Think about how Google talks about its business. It certainly doesn’t claim to be a monopoly.
- Peter Thiel
Notable Quotables
We can’t wait for Washington. Business leaders are going to have to galvanize their own constituencies and do everything they can to demonstrate confidence in the economy, and I think that can be contagious.
- Howard Schultz
The Costa Rican government is prioritizing laying fiber optic over paving roads. Costa Rica is trying to become one of the Internet societies. This is happening throughout the world.
- Reed Hastings
Great companies are built on great products.
- Elon Musk
We cannot take for granted that the future will be better, and that means we need to work to create it today.
- Peter Thiel
Peter Drucker once observed that the drive for mergers and acquisitions comes less from sound reasoning and more from the fact that doing deals is a much more exciting way to spend your day than doing actual work.
- James C. Collins
Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that
- Martin Luther King Jr.
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
Wanamaker learned this lesson early, but I personally had to blunder through this old world for a third of a century before it even began to dawn upon me that ninety-nine times out of a hundred, people don’t criticise themselves for anything no matter how wrong it may be.
- Dale Carnegie
Our schools are not teaching students to think. It is astonishing how many young people have difficulty in putting their brains definitely and systematically to work….
- Thomas Edison
I’ve actually made a prediction that within 30 years a majority of new cars made in the United States will be electric. And I don’t mean hybrid, I mean fully electric.
- Elon Musk
If I wish to compose or write or pray or preach well, I must be angry. Then all the blood in my veins is stirred, and my understanding is sharpened.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
I mean, we’ve built a lot of products that we think are good, and will help people share photos and share videos and write messages to each other. But it’s really all about how people are spreading Facebook around the world in all these different countries. And that’s what’s so amazing about the scale that it’s at today.
- Mark Zuckerberg
If they really don’t want to buy the flats, I’ll take their deposits.
- Lee Shau Kee
Surround yourself only with those that uplift you.
- Oprah Winfrey
Every day is a gift from God. There’s no guarantee of tomorrow, so that tells me to see the good in this day to make the most of it.
- Joel Olsteen
Word of mouth works now, much more than ever. @-reply every single person.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
Out of clutter, find simplicity.
- Albert Einstein
It is very difficult to get people to focus on the most important things when you’re in boom times.
- Jeff Bezos
The CIA will only hire people with impeccable credentials to be a translator. ‘Impeccable credentials’ means you’ve never lived outside the United States.
- Michael Bloomberg
If people look inward, they would see the opportunities for greatness.
- Aliko Dangote
When you throw dirt at people, you’re not doing a thing but losing ground.
- Zig Ziglar
There’s no mystery in business success. If you do each day’s task successfully and stay faithfully within these natural operations of commercial laws which I talk so much about and keep your head clear, you will come out all right.
- John D. Rockefeller
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’ is a good one because it not only turned out, I think, to be a really funny movie but it was also a delight to shoot. We were in the South of France, working with Glenne Headly and Michael Caine and Frank Oz the director – who were just fun.
- Steve Martin
The problem we have with America is that you come over here and want to make a deal. We meet you and want to form a relationship from which we can make a deal. We meet you and want to form a relationship from which we can make many deals. Most importantly and the basis of everything is that we have a relationship where we honor and trust each other.
- Akio Morita
Don’t say anything you can’t prove.
- Jerry Vass
Wanda and Reliance are two of the largest private conglomerates in their respective countries. By joining our strengths together, we hope our cooperation will bring mutual benefits and great results.
- Wang Jianlin
The truth of Moore’s law has made remarkable things possible. On the software side, I think natural user interfaces in all their forms are equally significant.
- Bill Gates
Practice what you preach
- Tony Hsieh
What nerds miss is that it takes hard work to make sales look easy.
- Peter Thiel
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
[In 1998] The Nike product has become synonymous with slave wages, forced overtime, and arbitrary abuse.
- Phil Knight
It is very important to grasp that Level 5 leadership is not just about humility and modesty. It is equally about ferocious resolve, an almost stoic determination to do whatever needs to be done to make the company great.
- James C. Collins
God wouldn’t have given you the dream unless He already had a way to bring it to pass.
- Joel Olsteen
There is a difference between what technology enables and what historical business practices enable.
- Bill Gates
For many people, extended reading sessions on an LCD display cause eyestrain.
