The first quality that is needed is audacity.
- Winston Churchill
Notable Quotables
Churchill kept perspective on the crowds that gathered to hear him speak by conceding they would be twice as big if gathered to see him hanged.
- Winston Churchill
We saw strength across our core switching and routing businesses, as well as traction in our advanced technologies. The service provider and public sector segments, in particular, continue to be solid markets for our products.
- John Chambers
Expect to make some mistakes when you try new and different approaches. Sometimes colossal failures lead to spectacular successes.
- Harvey Mackay
You can abuse me, you can strike me, so long as you let me have my own.
- Ron Chernow
Anyone, even a child, can be taught to develop a positive mental attitude. The method is to repeat positive affirmations such as: Day by day, in every way, through the grace of God, I am getting better and better.
- Napoleon Hill
I know of nothing more despicable and pathetic than a man who devotes all the hours of the waking day to the making of money for money’s sake.
- John D. Rockefeller
Just in terms of allocation of time resources, religion is not very efficient. There’s a lot more I could be doing on a Sunday morning.
- Bill Gates
Before you can be sure of your ability to transmute DESIRE into its equivalent, you will require SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE of the service, merchandise or profession which you intend to offer in return for fortune.
- Napoleon Hill
I get calls from everybody asking if I know of any drivers, anybody they can hire.
- Jack Taylor
Failure will never overtake me if my determination to succeed is strong enough.
- Og Mandino
Too often the investment in people stops there.
- Ben Horowitz
Failure is not attached to outcome, but in not trying. This way, it is about answering to yourself.
- Sara Blakely
I always seem to get inspiration and renewed vitality by contact with this great novel land of yours which sticks up out of the Atlantic.
- Winston Churchill
The dream in your heart may be bigger than the environment in which you find yourself.
- Joel Olsteen
In order to become rich, you need to learn to build systems that can work without you. .
- Robert Kiyosaki
Fortunately for India, it has got a growing economy. If it is doing the right things with taxation and focusing on the right areas for human development, it is going to have no problem, over a period of time, taking care of its own needs.
- Bill Gates
The balloons only have one life and the only way of finding out whether they work is to attempt to fly around the world.
- Richard Branson
The mistake that’s so easy to make is to get greedy as you choose your hive, to say, “this product is for everyone” or “anyone can benefit from this idea.” Well, there are seven billion people on the planet, so it’s unlikely your comment is correct; even if it is, there’s little chance that a virus would spread across a hive that big.
- Seth Godin
There is a hidden blessing in the most traumatic things we go through in our lives. My brain always goes to, ‘Where is the hidden blessing? What is my gift?
- Sara Blakely
Stopped they must be; on this all depends. Only a fully-trained Jedi Knight, with the Force as his ally, will conquer Vader and his Emperor.
- Yoda
Efficiency is doing the thing right. Effectiveness is doing the right thing.
- Peter Drucker
Checking the results of a decision against its expectations shows executives what their strengths are, where they need to improve, and where they lack knowledge or information.
- Peter Drucker
Cherish your visions and dreams as they are the children of your soul. The blueprints of your ultimate achievements.
- Napoleon Hill
Be a coach, instead of being a boss. Rather than tell people what to do, a leader helps team members figure it out for themselves. That way, when it’s time for them to take the training wheels off, they’ll have some experience to draw on. That’s the way it was with me and Andy. We were working together, I felt like I was making all the decisions even though he had the title
- David Novak
Diligence is the mother of good luck.
- Benjamin Franklin
I would call lack of candor the biggest dirty little secret in business, basically blocks smart ideas, fast action, and good people contributing all the stuff they’ve got. It’s a killer.
- Jack Welch
Once you create and dominate a niche market, then you should gradually expand into related and slightly broader markets. Amazon shows how it can be done. Jeff Bezos’s founding vision was to dominate all of online retail, but he very deliberately started with books. There were millions of books to catalog, but they all had roughly the same shape, they were easy to ship, and some of the most rarely sold books—those least profitable for any retail store to keep in stock—also drew the most enthusiastic customers. Amazon became the dominant solution for anyone located far from a bookstore or seeking something unusual. Amazon then had two options: expand the number of people who read books, or expand to adjacent markets. They chose the latter, starting with the most similar markets: CDs, videos, and software. Amazon continued to add categories gradually until it had become the world’s general store. The name itself brilliantly encapsulated the company’s scaling strategy.
- Peter Thiel
Poker is a game where you don’t have to have the best hand to win. Poker is really reading other people and reading human emotion, which certainly comes into play in business.
- Charles Ergen
Teachers started recognizing me and praising me for being smart in science and that made me want to be even smarter in science!
