Notable Quotables

The successful warrior is the average man, with laser-like focus.

- Bruce Lee

A lovely nook of forest scenery, or a grand rock, like a beautiful woman, depends for much of its attractiveness upon the attendance sense of freedom from whatever is low; upon a sense of purity and of romance.

- P.T. Barnum

If it’s a good idea, someone has already probably thought about it first.

- Jack Nadel

One of the greatest failures to execute is the lack of follow-up. This seems so obvious, yet very few companies place as much emphasis on accountability as they do on figuring what they want to get done. Steve Reinemund, who was president of Pizza Hut when I was head of marketing there, is the best I’ve ever seen on this front. He always carried a three-by-five note card in his shirt pocket. When saw something that needed to be done, he’d pull out the card and write it down. Like everyone else who witnessed this, I quickly realized that I had better write down the same things because he’d surely be on me until they got done. Steve got results everywhere he went, whether it was as president of Pizzas Hut or Frito-Lay or chairman of PepsiCo, because he made a point of following up. People often lose track of what they’ve talked about in meetings of what they promised to do, but when you write it down, you won’t forget it.

- David Novak

Antitrust is the way that the government promotes markets when there are market failures. It has nothing to do with the idea of free information.

- Bill Gates

The ballplayer who loses his head can’t keep his cool, is worse than no ballplayer at all.

- Lou Gehrig

TweetDeck is a very interesting client, because it presents a view that no other client in the world presents, which is this multicolumn, massive amounts of information in one pane. And people really, really enjoy that.

- Jack Dorsey

Be careful about virtual relationships with artificially intelligent pieces of software.

- Larry Ellison

Businesses often forget the culture, and ultimately, they suffer for it because you can’t deliever good service from unhappy employees.

- Tony Hsieh

The opportunity of a lifetime is to pick yourself. Quit waiting to get picked; quit waiting for someone to give you permission; quit waiting for someone to say you are officially qualified and pick yourself. It doesn’t mean you have to be an entrepreneur or a freelancer, but it does mean you stand up and say, ‘I have something to say. I know how to do something. I’m doing it. If you want me to do it with you, raise your hand.

- Seth Godin

Our belief was that if we kept putting great products in front of customers, they would continue to open their wallets

- Steve Jobs

Wise men, when in doubt whether to speak or to keep quiet, give themselves the benefit of the doubt, and remain silent.

- Napoleon Hill

This book, then, is a product of the last fifteen years, as well as a product of the fifteen years that preceded them. It was almost exactly eight years before The E-Myth was published that I founded our company, E-Myth Worldwide, which has provided the fuel and experience for the point of view I have shared with those of you who have read The E-Myth, and with those.

- Michael Gerber

If it scares you, it might be a good thing to try.

- Seth Godin

I do think a founder has special permission to make sweeping changes across an organization.

- Michael Dell

Everybody starts with creating or acquiring certain property in order to create the material to work with. When we started our business, we thought first of all about development, how to grow, and we managed to do this, even with all the difficulties and all the difficult rules that were implemented in Russia at that time.

- Vladimir Potanin

My big advantage was to have my father accept me as first-generation.

- Mukesh Ambani

SpaceX has the potential of saving the U.S. government $1 billion a year. We are opposed to creating an entrenched monopoly with no realistic means for anyone to compete.

- Elon Musk

Our goal is not to build a platform, it’s to be cross all of them.

- Mark Zuckerberg

The average occupancy rate of the core investment properties of the group was maintained at a high level of 96%.

- Lee Shau Kee

When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.

- Oprah Winfrey

For me, my father was, and still is, a symbol of qualified persons in the Ministry of Foreign Trade under Soviet conditions.

- Vladimir Potanin

To do much clear thinking a person must arrange for regular periods of solitude when they can concentrate and indulge the imagination without distraction.

- Thomas Edison

There is no more important economic policy issue today than helping our nation remain the global innovation leader. To do this, our leadership must focus on an aggressive agenda to support math and science education, patent litigation reform, healthcare information technology, and research and development. We thank President Bush for his leadership and urge all members of Congress to address these issues in a comprehensive fashion to get the job done.