- Jeff Bezos
Bad psychoanalysis would say I enjoyed pleasing people, working really hard and pleasing people, which is probably related to my father in some way. But I really liked working hard. When I worked at Disneyland, I’d do 12 hours straight and go home thrilled.
- Steve Martin
Money will buy you a bed, but not a good night’s sleep, a house, but not a home, a companion, but not a friend.
- Zig Ziglar
Entrepreneurs are always biased to understate the scale of competition, but that is the biggest mistake a startup can make.
- Peter Thiel
The thorough man of business knows that only by years of patient, unremitting attention to affairs can he earn his reward, which is the result, not of chance, but of well-devised means for the attainment to ends.
- Andrew Carnegie
This the real world, homie, school finished They done stole your dreams, you dunno who did it.
- Kanye West
Poor people ride the bus, because they value money more than time.
- Robert Kiyosaki
Eventually we’ll be able to sequence the human genome and replicate how nature did intelligence in a carbon-based system.
- Bill Gates
Death is a natural part of life. Rejoice for those around you who transform into the Force. Mourn them do not. Miss them do not. Attachment leads to jealously. The shadow of greed, that is.
- Yoda
Reviewing what you have learned and learning anew, you are fit to be a teacher.
- Confucius
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
India has over 20 percent of the kids born in the world. And they move around a lot.
- Bill Gates
The idea is to have relationships where you make money and the other guy makes money, too. That’s how a business keeps its team together.
- Russell Simmons
Change almost never fails because it’s too early. It almost always fails because it’s too late.
- Seth Godin
One thing only I know, and that is that I know nothing.
- Dale Carnegie
The three things that are most essential to achievement are common sense, hard work and stick-to-it-iv-ness…..
- Thomas Edison
Yes, I think it’s okay to abandon the big, established, stuck tribe. It’s okay to say to them, “You’re not going where I need to go, and there’s no way I’m going to persuade all of you to follow me. So rather than standing here watching the opportunities fade away, I’m heading off. I’m betting some of you, the best of you, will follow me.
- Seth Godin
The funny thing is people won’t let me pay for things. I’ll be in a restaurant and the manager will say, ‘Oh nom it’s on the house.’
- Richard Branson
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
Success (a win) doesn’t make you, and failure (a loss) doesn’t make you.
- Zig Ziglar
If you are starting a business I believe it has to be your passion.
- David Robinson
You have to be a crazy guy and a little eccentric to be very successful.
- Tadashi Yanai
Socialism needs to pull down wealth; liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests, Liberalism would preserve [them] … by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels of privilege and preference. Socialism assails the preeminence of the individual; Liberalism seeks … to build up a minimum standard for the mass. Socialism exalts the rule; Liberalism exalts the man. Socialism attacks capitalism; Liberalism attacks monopoly.
- Winston Churchill
You cannot let where you are today cause you to get stuck. I’m going to be my best right now. That’s what faith is all about.
- Joel Olsteen
On my desk I have three screens, synchronized to form a single desktop. I can drag items from one screen to the next. Once you have that large display area, you’ll never go back, because it has a direct impact on productivity.
- Bill Gates
But innovation and change make inordinate time demands on the executive. All one can think and do in a short time is to think what one already knows and to do as one has always done.
- Peter Drucker
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.
- Peter Thiel
Eventually, all companies are replaced.
- Bill Gates
If the rate of change on the outside exceeds the rate of change on the inside, the end is near.
- Jack Welch
Good shareholder activists have incredible interest in the company because they own a lot of it.
- Ben Horowitz
Great opportunities can be and have been created during tough economic times.
- Howard Schultz
Pity may represent little more than the impersonal concern which prompts the mailing of a check, but true sympathy is the personal concern which demands the giving of one’s soul.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
History recalls the remarkable resilience of the territory’s people.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Any great founders need to get out of the way of the company.
- Jack Dorsey
Level 5 leaders channel their ego needs away from themselves and into the larger goal of building a great company. It’s not that Level 5 leaders have no ego or self-interest. Indeed, they are incredibly ambitious—but their ambition is first and foremost for the institution, not themselves.
- James C. Collins
Every worthwhile accomplishment, big or little, has its stages of drudgery and triumph: a beginning, a struggle and a victory.
- Mahatma Gandhi
The power of man has grown in every sphere, except over himself.
