Now that we had a name, we had to have a trademark for the side of the shoe. It was 1971, and Ford had spent $2 million getting a trademark. We didn’t have $2 million, so I went by the graphic arts department at Portland State, and there was a woman there saying, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to get enough money for the dress for this prom,’ And I said, ‘I have a job for you.’ I paid her $2 an hour, and she spent 17 and a half hours. So $35 and she came up with what is now the swoosh.
- Phil Knight
Notable Quotables
Comparing Apple to Netflix is like comparing apples to oranges, especially if the oranges made so many mistakes that people stopped eating oranges and just went back to Blockbuster.
- Reed Hastings
Medicare and Medicaid costs are skyrocketing. The cost of compliance with some pretty tough rules has become very costly. If I’m small, I have to spend the same amount of money to comply with Medicare, whether I’m 10 members or if I’m 10 million.
- George Paz
When you’re curious, you find lots of interesting things to do.
- Walt Disney
It’s better to think of distribution as something essential to the design of your product. If you’ve invented something new but you haven’t invented an effective way to sell it, you have a bad business—no matter how good the product.
- Peter Thiel
Measles will always show you if someone isn’t doing a good job on vaccinations. Kids will start dying of measles.
- Bill Gates
You can’t be in neutral and hope to reach your full potential.
- Joel Olsteen
Every time you resist temptation you are winning for your children.
- Joel Olsteen
Maintain a pragmatic approach, keep up with the multitude of trials and strive to remain its level of attainment in order for achieving sound performance and scaling new heights.
- Cheng Yu-tung
My wife watches me like a hawk.
- Carl Icahn
The habit of doing more than is necessary can only be earned through practice.
- Seth Godin
Parkinson’s Law dictates that a task will swell in (perceived) importance and complexity in relation to the time allotted for its completion.
- Timothy Ferriss
Do you mind if I sit back a little? Because your breath is very bad.
- Donald Trump
If you learn to pray bold prayers… it allows God to do big things in your life.
- Joel Olsteen
I just believe that the way that young people’s minds develop is fascinating. If you are doing something for a grade or salary or a reward, it doesn’t have as much meaning as creating something for yourself and your own life.
- Steve Wozniak
The worst way of flying, I think, is standby. It never works. That’s why they call it standby. You end up standing there going, ‘Bye!’
- Jerry Seinfeld
Keep the right perspective Some people would love to have your problems. They would gladly trade places with you. They would love to have the job that frustrates you. They would love to sit in traffic in that car you don’t like. They would love to have your husband, who gets on your nerves. They would love to live in the house you think is too small.
- Joel Olsteen
We need original thinkers, provocateurs, and people who care. We need marketers who can lead, salespeople able to risk making a human connection, passionate change makers willing to be shunned if it is necessary for them to make a point. Every organization needs a linchpin, the one person who can bring it together and make a difference. Some organizations haven’t realized this yet, or haven’t articulated it, but we need artists.
- Seth Godin
We vote for a presidential candidate without saying, “Why not run the country for a month and then we’ll see . .
- Seth Godin
Look yourself in the mirror and ask yourself, what do I want to do everyday for the rest of my life…do that.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
You need to invent things and you need to get them to people. You need to commercialize those inventions. Obviously, the best way we’ve come up with doing that is through companies.
- Larry Page
The richest people in the world look for and build networks, everyone else looks for work.
- Robert Kiyosaki
Science investigates religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power religion gives man wisdom which is control.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
What material success does is provide you with the ability to concentrate on other things that really matter. And that is being able to make a difference, not only in your own life, but in other people’s lives.
- Oprah Winfrey
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 only meat I eat is from animals I’ve killed myself.
- Mark Zuckerberg
“Appreciate everything your associates do for the business. Nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They’re absolutely free and worth a fortune.”
- Sam Walton
My two primary areas of focus have been open-space conservation and education, and I expect those to remain my priorities in the future. The Irvine open space and parklands provide serenity and balance to our unique Orange County lifestyle.
- Donald Bren
What we expect with confidence becomes our own self-fulfilling prophecy.
- Brian Tracy
Bureaucratic hierarchies move slowly, and entrenched interests shy away from risk. In the most dysfunctional organizations, signaling that work is being done becomes a better strategy for career advancement than actually doing work (if this describes your company, you should quit now). At the other extreme, a lone genius.