- Steve Wozniak
(In reference to one of his first advertising sales mentors Howard Davis)… He was 6 foot 4 with silver hair…the quintessential advertising guy. He had a glass topped desk in his office because, as he put it, he like to be able to look down and see his Guccis while he worked. Howard taught me to get things done. He was very smart but he was also an animal. He exuded power and he could be very intimidating, and he knew how to use his power to get results while still managing to be a good guy. Howard’s personal style was very different from my own, but what he did teach me was how to create a sense of urgency, how to motivate performance by getting everyone’s heart pounding.
- David Novak
Happiness is found in doing, not merely possessing.
- Napoleon Hill
I flunked my exam for university two times before I was accepted by what was considered my city’s worst university, Hangzhou Teachers University. I was studying to be a high school English teacher. In my university, I was elected student chairman and later became chairman of the city’s Students Federation.
- Jack Ma
Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.
- Samuel Beckett
You probably can’t be the Google of 2014 in terms of compensation or perks, but you can be like the Google of 1999 if you already have good answers about your mission and team.
- Peter Thiel
There are only two ways to influence human behavior: you can manipulate it or you can inspire it.
- Simon Sinek
Success is one thing you can’t pay for. You buy it on the installment plan and make payments every day.
- Zig Ziglar
If everything seems under control, you’re just not going fast enough.
- Mario Andretti
We all know now that the 747 became the flagship jumbo jet of the airline industry, but the decision looks much different from the perspective of the late 1960s. Yet—and this is the key point—Boeing was willing to make the bold move in the face of the risks. As in Boeing’s case, the risks do not always come without pain.
- James C. Collins
The best leaders are readers of people. They have the intuitive ability to understand others by discerning how they feel and recognizing what they sense.
- John C. Maxwell
Most discussions of decision making assume that only senior executives make decisions or that only senior executives’ decisions matter. This is a dangerous mistake.
- Peter Drucker
The only antidote is simplicity. The simplicity of leading through truth and trust. Ceaselessly seeking the former, relentlessly building the latter. In every decision, in every action. Truth is a determined pursuit, a personal and unquenchable fire, burning to know what is really happening inside the company and out.
- Jack Welch
But entrepreneurs should take cultures of extreme dedication seriously.
- Peter Thiel
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
We may have all come on different ships, but we’re in the same boat now.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
People development should be a daily event, integrated into every aspect of your regular goings-on.
- Jack Welch
Customers have different need states and life experiences.
- Howard Schultz
If you look – look at – I mean, look at what’s going on with your gasoline prices. They’re going to go to $5, $6, $7 and we don’t have anybody in Washington that calls OPEC and says, ‘Fellas, it’s time. It’s over. You’re not going to do it anymore.’
- Donald Trump
What we know about the destination resort business is clearly established. But it’s all about one thing, and one thing only. All of the razzmatazz and jazz we hear about facilities and everything else doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. It’s customer experience that determines the longevity and endurance of these enterprises.
- Stephen Wynn
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
Half of College Grads Are Working Jobs That Don’t Require A Degree, Forbes 2013 college graduates have are an average of $32,500 in debt.
- CNNMoney
Well, real estate is always good, as far as I’m concerned.
- Donald Trump
Once we finished Christmas Rappin’ we began shopping it around town. There was interest, but no one was biting. The industry’s attitude was that Rapper’s Delight despite its U.S. sales and international appeal was an unrepeatable fluke. We identified Polygram which had a great roster of funk and R&B acts (Kool and the Gang, the Gap Band, Parliament) as the best place for Kurtis, so we made up a gang of test pressings and took them to clubs all over the city. Response in the street from DJs and club goers was great. So to hype up PolyGram we placed fake orders for the record into their system by telling retailers and wholesalers to order the 12 inch through PolyGram. PolyGram didn’t own it yet, but we created an appetite for Christmas Rappin that led them to buy it…So in the fall of 1979 Kurtis Blow signed with Mercury Records a division of Polygram Records, making him the first rapper on a major label…Christmas eve 1979 was the first time that I heard Christmas Rappin’ on the radio; I was upstairs at my family’s house. Frankie Crocker the biggest radio DJ in New York played it on WBLS.
- Russell Simmons
Marketing is too important to be left to the marketing department.
- David Packard
Sometimes what works 40 years ago doesn’t work today.
- Joel Olsteen
The organizational architecture is really that a centipede walks on hundred legs and one or two don’t count. So if I lose one or two legs, the process will go on, the organization will go on, the growth will go on.
- Mukesh Ambani
People ask me what’s the most important function when you’re starting an organization or setting up the kind of culture and values that are going to endure. The discipline I believe so strongly in is H.R., and its the last discipline that gets funded.
- Howard Schultz
Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity To seize everything you ever wanted in one moment Would you capture it? Or just let it slip?
- Marshall Bruce Mathers III
Every right implies a responsibility; Every opportunity, an obligation, Every possession, a duty.
- John D. Rockefeller
I think it’s a problem that we don’t have more companies like Facebook. It shouldn’t be the only company that’s doing this well.
- Peter Thiel
There are only two kinds of employees that I’ve run across in 30 years. There are ones that get results, and ones that make excuses. If you’re in that second camp, you’re not going to like Dish.