- John Chambers

‘I don’t know’ has become ‘I don’t know yet’.

- Bill Gates

I like football, but I think this is a very personal matter. I don’t see any negatives for some Russian rich man to buy a football club.

- Viktor Vekselberg

McDonald’s is a people business, and that smile on that counter girl’s face when she takes your order is a vital part of our image.

- Ray Kroc

In a world where wealth is growing, you can get away with printing money. Doubling the debt over the next 20 years is not a problem.

- Peter Thiel

What did I do that was right—and in what way could I have improved my performance? What lessons can I learn from that experience?

- Dale Carnegie

As Indian companies strive to be globally competitive, they have realized the importance of investing in information technology and networking to adapt quickly to rapidly shifting market transitions.

- John Chambers

I influence anybody who is able to get through the chaos of my first impression.

- Gary Vaynerchuk

There is a good saying to the effect that when a new book appears one should read an old one.

- Winston Churchill

People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people – and that social norm is just something that has evolved over time.

- Mark Zuckerberg

Worrying about the past or the future isn’t productive. When you start chastising yourself for past mistakes, or seeing disaster around every corner, stop and take a breath and ask yourself what you can do right now to succeed.

- Harvey Mackay

It takes the same effort to think small than to think big. But to think big frees you from the insignificant details.

- Jorge Paulo Lemann

Follow effective action with quiet reflection. From the quiet reflection will come even more effective action.

- Peter Drucker

I didn’t follow up on the exchanges we had on Time Warner Cable (TWC) that were mentioned in the media because we were not ready.

- Patrick Drahi

If Jesus were here today, he wouldn’t be riding around on a donkey. He’d be taking a plane, he’d be using the media.

- Joel Olsteen

If you can’t sleep, then get up and do something instead of lying there worrying. It’s the worry that gets you, not the lack of sleep.

- Dale Carnegie

The more you talk about negative things in your life, the more you call them in. Speak victory not defeat.

- Joel Olsteen

Americans reading the paper, listening to the news every single day, and all you hear is things are getting worse and worse. And that has a psychological effect on consumer confidence. That’s what consumer confidence is.

- Howard Schultz

China adopted a capitalist system in the 1980s, and they went from a 60% poverty rate to 10%.

- Bill Gates

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 love great music and art, but I think ‘cubist’ songs and paintings are hideous.

- Thomas Edison

It is predicated on the assumption that you dislike what you are doing during the most physically capable years of your life. This is a nonstarter—nothing can justify that sacrifice.

- Timothy Ferriss

While the uncertainties that the economic climate holds are a challenge for all companies, we are confident that by drawing from the strengths of our people, as well as on our core values of quality, initiative, trust and creativity, we will maintain our focus and strategic direction.

- Cheng Yu-tung

What I would say to young entrepreneurs is there’s so many moments in your life where you have these dreams, and people are trying to protect you, and they say, perhaps, friends, family, parents sometimes, they don’t agree with it, they think, ‘This is just too high of a hurdle.’ And I don’t agree with that.

- Howard Schultz

Management always bears in mind to ‘lend a hand’ to Hong Kong and Mainland China while we are working hard for shareholders’ benefits.

- Cheng Yu-tung

Remember happiness doesn’t depend upon who you are or what you have it depends solely on what you think.

- Dale Carnegie

Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.

- Stephen R. Covey

I say, don’t try to fight your own battles because God will do it.

- Joel Olsteen

The Group launched the ‘Create a New World for Children’ Corporate Alliance Campaign with UNICEF in August 2003 to help and ease the plight of the underprivileged in our society. We both share the same commitment in creating a better environment for disadvantaged children and improving their education opportunities.

- Cheng Yu-tung

If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favourable reference to the devil in the House of Commons.

- Winston Churchill

For 20-plus years I looked at thousands of storyboard for corporate and product ads, and I never allowed one advertisement on the air that I didn’t like.

- Jack Welch

In energy, you have to plan and do research way in advance, sometimes decades in advance to get a new system that’s safer, doesn’t require us to go around the world to get all our oil.