- Peter Thiel
I believe you have to be willing to be misunderstood if you’re going to innovate.
- Jeff Bezos
It’s a great thing when you can show that you’ve been successful and that you’ve made a lot of money and that you’ve employed a lot of people.
- Donald Trump
What’s your vision for the future of your follicles?
- Clay Clark
If you’re passionate about something and you work hard, then I think you will be successful.
- Pierre Omidyar
A valuable business must start by finding a niche and dominating a small market.
- Peter Thiel
Who decides what’s in Windows? The customers who buy it.
- Bill Gates
I’m an entrepreneur first and a wine critic second.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
If we are so contemptibly selfish that we can’t radiate a little happiness and pass on a bit of honest appreciation without trying to get something out of the other person in return – if our souls are no bigger than sour crab apples, we shall meet with the failure we so richly deserve.
- Dale Carnegie
I was lucky enough to co-found a business in college that ended up with 400 employees, and I launched 20 different projects while I was there – a project a week.
- Seth Godin
Tip 29 – A good Accountant is not just a scorekeeper.
- Jack Nadel
Statistics suggest that when customers complain, business owners and managers ought to get excited about it. The complaining customer represents a huge opportunity for more business.
- Zig Ziglar
Why do I drive a truck? What am I supposed to haul my dogs around in, a Rolls-Royce?
- Sam Walton
Our success has really been based on partnerships from the very beginning.
- Bill Gates
Healthy citizens are the greatest asset any country can have.
- Winston Churchill
Imagine if you had baseball cards that showed all the performance stats for your people: batting averages, home runs, errors, ERAs, win/loss records. You could see what they did well and poorly and call on the right people to play the right positions in a very transparent way.
- Ray Dalio
Cultures, for better or worse, are very stable.
- Jeff Bezos
I just want to do God’s will. And he’s allowed me to go to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the promised land! I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
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
Worry is interest paid before it’s due.
- Zig Ziglar
How do you tap in to what God has already done? Very simple: just act like you’re blessed, talk like you’re blessed, walk like you’re blessed, think like you’re blessed, smile like you’re blessed, dress like you’re blessed. Put actions behind your faith, and one day you will see it become a reality.
- Joel Olsteen
Quality is remembered long after price is forgotten.
- Anonymous
Strategy is empty without change, empty without passion, and empty without people willing to confront the void.
- Seth Godin
Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.
- Mahatma Gandhi
For more than a decade, I led an organization that put on an elaborate Christmas program each December. It was a big production, with over 250 people participating in more than 20 performances. By the end of the season, everyone who participated was exhausted.”
- John C. Maxwell
People ask the difference between a leader and a boss. The leader leads, and the boss drives.
- Theodore Roosevelt
We must hang together or we will hang together.
- Benjamin Franklin
Dreams grow if you grow.
- Zig Ziglar
Keep in mind, just because you don’t know the answer doesn’t mean that one does not exist. You simply haven’t discovered it yet.
- Joel Olsteen
When we try to drill and practice someone into subservient obedience, we’re stamping out the artist that lives within.
- Seth Godin
The good-to-great companies displayed two distinctive forms of disciplined thought. The first, and the topic of this chapter, is that they infused the entire process with the brutal facts of reality. (The second, which we will discuss in the next chapter, is that they developed a simple, yet deeply insightful, frame of reference for all decisions.)
- James C. Collins
The basis of persistence is the power of will. Men who accumulate, great fortunes are generally known as cold-blooded and sometimes ruthless. Often they are misunderstood. What they have is willpower, which they mix with persistence and place back of their desires to insure that attainment of their objectives. Henry Ford was generally misunderstood to be ruthless and cold-blooded. This misconception grew out of Ford’s habit of following through in all of his plans with PERSISTENCE…few carry on despite all opposition until they attain their goal. Those few are the Fords, Carnegies, Rockefellers and Edisons.
- Napoleon Hill
I grew up in a house where my father encouraged my brother and me to fail. I specifically remember coming home and saying, ‘Dad, Dad, I tried out for this or that and I was horrible,’ and he would high-five me and say, ‘Way to go.’
- Sara Blakely
It took Flickr two years to reach the milestone of 100 million uploaded pictures. It took Instagram eight months
- Gary Vaynerchuk
I’m trying to change the culture in New York City, that’s hard enough!
