Know your numbers’ is a fundamental precept of business.
- Bill Gates
Notable Quotables
We all have possibilities we don’t know about. We can do things we don’t even dream we can do.
- Dale Carnegie
The local property market witnessed a slowdown following the 9-11 incident in the United States, under an environment of high unemployment and sustained deflation in Hong Kong. On the whole, property prices showed a slight decline as compared with the price levels recorded in the previous financial year.
- Lee Shau Kee
Surplus wealth is a sacred trust which its possessor is bound to administer in his lifetime for the good of the community.
- Andrew Carnegie
I never worry about action, but only inaction.
- Winston Churchill
Technology is an inherent democratizer. Because of the evolution of hardware and software, you’re able to scale up almost anything. It means that in our lifetime everyone may have tools of equal power.
- Sergey Brin
I consider myself a “social ecologist,” concerned with man’s man-made environment the way the natural ecologist studies the biological environment…..the discipline itself boasts an old and distinguished lineage. Its greatest document is Alexis de Tocqueville’s Democracy in America. But no one is as close to me in temperament, concepts, and approach as the mid-Victorian Englishman Walter Bagehot. Living (as I have) in an age of great social change, Bagehot first saw the emergence of new institutions: civil service and cabinet government, as cores of a functioning democracy, and banking as the center of a functioning economy. A hundred years after Bagehot, I was first to identify management as the new social institution of the emerging society of organizations and, a little later, to spot the emergence of knowledge as the new central resource, and knowledge workers as the new ruling class of a society that is not only “postindustrial” but postsocialist and, increasingly, post-capitalist. As it had been for Bagehot, for me too the tension between the need for continuity and the need for innovation and change was central to society and civilization.
- Peter Drucker
You have to motivate yourself with challenges. That’s how you know you’re still alive.
- Jerry Seinfeld
Recovery continues to gain momentum on a global basis.
- John Chambers
Most great people have attained their greatest success just one step beyond their greatest failure.
- Napoleon Hill
Social media is a giant distraction to the ultimate aim, which is honing your craft as a songwriter. There are people who are exceptional at it, however, and if you can do both things, then that’s fantastic, but if you are a writer, the time is better spent on a clever lyric than a clever tweet.
- Bryan Adams
We should remember the warning of the wise Grail knight in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade: You must choose, but choose wisely, for as the true Grail will bring you life, the false Grail will take it from you.Choose the highest-yield material and you can be an idiot and enjoy stunning success. Choose poorly and, as the Grail knight implied, you’re screwed no matter what. You’ll chase your own tail for years.
- Timothy Ferriss
Tip #1 – Self-motivation is the key to success and will achieve powerful results.
- Jack Nadel
Being productive gives people a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment that loafing never can.
- Zig Ziglar
President Bush is endangering our safety, hurting our vital interests, and undermining American values.
- George Soros
People rarely succeed unless they have fun in what they are doing.
- Dale Carnegie
Often, organizations need bold, grand gestures to galvanize people towards a new mission or refocus their attention.
- Howard Schultz
The person who has technical knowledge plus the ability to express ideas, to assume leadership, and to arouse enthusiasm among people—that person is headed for higher earning power.
- Dale Carnegie
We don’t have as many managers as we should, but we would rather have too few than too many.
- Larry Page
The concept of serviced apartments makes economic sense for tenancies of short to medium term duration – a fact many leading Hong Kong and overseas corporations now appreciate.
- Cheng Yu-tung
If the broadcasters were to win on their claims, they’d outlaw the DVR.
- Charles Ergen
If I’d had some set idea of a finish line, don’t you think I would have crossed it years ago?
- Bill Gates
Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.
- Seneca
If I have one skill as a manager, I can make things extremely clear.
- Ben Horowitz
Unemployment in America today is too high. And part of the reason, unfortunately, is that many companies cannot fill the high-skilled jobs increasingly at risk of going overseas.
- Michael Bloomberg
It says in Romans 5:17, We are to reign in life as kings.” When God looks at us He doesn’t see us defeated, barely getting by, or just taking the leftover positions. Not at all. God sees you as a king. He sees you as a queen. You have His royal blood flowing through your veins. You and I are supposed to reign in life. Do you know what that word reign means? It means, time in power.” God said we’re to reign how long? In life. That means as long as you’re alive that is your time in power. You don’t have a two-year term like a mayor, a four-year term like a president. Your term is to reign every single day, to be victorious, to rise to new levels, to accomplish great things.
- Joel Olsteen
Do you know of the water and the moon? The river flows endlessly, yet it never disappears. The moon waxes and wanes, yet it never grows bigger or smaller. Therefore, if you look in the eyes of change, everything in this world changes in an instant. But if you look in the eyes of stability, everything in the world, including humanity, is eternal. Dozens of worlds have demonstrated precisely the truth of the changing universe. The changes of the water and the moon happen on their appearances, but never on their physical natures. Therefore, whether changes happen depends on people’s mind and view. Since nothing remains permanent in the world, change is just the eternal fact.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Success comes from doing the hard part. When the hard part is all you’ve got, you’re more likely to do it.And this is precisely why it’s difficult to focus. Because focusing means acknowledging that you just signed up for the hard part.