- Bill Gates

It’s not how much money you make, but how much money you keep, how hard it works for you, and how many generations you keep it for.

- Robert Kiyosaki

American Dream – and it says that you should graduate from high school, graduate from college, get married, find a job with good benefits, have sex with your spouse two times per week, buy a home with a mortgage, get a pet, go on vacation two times per year, have two kids, invest in mutual funds and IRAs, recycle when possible, and aim to retire early in your mid-fifties to early sixties, if you are lucky. I don’t know about you, but for me it’s kind of hard to be passionate about that American Dream.

- Clay Clark

We want to do a lot of stuff, we’re not in great shape. We didn’t get a good night’s sleep. We’re a little depressed. Coffee solves all these problems in one delightful little cup.

- Jerry Seinfeld

We have the brand, and we have the fulfillment capability. Now we had to get the Net, and that’s the easiest part of the game,

- Jack Welch

No institution can possibly survive if it needs geniuses or supermen to manage it. It must be organized in such a way as to be able to get along under a leadership composed of average human beings.

- Peter Drucker

Without a sense of fairness and justice, no leader can command and retain the respect of his followers.

- Napoleon Hill

Netscape was able to get the government working on its behalf.

- Bill Gates

You’ve got to eat while you dream. You’ve got to deliver on short-range commitments, while you develop a long-range strategy and vision and implement it. The success of doing both. Walking and chewing gum if you will. Getting it done in the short-range, and delivering a long-range plan, and executing on that.

- Jack Welch

When I was little, I wanted to be an astronomer, but that didn’t happen.

- Ma Huateng

Don’t be intimidated as you design your pitch. The fact is that nobody will come to you at first. You must be the aggressor, or you will not be heard.

- Michael Levine

When I was a CEO, the books on management that I read weren’t very much help after the first few months on the job. They were all designed to give you directions on how not to screw up your company.

- Ben Horowitz

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

Use technology to remind people that we are really human and civilization is meant to connect together. Civilization is meant to be easy, and the technology to completely disappear. And should be easy to pick up.

- Jack Dorsey

It occurs to me, Jim, that you spend too much time trying to be interesting. Why don’t you invest more time being interested?

- James C. Collins

The question is not, ‘Do you have a problem?’ The question is, ‘Does the problem have you? ‘

- Joel Olsteen

You should know now that a man of knowledge lives by acting, not by thinking about acting, not by thinking about what he will think when he has finished acting. A man of knowledge chooses a path with heart and follows it.

- Carlos Castaneda

Marriage is like a game of chess except the board is flowing water, the pieces are made of smoke and no move you make will have any effect on the outcome.

- Jerry Seinfeld

A product is viral if its core functionality encourages users to invite their friends to become users too.

- Peter Thiel

Sometimes even to live is an act of courage.

- Seneca

Do not swallow anything Satan is trying to ram down your throat. Jesus comes first.

- Joel Olsteen

Incineration does not equal human digestion, eating a fireplace log will not store the same number of calories as burning one will produce.

- Timothy Ferriss

Many of our best opportunities were created out of necessity. The things that we were forced to learn and do, because we started out underfinanced and undercapitalized in these remote small communities, contributed mightily to the way we’ve grown as a company. Had we been capitalized, or had we been the offshoot of a large corporation the way I wanted to be, we might not ever have tried…

- Sam Walton

We appreciate size, but only if it is robust growth. Just to be big is not a target.

- Alexei Mordashov

When you look at the dark side, careful you must be. For the dark side looks back.

- Yoda

If you have 50 different plug types, appliances wouldn’t be available and would be very expensive. But once an electric outlet becomes standardized, many companies can design appliances, and competition ensues, creating variety and better prices for consumers.

- Bill Gates

The Chinese people have always been determined to forge ahead.

- Cheng Yu-tung

Execution begins with a vision and your people saying, I understand it. I’m excited about it. I can help make it happen.

- David Novak

I think that maybe inside any business, there is someone slowly going crazy.

- Michael Gerber

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