at companies and they’re also raising families. They have two year olds. I have it easy.
- Jack Dorsey
If you can get just one distribution channel to work, you have a great business. If you try for several but don’t nail one, you’re finished.
- Peter Thiel
When my partners and I meet with entrepreneurs, the two key characteristics that we look for are brilliance and courage. In my experience as CEO, I found that the most important decisions tested my courage far more than my intelligence.
- Ben Horowitz
I went online with winelibrary.com in July of 1997. That was my first professional online play
- Gary Vaynerchuk
I’m a physician. I’ve been blessed with ideas and resources to use technology to make the world a better place. That’s what I would like to leave behind.
- Patrick Soon-Shiong
After all, a man’s Life must be nailed to a cross either of Thought or Action. Without work there is no play.
- Winston Churchill
The economy is like a machine.
- Ray Dalio
My drive into high tech doesn’t involve a lot of people – just me and a very small team.
- Raymond Kwok
Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.
- William Feather
By swallowing evil word unsaid noone has ever yet harmed his stomach.
- Winston Churchill
I’m a creative guy. And I only do businesses as a result of like I’ve – I’m try to find what my gifts are and give them immediately. As soon as I get them and I understand, I give them back.
- Russell Simmons
Strategy is a commodity, execution is an art.
- Peter Drucker
People have no confidence that Washington, both sides of aisle, are coming together to try and do what’s right for the economy.
- Michael Bloomberg
I view my role more as trying to set up an environment where the personalitites, creativity and individuality of all the different employees come out and can shine.
- Tony Hsieh
We are seeing the beginning of things. Web 2.0 is broadband. Web 3.0 is 10 gigabits a second.
- Reed Hastings
I already told you that it is 100% outside buyers.
- Lee Shau Kee
Do you know why the nose of the bull dog is sloped backwards? So it can keep on breathing without ever letting go.
- Winston Churchill
There’s a belief that you’re supposed to be poor, and suffering, and show your humility. I just don’t see the Bible that way. I see that God came and Jesus died so that we might live an abundant life and be a blessing to others.
- Joel Olsteen
It’s absolutely true we set out to expose Microsoft’s covert activities, I feel very good about what we did … Maybe our investigation organization may have done things unsavory, but it’s not illegal. We got the truth out.
- Larry Ellison
If you think the people you attract could be better, then it’s time for you to improve yourself.
- Napoleon Hill
You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.
- Zig Ziglar
Every university believes in “excellence,” and hundred-page course catalogs arranged alphabetically according to arbitrary departments of knowledge seem designed to reassure you that “it doesn’t matter what you do, as long as you do it well.” That is completely false. It does matter what you do. You should focus relentlessly on something you’re good at doing, but before that you must think hard about whether it will be valuable in the future.
- Peter Thiel
Every setback is a setup for a comeback.
- Joel Olsteen
My belief and goal is that every professional in the world should be on a service liked LinkedIn.
- Reid Hoffman
A company shouldn’t get addicted to being shiny, because shiny doesn’t last.
- Jeff Bezos
Concentrate your energies, your thoughts and your capital. The wise man puts all his eggs in one basket and watches the basket.
- Andrew Carnegie
The third way is less common and certainly less of a layup—a culture of integrity, meaning a culture of honesty, transparency, fairness, and strict adherence to rules and regulations. In such cultures, there can be no head fakes or winks. People who break the rules do not leave the company for “personal reasons” or to “spend more time with their families.” They are hanged—publicly—and the reasons are made painfully clear to everyone.
- Jack Welch
Whenever you go out-of-doors, draw the chin in, carry the crown of the head high, and fill the lungs to the utmost; drink in the sunshine; greet your friends with a smile, and put soul into every handclasp. Do not fear being misunderstood and do not waste a minute thinking about your enemies. Try to fix firmly in your mind what you would like to do; and then, without veering off direction, you will move straight to the goal. Keep your mind on the great and splendid things you would like to do, and then, as the days go gliding away, you will find yourself unconsciously seizing upon the opportunities that are required for the fulfillment of your desire, just as the coral insect takes from the running tide the element it needs. Picture in your mind the able, earnest, useful person you desire to be, and the thought you hold is hourly transforming you into that particular individual . . . Thought is supreme. Preserve a right mental attitude – the attitude of courage, frankness, and good cheer. To think rightly is to create. All things come through desire and every sincere prayer is answered. We become like that on which our hearts are fixed. Carry your chin in and the crown of your head high. We are gods in the chrysalis.
- Dale Carnegie
I want to challenge you today to get out of your comfort zone. You have so much incredible potential on the inside. God has put gifts and talents in you that you probably don’t know anything about.
- Joel Olsteen
It does matter what you do. You should focus relentlessly on something you’re good at doing, but before that you must think hard about whether it will be valuable in the future.
- Peter Thiel
You are the only person on earth who can use your ability. It’s an awesome responsibility.