- Seth Godin
A lot of times, you could play me just the laughs from my set, and I could tell you, from the laugh, what the joke was. Because they match.
- Jerry Seinfeld
The craftsman and the artist say, “Here, I made this.” The workingman is asked to follow instructions.
- Seth Godin
We ride roughshod over the feelings of others, getting our own way, finding fault, issuing threats, criticising a child or an employee in front of others, without even considering the hurt to the other person’s pride. Whereas a few minutes’ thought, a considerate word or two, a genuine understanding of the other person’s attitude, would go so far toward alleviating the sting!
- Dale Carnegie
If we all did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves.
- Thomas Edison
Control has to be by feedback from the work done. The work itself has to provide the information. If it has to be checked all the time, there is no control.
- Peter Drucker
I know why logs spit. I know what it is to be consumed.
- Winston Churchill
Today’s stock price is X, tommorrow’s is up to you.
- Sam Walton
I predict at least one of the rookie drivers will win a race this year. With this strong of a group, two or three of them will likely win.
- Ed Clark
Speech is power: speech is to persuade, to convert, to compel.
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
A great business has to have a conscience. You have to know who you are and who you are not.
- Howard Schultz
Visionary companies are so clear about what they stand for and what they’re trying to achieve that they simply don’t have room for those unwilling or unable to fit their exacting standards.
- James C. Collins
We’re living in what I like to call the ‘Thank You Economy,’ because only the companies that can figure out how to mind their manners in a very old-fashioned way – and do it authentically – are going to have a prayer of competing.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
I am pleased with the strides we’ve made in our global equipment business where revenues grew 41 percent this past quarter and 37 percent year-to-date, … The strong dollar continues to negatively impact our European results constant dollar revenues in Europe were up 23 percent in the second quarter.
- Phil Knight
When you acknowledge God, He will go before you and make the crooked places straight.
- Joel Olsteen
The problems forced us to take a hard look at what we were doing, what was going wrong, what we were good at, and where we wanted to go.
- Phil Knight
What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone? How else can we put ourselves in harmonious relation with the great verities and consolations of the infinite and the eternal? And I avow my faith that we are marching towards better days. Humanity will not be cast down. We are going on swinging bravely forward along the grand high road and already behind the distant mountains is the promise of the sun.
- Winston Churchill
The word cellulite, for example, first appeared in the April 15, 1968, issue of Vogue magazine, and this invented disease soon had a believer base worldwide: Vogue began to focus on the body as much as on the clothes, in part because there was little they could dictate with the anarchic styles.… In a stunning move, an entire replacement culture was developed by naming a problem” where it had scarcely existed before, centering it on the women’s natural state, and elevating it to the existential female dilemma… . The number of diet- related articles rose 70 percent from 1968 to 1972.
- Timothy Ferriss
The librarian is the interface between reams of data and the untrained but motivated user.
- Seth Godin
In terms of mathematics textbooks, why can’t you have the scale of a national market? Right now, we have a Texas textbook that’s different from a California textbook that’s different from a Massachusetts textbook. That’s very expensive.
- Bill Gates
I’ve traveled around the world, and what’s so revealing is that, despite the differences in culture, politics, language, how people dress, there is a universal feeling that we all want the same thing. We deeply want to be respected and appreciated for our differences.
- Howard Schultz
The only thing worse than training employees and losing them is to not train them and keep them.
- Zig Ziglar
I’m a very big believer in equal opportunity as opposed to equal outcome. I don’t believe in equal outcome because unfortunately life’s not like that. It would be a pretty boring place if it was. But I really believe in equal opportunity. Equal opportunity to me more than anything means a great education.
- Steve Jobs
I believe that every right implies a responsibility; every opportunity, an obligation; every possession, a duty.
- John D. Rockefeller
When nobody else celebrates you, learn to celebrate yourself. When nobody else compliments you, then compliment yourself. It’s not up to other people to keep you encouraged. It’s up to you. Encouragement should come from the inside.
- Joel Olsteen
Not life, but good life, is to be chiefly valued.
- Socrates
About the only thing ordinary salespeople agree upon is the idea that you must sell yourself first.
- Jerry Vass
The focus is on the future.
- Cheng Yu-tung
When you look at the dark side, careful you must be. For the dark side looks back.
- Yoda
If Google Books is successful, others will follow.
- Sergey Brin
I don’t think that ambition should not be in the dictionary of entrepreneurs. But our ambition should be realistic. You have to realise that you can’t do everything.
- Mukesh Ambani
The most important quality for an investor is temperament, not intellect. You need a temperament that neither derives great pleasure from being with the crowd or against the crowd.
- Warren Buffett
It’s the power of the brand. We’ve never formally advertised.
- Sara Blakely
Waiting isn’t easy, which is precisely why it is so effective when engaging with other people.
- Seth Godin
They don’t understand that Excellence isn’t about working extra hard to do what you’re told. It’s about taking the initiative to do work you decide is worth doing.
