Over the past ten years, technological advances have dramatically lowered the financial bar for starting a new company, but the courage bar for building a great company remains as high as it has ever been.
- Ben Horowitz
Notable Quotables
We got to know a lot of investors and know what they like and don’t like. Through many co-investments opportunities, we have built trust among these investors. So when it came to investing in Xiaomi, things were a lot easier.
- Lei Jun
Capital punishment is as fundamentally wrong as a cure for crime as charity is wrong as a cure for poverty.
- Henry Ford
In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield.
- Warren Buffett
We believe that the business system only is the key to success. It’s no miracle, only day-to-day work in the appropriate way.
- Alexei Mordashov
If I designed a computer with 200 chips, I tried to design it with 150. And then I would try to design it with 100. I just tried to find every trick I could in life to design things real tiny.
- Steve Wozniak
This defines entrepreneur and entrepreneurship – the entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.
- Peter Drucker
From wherever you are, you can go anywhere you want to go if you pick the right roads to travel.
- Zig Ziglar
Don’t be afraid to assert yourself, have confidence in your abilities, and don’t let the bastards get you down.
- Michael Bloomberg
m reasonably optimistic about the future, especially the future of the United States – for the century, at least.
- Elon Musk
confusion is the main cause of worry.
- Dale Carnegie
The “non-profit” institution neither supplies goods or services not controls. Its “product” is neither a pair of shoes nor an effective regulation. Its product is a changed human being. The non-profit institutions are human-change agents. Their “product” is a cured patient, a child that learns, a young man or woman grown into a self-respecting adult; a changed human life altogether.
- Peter Drucker
I don’t want to kill ads. I think advertising is great, and I’m very aware that there’s multiple revenue streams in television, subscription and advertising. But I also don’t want to put my head in the sand, and I think the world is changing.
- Charles Ergen
You’re not really free until you’re free from trying to please everybody.
- Joel Olsteen
If you do not conquer self, you will be conquered by self.
- Napoleon Hill
Don’t count the things you do. Do the things that count.
- Zig Ziglar
If it’s set up in such a way that it breaks the conditionality required by the (International Monetary Fund), I think that would be a step backward.
- John Chambers
The goal is not to simply eliminate the bad, which does nothing more than leave you with a vacuum, but to pursue and experience the best in the world.
- Timothy Ferriss
Even though I’m a hype man myself, I like the practicality of it all. People who understand how to turn a profit. At the end of the day, this is still business so I’m looking for real practical knowledge of how to actually make money, not necessarily raise it.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
It doesn’t matter how many people you offend, as long as you’re getting your message to your consumers. I say to those people who do not want to offend anybody: You are going to have a very, very difficult time having meaningful advertising.
- Phil Knight
The U.S. couldn’t even get rid of Saddam Hussein. And we all know that the EU is just a passing fad. They’ll be killing each other again in less than a year. I’m sick to death of all these fascist lawsuits.
- Bill Gates
The first rule of organizational design is that all organizational designs are bad.
- Ben Horowitz
Don’t find customers for your products, find products for your customers.
- Seth Godin
It is no ordindary desire that survives disappointment, discouragement, temporary defeat, criticism, and the constant reminding of waste of time. It is a burning desire an obsession! – Napoleon Hill (on leadership)
- Napoleon Hill
Look at the product pipeline, look at the fantastic financial results we’ve had for the last five years. You only get that kind of performance on the innovation side, on the financial side, if you’re really listening and reacting to the best ideas of the people we have.
- Steve Ballmer
I say something, and then it usually happens. Maybe not on schedule, but it usually happens.
- Elon Musk
If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.
- Henry Ford
We are all worms. But I believe that I am a glow-worm.
- Winston Churchill
Our underwear used to just be cotton, but we wanted to see if we could create something out of synthetics.
- Tadashi Yanai
You measure your people and you take action on those that don’t measure up.
- Jack Welch
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
If you can’t make it good, at least make it look good.
- Bill Gates
Create a definite plan for carrying out your desire and begin at once, whether you are ready or not to put this plan into action.
- Napoleon Hill
[On exporting sports shoes from Japan to the US]The best hope for exports lay with Onitsuka Company. So I made a cold call on them.
- Phil Knight
Don’t confuse selling with art.
- Jack Taylor
The Overseas Chinese habit is to save a lot and make a lot of friends.
- Lee Shau Kee
My general attitude to life is to enjoy every minute of every day. I never do anything with a feeling of, ‘Oh God, I’ve got to do this today.’
