Notable Quotables

The pent-up demand for the good life in China is extraordinary.

- Stephen Wynn

My parents really wanted me to get out of New York, be exposed to other people, other ways of life.

- Howard Schultz

Your first mistake might be assuming that people are rational.Your second mistake could be assuming that people are eager for change.And the marketer’s third mistake is assuming that once someone knows things the way you know them, they will choose what you chose.

- Seth Godin

“Trust me.” That’s what a CEO says every day to her employees. Trust me: This will be a good company. Trust me: This will be good for your career. Trust me: This will be good for your life. A layoff breaks that trust. In order to rebuild trust, you have to come clean.

- Ben Horowitz

To be Jedi is to face the truth, and choose. Give off light, or darkness, Padawan. Be a candle, or the night.

- Yoda

Frank Wells 1888 instruction to his agents: The most polite and gentlemanly treatment of all customers, however insignificant in their business, is insisted upon. Proper respect must be shown to all – let them be men, women or children, rich or poor, white or black – it must not be forgotten, that the company is dependent on these people for its business.

- Frank Wells

I have always regarded Paine as one of the greatest of all Americans. Never have we had a sounder intelligence in this republic … It was my good fortune to encounter Thomas Paine’s works in my boyhood … it was, indeed, a revelation to me to read that great thinker’s views on political and theological subjects. Paine educated me, then, about many matters of which I had never before thought. I remember, very vividly, the flash of enlightenment that shone from Paine’s writings, and I recall thinking, at that time, ‘What a pity these works are not today the schoolbooks for all children!’ My interest in Paine was not satisfied by my first reading of his works. I went back to them time and again, just as I have done since my boyhood days.

- Thomas Edison

And here is the prime condition of success, the great secret. Concentrate your energy, thoughts and capital exclusively upon the business in which you are engaged in. Having begun in one line, resolve to fight it out on that line; to lead in it. Adopt every improvement, have the best machinery and know the most about it.

- Andrew Carnegie

American democracy is spoiled by people buying everything in sight and then selling and buying everything in sight, including our politicians.

- Russell Simmons

The time to look for a new job is when you don’t need one. The time to switch jobs is before it feels comfortable.

- Seth Godin

Every day were saying, ‘How can we keep this customer happy?’ How can we get ahead in innovation by doing this, because if we don’t, somebody else will.

- Bill Gates

If you are satisfied with the results you are now getting, why change? If you are not satisfied, why not experiment?

- Dale Carnegie

Mankind has never been in this position before. Without having improved appreciably in virtue or enjoying wiser guidance, it has got into its hands for the first time the tools by which it can unfailingly accomplish its own extermination. That is the point in human destinies to which all the glories and toils of men have at last led them. They would do well to pause and ponder upon their new responsibilities. Death stands at attention, obedient, expectant, ready to serve, ready to shear away the peoples en masse; ready, if called on, to pulverise, without hope of repair, what is left of civilisation. He awaits only the word of command. He awaits it from a frail, bewildered being, long his victim, now—for one occasion only—his Master.

- Winston Churchill

After its return to China, Hong Kong has become an inseparable part of this large country by exerting its business strengths to become a vital member of the country and developing its four pillar industries, namely finance, commerce, shipping and professional services.

- Cheng Yu-tung

I’m going to save my public voice largely for the issues where I have some depth.

- Bill Gates

The space shuttle was often used as an example of why you shouldn’t even attempt to make something reusable. But one failed experiment does not invalidate the greater goal. If that was the case, we’d never have had the light bulb.

- Elon Musk

Mr. Carnegie’s Master Mind group consisted of a staff of approximately 50 men, with whom he surrounded himself, for the definiteness purpose of manufacturing and marketing steel. He attributed his entire fortune to the POWER he accumulated through this Master Mind…Great POWER CAN BE ACCUMULATED THROUGH NO OTHER PRINCIPLE.

- Napoleon Hill

Consensus decisions about executives almost always sway the process away from strength and toward lack of weakness.

- Ben Horowitz

All a bliss state like California does is spoil you.

- Phil Knight

A company should limit its growth based on its ability to attract enough of the right people.

- James C. Collins

The Benefits are about the Buyer’s stuff – what your products or services do for Buyers. Do the Benefits make them feel better about life – give them power; make them sexier, prettier, richer, more comfortable or secure, smarter, more competitive? Do they save time, money, fear or hassle?

- Jerry Vass

I have seen firsthand that agricultural science has enormous potential to increase the yields of small farmers and lift them out of hunger and poverty.

- Bill Gates

Being the first mover doesn’t do you any good if someone else comes along and unseats you. It’s much better to be the last mover—that is, to make the last great development in a specific market and enjoy years or even decades of monopoly profits.

- Peter Thiel

A good deed, said the prophet Mohammed, is one that brings a smile of joy to the face of another.Why will doing a good deed every day produce such astounding efforts on the doer?Because trying to please others will cause us to stop thinking of ourselves: the verything that produces worry and fear and melancholia.