- Winston Churchill
Politics are close to me, but there are different ways of participating in politics.
- Vagit Alekperov
The first is the result of a decision to act—to do something. This type of mistake is made with incomplete information, as it’s impossible to have all the facts beforehand. This is to be encouraged. Fortune favors the bold. The second is the result of a decision of sloth—to not do something—wherein we refuse to change a bad situation out of fear despite having all the facts. This is how learning experiences become terminal punishments, bad relationships become bad marriages, and poor job choices become lifelong prison sentences.
- Timothy Ferriss
Healthy citizens are the greatest asset any country can have.
- Winston Churchill
If inflation-adjusted interest rates decline in a given country, its currency is likely to decline.
- Ray Dalio
The slower growth in revenues and continued pressure on margins will result in negative earnings comparison for at least the next two quarters, with fiscal 1998 earnings per share likely to be in the 2 to 2.15 range.
- Phil Knight
We will be one of the most productive residential developers in China in the next few years.
- Lee Shau Kee
EVERYBODY SELLS Nerds might wish that distribution could be ignored and salesmen banished to another planet. All of us want to believe that we make up our own minds, that sales doesn’t work on us. But it’s not true. Everybody has a product to sell—no matter whether you’re an employee, a founder, or an investor. It’s true even if your company consists of just you and your computer. Look around. If you don’t see any salespeople, you’re the salesperson.
- Peter Thiel
As CEO, you should have an opinion on absolutely everything. You should have an opinion on every forecast, every product plan, every presentation, and even every comment. Let people know what you think. If you like someone’s comment, give her the feedback. If you disagree, give her the feedback. Say what you think. Express yourself.
- Ben Horowitz
The Beatles created something that never trailed off. What a gift that was to their fans. If you’re into the Beatles, you loved them from beginning to end.
- Jerry Seinfeld
I’m an entrepreneur first and a wine critic second.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
In 20 years from now we will all be able to click and watch TV.
- Reed Hastings
Applause is a receipt, not a bill.
- Dale Carnegie
He who lives by the crystal ball will eat shattered glass.
- Ray Dalio
Until we’re educating every kid in a fantastic way, until every inner city is cleaned up, there is no shortage of things to do.
- Bill Gates
If You Want to Gather Honey, Don’t Kick Over the Beehive.
- Dale Carnegie
I cut the feet off of a pair of panty hose and it allowed me to wear a pair of great strappy sandals. I didn’t see lines but the hose rolled up at my feet – and that’s how Spanx born.
- Sara Blakely
AP pleaded guilty to criminal theft of our software. Let me be clear. I’m not accusing SAP of anything. What did SAP do? Did you engage in criminal behavior and steal lots of Oracle software? Yes. That’s SAP. Who was CEO when you were doing all this criminal stuff? Leo.
- Larry Ellison
It is a very big exaggeration to say I am a friend of Mr. Putin.
- Alexei Mordashov
God never promised that we wouldn’t have challenges. In fact, He said just the opposite. His word says, ‘Be truly glad!…these trials are only to test your faith, to see whether or not it is strong and pure…’ so if your faith remains strong after being tried in the test tube of fiery trials, it will bring you much praise and glory and honor on the day of His return.
- Joel Olsteen
Well we know that people in Austrailia love the idea of both Impulse and Virgin Blue getting up and adding a bit of competition, and it’s fun to be able to deliver it.
- Richard Branson
You hit what you aim at, and if you aim at nothing you will hit it every time.
- Zig Ziglar
The secret to modern life is finding the measure in time management. I have two kids, career and I travel, and I don’t think my life is any different than most couples. The most valuable commodity now for many people is time and how to parcel that out.
- Hugh Jackman
We just sort of factor all that information into the computer between the ears and come up with conclusions.
- Phil Knight
In almost every area of human endeavor, the practice improves over time. That hasn’t been the case for teaching.
- Bill Gates
What you are will show in what you do.
- Thomas Edison
If you give a good thing to the world, then over time your karma will be good, and you’ll receive good.
- Russell Simmons
Take unorthodox ideas seriously today, and the mainstream sees that as a sign of progress. We can be glad that there are fewer crazy cults now, yet that gain has come at great cost: we have given up our sense of wonder at secrets left to be discovered.
- Peter Thiel
If you can’t be remarkable, perhaps you should consider doing nothing until you can.
- Seth Godin