- Zig Ziglar
It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can keep him from lynching me, and I think that’s pretty important.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
If I could drink only one wine, it would be Champagne.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
That Newport store was really the beginning of where Walmart is today. We did everything. We would wash windows, sweep floors, trim windows. We did all the stockroom work, checked the freight in. Everything it took to run a store. We had to keep expenses to a minimum. That is where it started, years ago. Our money was made by controlling expenses. That, and Sam always being so ingenius. He never stopped trying to do something different. One thing, though: I never forgave him for was making me clean out that damned ice cream machine.
- Bud Walton
I mean, you know, we don’t live in a perfect world.
- Michael Bloomberg
Another challenge is a phenomenon that I call the Law of Crappy People. The Law of Crappy People states: For any title level in a large organization, the talent on that level will eventually converge to the crappiest person with the title.
- Ben Horowitz
I tell college students, when you get to be my age you will be successful if the people who you hope to have love you, do love you.
- Warren Buffett
Never, never, never give in!
- Winston Churchill
The chief cause of failure and unhappiness is trading what you want most for what you want right now.
- Zig Ziglar
We think of Starbucks not as a coffee company but a media company.
- Howard Schultz
Buoyant consumer confidence will continue to underpin retial spending and hence rental growth for shopping centres. The office market is expected to perform well on the back of tight supply being met by keen demand from companies looking for expansion opportunities.
- Lee Shau Kee
My dad had a church of 90 people when I was born. It was just, over the years it continued to grow.
- Joel Olsteen
If you can’t communicate and talk to other people and get across your ideas, you’re giving up your potential.
- Warren Buffett
When the economy does pick up, … so will … spending.
- John Chambers
It’s not enough to do good things. You have to let people know what you’re doing.
- Phil Knight
For many people, extended reading sessions on an LCD display cause eyestrain.
- Jeff Bezos
All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
For any Silicon Valley company, the most important thing is the company. And any great founders need to get out of the way of the company. We presented a spark with an idea.
- Jack Dorsey
Morality is simply the attitude we adopt toward people we personally dislike.
- Oscar Wilde
A startup is the largest endeavor over which you can have definite mastery. You can have agency not just over your own life, but over a small and important part of the world. It begins by rejecting the unjust tyranny of Chance. You are not a lottery ticket.
- Peter Thiel
One of my biggest personal holdings is Rotana. That company has a very dominant force in the Middle East. It has around 45% of all the movie industry and around 75% of all the music.
- Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal Alsaud
I encourage active skepticism – when people are being skeptical because they’re trying to identify the best course of action. They’re trying to identify the next step for themselves or other people.
- Timothy Ferriss
It is never too late to be what you might have been.
- George Eliot
Every great business is built around a secret that’s hidden from the outside.
- Peter Thiel
We cannot become what we need by remaining what we are.
- John C. Maxwell
I tried to build a company my father would have been proud to work for, that he would have looked back on and said, ‘That’s the company that honoured me, even though I don’t have an education’. I wanted to build a company that had a conscience.
- Howard Schultz
I believe God is managing affairs and that He doesn’t need any advice from me. With God in charge, I believe everything will work out for the best in the end. So what is there to worry about.
- Henry Ford
I wouldn’t say I have a lack of fear. In fact, I’d like my fear emotion to be less because it’s very distracting and fries my nervous system.
- Elon Musk
I think when you’re very dedicated to something and you’re engaged fully, you become a giver.
- Russell Simmons
I kind of thought that stand-up comedy would suffer from the Internet because people seem to know more about the craft of stand-up than ever before. I thought it would seem trite. Kind of like if you know more about magicians, you wouldn’t love them.
- Jerry Seinfeld
We’re seeing an explosion in new approaches, new models and new forms of interaction. This growth comes from change, insight and exploration, not obedience.
- Seth Godin
A squirrel dying in your front yard may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.
- Mark Zuckerberg
He looks like a female llama who has just been surprised in her bath.
- Winston Churchill
Your attitude, not your aptitude, will determine your altitude.
- Zig Ziglar
The competitor to be feared is one who never bothers about you at all, but goes on making his own business better all the time.
- Henry Ford
It has always been my belief that a man should do his best, regardless of how much he receives for his services, or the number of people he may be serving or the class of people served.
- Napoleon Hill
Mrs. Carnegie and I had dinner at a friend’s house in Chicago. While carving the meat, he did something wrong. I didn’t notice it; and I wouldn’t have cared even if I had noticed it. But his wife saw it and jumped down his throat right in front of us. John,” she cried, watch what you are doing! Can’t you ever learn to serve properly!” Then she said to us: He is always making mistakes. He just doesn’t try.” Maybe he didn’t try to carve; but I certainly give him credit for trying to live with her for twenty years. Frankly, I would rather have eaten a couple of hot dogs with mustard—in an atmosphere of peace—than to have dined on Peking duck and shark fins while listening to her scolding.
- Dale Carnegie
The hardest thing about being a leader is demonstrating or showing vulnerability… When the leader demonstrates vulnerability and sensibility and brings people together, the team wins.
- Howard Schultz
The great majority of people are “wandering generalities” rather than “meaningful specifics”. The fact is that you can’t bit a target that you can’t see. If you don’t know where you are going, you will probably end up somewhere else. You have to have goals.
- Zig Ziglar