- Dale Carnegie

The revolutionary breakthrough will come with rockets that are fully and rapidly reusable. We will never conquer Mars unless we do that. It’ll be too expensive. The American colonies would never have been pioneered if the ships that crossed the ocean hadn’t been reusable.

- Elon Musk

Money won’t make you have, but it will pay for the search.

- Prince

I’m in two modes when I’m on Lanai: In engineering mode, I’m trying to find the right place for the reservoir and the desalination plant, and looking at designs for new hotel rooms. The rest of the time, I’m in decompression mode. I’m on Hulopoe Beach, going for a swim, or on my paddleboard surrounded by 100 spinner dolphins.

- Larry Ellison

Frequently I’ll be interviewing with somebody or talking and in about 15 minutes they’ll interrupt me mid-stream and say, ‘Oh my God, you’re nothing like I’d thought you’d be.’

- Larry Ellison

The perfect target market for a startup is a small group of particular people concentrated together and served by few or no competitors. Any big market is a bad choice, and a big market already served by competing companies is even worse. This is why it’s always a red flag when entrepreneurs talk about getting 1% of a $100 billion market. In practice, a large market will either lack a good starting point or it will be open to competition, so it’s hard to ever reach that 1%. And even if you do succeed in gaining a small foothold, you’ll have to be satisfied with keeping the lights on: cutthroat competition means your profits will be zero.

- Peter Thiel

I’m sorry that we have to have a Washington presence. We thrived during our first 16 years without any of this. I never made a political visit to Washington and we had no people here. It wasn’t on our radar screen. We were just making great software.

- Bill Gates

We’re absolutely going to have a better facility.

- Ed Clark

The other buzzword that epitomizes a bias toward substitution is “big data.” Today’s companies have an insatiable appetite for data, mistakenly believing that more data always creates more value. But big data is usually dumb data. Computers can find patterns that elude humans, but they don’t know how to compare patterns from different sources or how to interpret complex behaviors. Actionable insights can only come from a human analyst (or the kind of generalized artificial intelligence that exists only in science fiction).

- Peter Thiel

I broke into an industry that was completely money-focused. Nobody was paying attention to the women and thinking about how these undergarments felt, or how they fit…All of a sudden I showed up and charged more for one pair than anybody can comprehendand women lined up in droves to buy them. I think I left the industry in show, but I really believed that we needed to make it better not cheaper.

- Sara Blakely

I’d like to dial it back 5% or 10% and try to have a vacation that’s not just e-mail with a view.

- Elon Musk

My supply of Scotch caution never has been small; but I was apparently something of a daredevil now and then to the manufacturing fathers of Pittsburgh. They were old and I was young, which made all the difference.

- Andrew Carnegie

I never thought much about success early on. I only thought about being a comedian – or just being in show business, is really more accurate.

- Steve Martin

The good-to-great leaders never wanted to become larger-than-life heroes. They never aspired to be put on a pedestal or become unreachable icons. They were seemingly ordinary people quietly producing extraordinary results.

- James C. Collins

I read the paper every day and the Bible every day, that way I know what both sides are up to.

- Zig Ziglar

The future of America is not an entitlement. We have been given a treasure chest of gifts and opportunities, but some people are being left behind, and success is not sustainable unless it is shared.

- Howard Schultz

Don’t solicit feedback on your product, your idea, or your business just for validation purposes. Be really careful about that. You want to tell the people that can help move your idea forward. But if you’re just looking to your friend, coworker, husband, wife, for validation, be careful. Because out of love… a lot of people will express some concerns, and it can stop a lot of multi-million dollar ideas right in their tracks.

- Sara Blakely

Transparency in the traditional school might destroy it.

- Seth Godin

When a man has accumulated a sum of money, accumulated it within the law, the Government has no right to share in its earnings.

- John D. Rockefeller

There may be times when you just have to love people from a distance.

- Joel Olsteen

There are some people that can get things done, and it seems there are others who just can’t. That’s why we move heaven and earth to retain our stars and the main reason we manage out our lowest performers – the bottom 10% at least – each year.

- David Novak

The dream in your heart may be bigger than the environment in which you find yourself.

- Joel Olsteen

Tomorrow is only found in the calendar of fools.

- Og Mandino

I kept saying, Sam, we’re making a good living. Why go out why expand so much more? The stores are getting farther and farther away. After the seventeenth store, though, I realized there wasn’t going to any stopping it.

- Helen Walton

Converting a decision into action requires answering several distinct questions: Who has to know of this decision? What action has to be taken? Who is to take it? And what does the action have to be so that the people who have to do it can do it? The first and the last of these are too often overlooked—with dire results.

- Peter Drucker

About 80% of our locations are second-generation. In other words, the building used to be, say, a Wal-Mart that moved out to become a Super Wal-Mart, or a Kmart that closed. It seems that such a site becomes available almost every year in every city.