- Richard Branson
It turns out that is exactly what product strategy is all about—figuring out the right product is the innovator’s job, not the customer’s job. The customer only knows what she thinks she wants based on her experience with the current product. The innovator can take into account everything that’s possible, but often must go against what she knows to be true. As a result, innovation requires a combination of knowledge, skill, and courage.
- Ben Horowitz
If you want to be successful, find someone who has achieved the results you want and copy what they do and you’ll achieve the same results.
- Tony Robbins
AIDS itself is subject to incredible stigma.
- Bill Gates
I think it’s fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool we’ve ever created. They’re tools of communication, they’re tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.
- Bill Gates
E – Edge, ability to make tough yes and no decisions
- Jack Welch
How do leaders serve their people? They may pay good wages and treat employees with respect.
- John C. Maxwell
One thing I resent is the slur that I just support political candidates because of the business.
- Rupert Murdoch
Failure is not attached to outcome, but in not trying. This way, it is about answering to yourself.
- Sara Blakely
The guy keeps making speeches about redistribution and maybe we ought to do something to businesses that don’t invest, their holding too much money. We haven’t heard that kind of talk except from pure socialists. Everybody’s afraid of the government and there’s no need soft peddling it, it’s the truth. It is the truth.
- Stephen Wynn
Make the decision and say, I’m not letting that worry in. I’m done being upset when my plans don’t work out. I’m not letting that stress in.” Negative thoughts will still come to your mind, but you don’t have to let them into your spirit.
- Joel Olsteen
I like to look for patterns in science and life. It’s what I do.
- Patrick Soon-Shiong
No one’s going to be able to operate without a grounding in the basic sciences. Language would be helpful, although English is becoming increasingly international. And travel. You have to have a global attitude.
- Rupert Murdoch
Obviously everyone wants to be successful, but I want to be looked back on as being very innovative, very trusted and ethical and ultimately making a big difference in the world.
- Sergey Brin
Americans want students to get the best education possible. We want schools to prepare children to become good citizens and members of a prosperous American economy.
- Bill Gates
Create a vision and personalize it. People need to say, I understand it, I’m excited about it, and I can make it happen.
- David Novak
In return, society rewards those who give it what it wants. That is why how much money people have earned is a rough measure of how much they gave society what it wanted.
- Ray Dalio
you are insecure, guess what? The rest of the world is, too. Do not overestimate the competition and underestimate yourself. You are better than you think.
- Timothy Ferriss
This is not to imply that we agree on everything because we don’t. Nor does it mean there are no arguments because there are. It does mean there is never any maliciousness or bitterness in our differences. It does mean each is willing to admit a mistake and apologize if he or she is wrong. It means we enjoy each other and love each other enough to put the other one first. We never part company or go to sleep without settling our differences and reaffirming our love. We’re both grateful that God has let us spend enough years together to develop a relationship and discover what real love is all about. Our prayer is that God will permit us to have many more years together before we start our walk though eternity—together.
- Zig Ziglar
Good product managers crisply define the target, the “what” (as opposed to the “how”), and manage the delivery of the “what.” Bad product managers feel best about themselves when they figure out “how.” Good product managers communicate crisply to engineering in writing as well as verbally. Good product managers don’t give direction informally. Good product managers gather information informally.
- Ben Horowitz
Nothing happens until something is sold.
- Joe Ricketts
Jeremy Stoppelman started Yelp. Max Levchin started Slide. I started LinkedIn. It was a mininova explosion of folks jumping out to doing other entrepreneurial activities.
- Reid Hoffman
My goal was never to just create a company. A lot of people misinterpret that, as if I don’t care about revenue or profit or any of those things. But what not being just a company means to me is not being just that – building something that actually makes a really big change in the world.
- Mark Zuckerberg
I always invest my own money in the companies that I create. I don’t believe in the whole thing of just using other people’s money. I don’t think that’s right. I’m not going to ask other people to invest in something if I’m not prepared to do so myself.
- Elon Musk
When fate hands you lemons, make lemonade.
- Dale Carnegie
Planning is arrogant and inflexible. Instead you should try things out.
- Peter Thiel
Practice what you preach
- Tony Hsieh
I’ve actually not read any books on time management.
- Elon Musk
Our reputation is more important than the last hundred million dollars.
- Rupert Murdoch
Bill Gates is the pope of the personal computer industry. He decides who’s going to build.
- Larry Ellison
The path of least resistance makes all rivers, and some men, crooked.