- Seth Godin
I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
The dark side clouds everything. Impossible to see the future is.
- Yoda
Praise is like sunlight to the warm human spirit; we cannot flower and grow without it. And yet, while most of us are only too ready to apply to others the cold wind of criticism, we are somehow reluctant to give our fellow the warm sunshine of praise.
- Dale Carnegie
The interview process takes twelve to fifteen hoursof your team’s time. This process is expensive for your team, so you should vet people in advance. A technique I use is to email the references and say, Rate this person one to ten. No one’s going to reply a five or a three by email; that means they hate the candidate. Call me is usually the response for a sub-seven rating. At the same time, nobody is going to reply with a ten. What you’re really looking for is a bunch of eights and nines. This is an exceptionally quick referencing system when you’re trying to triage a list.
- Reid Hoffman
My greatest strength as a consultant is to be ignorant and ask a few questions.
- Peter Drucker
For the first time in a very long time, I believe the external factors are slowly starting to be more positive, … This is still a minority view, held by a minority of our customers, but we’ve seen early indications that the recovery could be gaining momentum.
- John Chambers
The responsibility of the leader is to define reality and create hope.
- David Novak
Danger: if you meet it promptly and without flinching, you will reduce the danger by half. Never run away from anything. Never!
- Winston Churchill
Government isn’t that good at rapid advancement of technology. It tends to be better at funding basic research. To have things take off, you’ve got to have commercial companies do it.
- Elon Musk
Every one of us gets through the tough times because somebody is there, standing in the gap to close it for us.
- Oprah Winfrey
I think the advantage of democracy is that it makes us less dependent on a group of leaders.
- Azim Premji
The secret is not to give up hope. It’s very hard not to because if you’re really doing something worthwhile I think you will be pushed to the brink of hopelessness before you come through the other side.
- George Lucas
Rockets are cool. There’s no getting around that.
- Elon Musk
I deal with more practical issues of the Bible.
- Joel Olsteen
Being defeated is often a temporary condition. Giving up is what makes it permanent.
- Marilyn vos Savant
I don’t think there’s a… boundary between digital media and print media. Every magazine is doing an online version.
- Bill Gates
Only a company with great integrity and the resources to fight for what’s right can afford to take on the government.
- Jack Welch
War will find us whether we are ready or not.
- Winston Churchill
The more you talk about negative things in your life, the more you call them in. Speak victory not defeat.
- Joel Olsteen
God, I’m ready. I’m taking the limits off of You. I’m enlarging my vision. I may not see a way but I know You have a way. I declare I’m coming into a shift.
- Joel Olsteen
Nobody is going to delegate a lot of power to a secretary that they can’t control.
- Michael Bloomberg
For many of us, the happiest future is one that’s precisely like the past, except a little better.
- Seth Godin
Consumers, we’re too busy to pay attention to advertising, but we’re desperate to find good stuff that solves our problems.
- Seth Godin
When I was 7, I came up with the idea of ‘charm socks.’ My mom would take me to buy bags of plastic charms, we would sew them on frilly white socks, and I sold them at school.
- Sara Blakely
Just because an employee does things differently doesn’t mean he or she won’t do the job right or as well. If you establish expectations of the goal and the standards to follow, then methodology shouldn’t be an issue.
- Harvey Mackay
Customers are the reason we open our doors every day, and keep the machines humming all night long. Customers determine what we eat, where we live, whether we stay in business.
- Harvey Mackay
I’m not trying to follow a set of rules and stuff. I’m just living my life.
- Joel Olsteen
The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
It’s not enough to do good things. You have to let people know what you’re doing.
- Phil Knight
True joy comes when you inspire, encourage, and guide someone else on a path that benefits him or her.
- Zig Ziglar
We believe that it is better to give one a rod to fish rather than just dole out fish to them.
- Henry Sy
Being a stand-up is my mission in life; it’s my passion. My ongoing goal is to simply be funny, on my own, in front of a roomful of strangers.
- Jerry Seinfeld
London, a city where creativity and innovation have always flourished, provides a significant home for Starbucks and a significant gateway into Europe.
- Howard Schultz
When Sam feels a certain way, he is relentless. He will just wear you out. He will bring up an idea, and we’ll discuss it and then decide maybe that it’s not something we should be doing right now or ever. Fine. Case closed. But as long as he is convinced that it is the right thing, it just keep coming up week after week – until finally everybody capitulates and says, well it’s easier to do it than to keep fighting this fight. I guess it could be called management by wearing you down.
- David Glass
Do the hard jobs first. The easy jobs will take care of themselves.
- Dale Carnegie
Starbucks represents something beyond a cup of coffee.
- Howard Schultz
When we put $4 billion into the U.S. economy, they were OK with this. When we preserved jobs in Dearborn, or preserved jobs in Columbus, or preserved jobs in Pennsylvania, everyone was happy.
- Alexei Mordashov
We can’t have democracy if we’re having to protect you and our users from the government over stuff we’ve never had a conversation about. We need to know what the parameters are, what kind of surveillance the government is going to do, and how and why.
- Larry Page