- David Green

The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.

- Vince Lombardi

Growth demands a temporary surrender of security. It may mean giving up familiar but limiting patterns, safe but unrewarding work, values no longer believed in, and relationships that have lost their meaning.

- John C. Maxwell

It’s hard to improve public education – that’s clear.

- Bill Gates

I like sports, and I enjoy playing basketball and lifting weights.

- Joel Olsteen

You have to learn to follow your heart. You can’t let other people pressure you into being something that you’re not. If you want God’s favor in your life, you must be the person He made you to be, not the person your boss wants you to be, not even the person your parents or your husband wants you to be. You can’t let outside expectations keep you from following your own heart.

- Joel Olsteen

The final relationship that cannot be ignored is with disrupters: They are individuals who cause trouble for sport – inciting opposition to management for a variety of reasons, most of them petty. Usually these people have good performance – that’s their cover – and so they are endured or appeased. A company that manages people well takes disrupters head-on. First they give them very tough evaluations, naming their bad behaviour and demanding it change. Usually it won’t. Disrupters are a personality type. If that’s the case, get them out of the way of people trying to do their jobs. They’re poison.

- Jack Welch

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

Anyone that makes me a quarter of a billion dollars, I like.

- Carl Icahn

Decisiveness is a characteristic of high performing men and women. Almost any decision is better than no decision at all.

- Brian Tracy

Many leaders of big organizations, I think, don’t believe that change is possible. But if you look at history, things do change, and if your business is static, you’re likely to have issues.

- Larry Page

Everyone has the potential to become an encourager. You don’t have to be rich. You don’t have to be a genius. You don’t have to have it all together. All you have to do is care about people and initiate.

- John C. Maxwell

If the employees fundamentally trust the C.E.O., then communications will be vastly more efficient than if they don’t. Telling things as they are is a critical part of building this trust.

- Ben Horowitz

The United States is definitely ahead in culture of innovation. If someone wants to accomplish great things, there is no better place than the U.S.

- Elon Musk

We were old sinners – but when we came to Christ we are not sinners anymore.

- Joel Olsteen

The price of success is hard work, dedication to the job at hand, and the determination that whether we win or lose, we have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand.

- Vince Lombardi

We don’t have the luxury of time. We spend more because of how we live, but it’s important to be with our family and friends.

- Sara Blakely

One who knows God is going to bless them, despite the fact that they have no idea how to actually raise capital or solve a real problem that people have in exchange for monetary compensation. They love the idea of business ownership, yet fear working, as though doing any actual work or rendering any tangible service or product might ruin their lives on this planet and for eternity.

- Clay Clark

Talent is God-given, be humble. Fame is man-given, be thankful. Conceit is self-given, be careful.

- Harvey Mackay

I didn’t invent the hamburger. I just took it more seriously than anyone else…We take the hamburger business more seriously than anyone else.

- Ray Kroc

Well, yes, I’ve fired a lot of people. Generally I like other people to fire, because it’s always a lousy task. But I have fired many people.

- Donald Trump

There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth. Not going all the way, and not starting.

- Siddhartha Gautama

Before I left China, I was educated that China was the richest, happiest country in the world. So when I arrived Australia, I thought, ‘Oh my God, everything is different from what I was told.’ Since then, I started to think differently.

- Jack Ma

Don’t go into the new year holding a grudge from last year. Leave the hurts and disappointments behind.

- Joel Olsteen

Said another way, the Entrepreneurial Model has less to do with what’s done in a business and more to do with how it’s done. The commodity isn’t what’s important—the way it’s delivered is. When The Entrepreneur creates the model.

- Michael Gerber

There is only one way… to get anybody to do anything. And that is by making the other person want to do it.

- Dale Carnegie

That’s your opportunity–to approach your work in a way that generates unique learning and interactions that are worth sharing.

- Seth Godin

Fortunately, problems are an everyday part of our life. Consider this: If there were no problems, most of us would be unemployed.

- Zig Ziglar

Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals.

- Martin Luther King Jr.

Many people who I respected were disappointed when I started ‘Wine Library TV.’ They thought I was dumbing down wine, but I always knew I was one of the biggest producers of new wine drinkers in the world, and people are realizing it now.

- Gary Vaynerchuk

K to 12 is partly about babysitting the kids so the parents can do other things.

- Bill Gates

I believe that sex is one of the most beautiful, natural, wholesome things that money can buy.

- Steve Martin

It’s different when you’re trying to turn something around, especially something that you built, at a time when so many constituents – the media, Wall Street, competitors, ex-employees – are all saying that Starbucks’s best days are behind it, and that Schultz is never going to be able to bring it back.

- Howard Schultz

No slovenly, careless person can become a successful leader. Leadership calls for respect. Followers will not respect a leader who does not grade high on all of the factors of a Pleasing Personality.

- Napoleon Hill

The past is prophetic in that it asserts loudly that wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.

- Martin Luther King Jr.

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