- Napoleon Hill
The thing that motivates me is a very common form of motivation. And that is, with other folks counting on me, it’s so easy to be motivated.
- Jeff Bezos
By June this year, the [Henderson] Group had sold approximately 9,500 residential units totally around HK$21 billion in aggregate value.
- Lee Shau Kee
It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.
- Mark Cuban
During their lifetimes, every man and woman will stumble across a great opportunity. Sadly, most of them will simply pick themselves up, dust themselves down and carry on as if nothing ever happened.
- Winston Churchill
Venture-backed companies create 11% of all private sector jobs. They generate annual revenues equivalent to an astounding 21% of GDP.
- Peter Thiel
Certainly, other people can pray for you, they can believe for you, they can quote the scripture to you, but you must exercise faith for yourself. If you are always depending on somebody else to keep you happy, somebody else to encourage you or to get you out of trouble, you will live in perpetual weakness and disappointment. You must make a decision that you are going to be a believer. Take charge of your life and decide, No matter what comes against me, I believe in God. I’m going to have a positive outlook for my life! Other people’s faith can indeed bolster yours. But your own faith will bring you a miracle much faster than anybody else’s. What you believe has a much greater impact on your life than what anybody else believes.
- Joel Olsteen
Legacy is greater than currency.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
At the end of the day, the Irvine Co. is slowly being transformed. Our long-term goal is to transform what was once an agricultural company to a development company, and to that, the next, final step is to create a large real estate investment company.
- Donald Bren
Being productive gives people a sense of satisfaction and fulfillment that loafing never can.
- Zig Ziglar
My biggest mistake is probably weighing too much on someone’s talent and not someone’s personality. I think it matters whether someone has a good heart.
- Elon Musk
Pure hell forces action, but anything less can be endured with enough clever rationalization.
- Timothy Ferriss
Once a decision is made…problems have to be solved.
- Theodore Roosevelt
We create stress for ourselves because you feel like you have to do it. You have to. I don’t feel that anymore.
- Oprah Winfrey
I think Les Moonves is the most highly overrated person in television.
- Donald Trump
If you say too much or mix in multiple pitches, you diffuse your goal. You must give the media a pitch they can hit.
- Michael Levine
Secret, shall I tell you? Grand Master of Jedi Order am I. Won this job in a raffle I did, think you? “How did you know, how did you know, Master Yoda?” Master Yoda knows these things. His job it is.
- Yoda
If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said ‘faster horses.’
- Henry Ford
Oracle’s latest database, version 12c, was specifically designed for the cloud. Oracle 12c makes all your Oracle applications multitenant applications without you having to make any changes whatsoever to your applications.
- Larry Ellison
The greatest business people I’ve met are determined to get it right no matter what the cost.
- Michael Gerber
Solving big problems is easier than solving little problems.
- Sergey Brin
Tip 29 – A good Accountant is not just a scorekeeper.
- Jack Nadel
Hay dos errores que podemos cometer en el camino hacia la verdad. No recorrer todo el camino, y no empezar.
- Siddhartha Gautama
Our line of business structure has served us very well in the past, when customer segments and product requirements were very distinct. Today, the differences have blurred between these customer segments and Cisco is in a unique position to provide the industry’s broadest family of products united under a consistent architecture designed to help our customers improve productivity and profitability.
- John Chambers
Lack of A Well Defined Power of Decision.
- Napoleon Hill
I hate writing about personal stuff. I don’t have a Facebook page. I don’t use my Twitter account. I am familiar with both, but I don’t use them.
- Elon Musk
by breakthrough, broken into three broad stages: disciplined people, disciplined thought, and disciplined.
- James C. Collins
An idealist is a person who helps other people to be prosperous.
- Henry Ford
I was reading an article in the ‘New York Times;’ it talked about being in the zone, and being in the zone you’re so focused that time ceases to exist. It’s when you think, ‘Oh, I’ve been doing this for five hours and didn’t even know it.’ It’s the difference between hard work and going, ’12 o’clock, not moving.’
- Steve Martin
For every sale you miss because you were too enthusiastic, you’ll miss a hundred because you weren’t enthusiastic enough.
- Zig Ziglar
Initiative = Happiness
- Seth Godin
History recalls the remarkable resilience of the territory’s people.
- Cheng Yu-tung
You’re not better than anybody else, but you’re not less than anybody else. You’re a child of the Most High God.
- Joel Olsteen
Make failure your teacher, not your undertaker.
- Zig Ziglar