- Charles Ergen
St Patrick was a Roman Briton of good family dwelling probably in the Severn valley.
- Winston Churchill
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
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
People are skeptical of many televangelists, and I’m sensitive to that.
- Joel Olsteen
It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.
- Henry Ford
Men sometimes stumble over the truth, but often pick themselves up and hurry off as though nothing had happened.
- Winston Churchill
The path to the CEO’s office should not be through the CFO’s office, and it should not be through the marketing department. It needs to be through engineering and design.
- Elon Musk
There’s no reason in 2014, to do shit you hate. NONE.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
Our belief was that if we kept putting great products in front of customers, they would continue to open their wallets
- Steve Jobs
I started NetSuite. NetSuite was my idea. I called up Evan Goldberg and said, ‘We’re going to do ERP on the Internet, software-as-a-service.’ Six months later Marc Benioff, finding out what NetSuite was doing, and kind of copied it.
- Larry Ellison
In many places where coffee is grown, deforestation is a major issue. With Starbucks’ position in the marketplace and the respect and relationships we have, we can – and have, in some cases – been able to educate and influence people.
- Howard Schultz
Surround yourself with only people who are going to lift you higher.
- Oprah Winfrey
I believe life is a series of near misses. A lot of what we ascribe to luck is not luck at all. It’s seizing the day and accepting responsibility for your future. It’s seeing what other people don’t see And pursuing that vision.
- Howard Schultz
Judge not, that ye be not judged.
- Dale Carnegie
You have enough people against you… be for yourself.
- Joel Olsteen
My first transistor radio was the heart of my gadget love today. It fit in my hand and brought me a world of music 24 / 7.
- Steve Wozniak
Saudi Arabia has stability. The social contract and the political contract between the king and the rulers and the royal family and the ruled people in Saudi Arabia is very strong and the bondage is so solid.
- Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal Alsaud
The most serious mistakes are not being made as a result of wrong answers. The true dangerous thing is asking the wrong questionl
- Peter Drucker
We had gotten people’s attention. So a lot of American shoe distributors were going to Japan and telling Onitsuka, ‘Well, if this two-bit outfit up in the woods in Oregon can do this kind of business, wait till you get somebody that’s really in the business.
- Phil Knight
You can’t worry about the mistakes, because you’re going to make a lot of them. You’ve got to be thinking about your next move.
- Ben Horowitz
Catering to a mass audience usually backfires. Instead the key thing is to stay in your lane, and if you are good enough and interesting enough, people move to you…If you never compromise, your core audience will come with you as you grow. Then you build on their loyalty and bring in other people.
- Russell Simmons
Stick with the Dips that are likely to pan out, and quit the Cul-de-Sacs to focus your resources.
- Seth Godin
Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren’t used to an environment where excellence is expected.
- Steve Jobs
We’ve announced an Oracle Virtual Compute Appliance, a bunch of low-cost commodity servers running Linux, integrated in our case, with InfiniBand – connected with InfiniBand vs. the traditional Ethernet.
- Larry Ellison
In times of great stress or adversity, it’s always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.
- Lee Iacocca
Then he fell on his knees and cried out, Lord do not hold this sin against them. When he said this, he fell asleep (he died).
- Acts 7:60
Remember, today is the tomorrow you worried about yesterday.
- Dale Carnegie
Powerful you have become, the dark side I sense in you.
- Yoda
Marc: “Do you know the best thing about startups?” Ben: “What?” Marc: “You only ever experience two emotions: euphoria and terror. And I find that lack of sleep enhances them both.”
- Ben Horowitz
Today, Andy Quinn pitched a great game finally, and that’s what he’s capable of. He fell behind a few hitters, but he got stronger as he went on.
- Jack Taylor
Don’t waste your energy trying to convince people to understand you. Your time is too valuable to try to prove yourself to people.
- Joel Olsteen
Right now I’m just delighted to be alive and to have had a nice long bath.
- Richard Branson
This was a decision we reached after a number of years speaking to the human rights groups, and specifically people who really cared about China on human rights. I understand why other people might have other views.
- Sergey Brin
American running shoes were still made by offshoots of the tire companies, cheap and terrible. They cost five bucks and gave you blood blisters…
- Phil Knight
What am I supposed to haul my dogs around in, a Rolls-Royce?
- Sam Walton
Business ends up being very dynamic and situational.
- Ben Horowitz
The knowledge worker is not poverty-prone. He is in danger of alienation, to use the fashionable word for boredom, frustration, and silent despair.
- Peter Drucker
Short cycle business are being impacted by credit, and are being impacted by gasoline prices, food, distribution businesses, chemical business.
- Jack Welch
Apart from consolidating our position as a major property developer in Hong Kong, we have also been diversifying into other activities such as hotel businesses, construction and engineering, container terminal services and television industry…
- Cheng Yu-tung