- Michael Bloomberg
I don’t argue when people say that my message is simple, but I believe Jesus’ message was simple. Jesus didn’t go around condemning people.
- Joel Olsteen
Although prepared for martyrdom, I prefer that it be postponed.
- Winston Churchill
When screening engineers from other companies, its smart to value engineers from great companies more than those from mediocre companies.
- Ben Horowitz
It’s disappointing, but it’s still a really good book. I’m glad Kenny did it, and I’m glad it’s going to get out. … I still endorse the book. I think everybody should buy it. I think he did a great job on a very complicated topic.
- Phil Knight
I fell in love with flora of all types, especially ferns. Loved the sparse structure and repetition of shape – almost fractal.
- Jack Dorsey
Often any decision, even the wrong decision, is better than no decision.
- Ben Horowitz
If no mistake have you made, yet losing you are … a different game you should play.
- Yoda
I’ve always taught that a poor economy is the best opportunity for salespeople because the naysayers and grumblers have already given up, leaving more territory, more opportunities to be successful than in a good economy when virtually all salespeople are out there, giving it their best.
- Zig Ziglar
A drop of honey catches more flies than a gallon of gall.
- Abraham Lincoln
You walk into a retail store, whatever it is, and if there’s a sense of entertainment and excitement and electricity, you wanna be there.
- Howard Schultz
The person who dumps garbage into your mind will do you considerably more harm than the person who dumps garbage on your floor, because each load of mind garbage negatively impacts your possibilities and lowers your expectations.
- Zig Ziglar
Do you know why the nose of the bull dog is sloped backwards? So it can keep on breathing without ever letting go.
- Winston Churchill
I want to challenge you today to get out of your comfort zone. You have so much incredible potential on the inside. God has put gifts and talents in you that you probably don’t know anything about.
- Joel Olsteen
The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
It was definitely kind of surprising to see us come out and run the ball because we usually like to pass to start the game and put up some quick points. But tonight, we had real good balance offensively. We ran and passed the ball well, which kept them off balance all night.
- Jack Taylor
There was absolutely no consistency to the experience.
- Michael Gerber
Men must be taught as if you taught them not And things unknown proposed as things forgot.
- Dale Carnegie
When we put $4 billion into the U.S. economy, they were OK with this. When we preserved jobs in Dearborn, or preserved jobs in Columbus, or preserved jobs in Pennsylvania, everyone was happy.
- Alexei Mordashov
David Novak CEO of YUM Brands (on crisis management)
- David Novak
Every entrepreneur should plan to be the last mover in her particular market. That starts with asking yourself: what will the world look like 10 and 20 years from now, and how will my business fit in?
- Peter Thiel
I do think – as self-serving as it sounds – that I was the right person, given the very, very strong headwind we had from the economy and our own issues, to come back and rewrite the future of the company.
- Howard Schultz
I’m not afraid to call a wine that tastes like Skittles or green peppers mixed with orange marmalade. I’ll say, ‘It tastes like chicken.’ I mean, that’s not what people think of when they think of wine, but that’s what it tastes like to me and it hits home.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
Not good — great.
- Jack Welch
You cannot overestimate the unimportance of practically everything.
- John C. Maxwell
your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a stifling wave of remorse swept over me. Guiltily I came to your bedside. There are the things I was thinking, son: I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face merely a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when you threw some of your things on the floor.
- Dale Carnegie
If my mind can conceive it and my heart can believe it, then I can achieve it.
- Muhammad Ali
For many of us, the happiest future is one that’s precisely like the past, except a little better.
- Seth Godin
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
It used to be the case, like you’d switch jobs, and then maybe you wouldn’t keep in touch with all the people that you knew from that old job, just because it was too hard. But one of the things that Facebook does is it makes it really easy to just stay in touch with all these people.
- Mark Zuckerberg
Success is dependent upon the glands – sweat glands.
- Zig Ziglar
In the end, you’re measured not by how much you undertake but by what you finally accomplish.
- Donald Trump
The concept of serviced apartments makes economic sense for tenancies of short to medium term duration – a fact many leading Hong Kong and overseas corporations now appreciate.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Does that mean that we should never hire or promote an inexperienced manager who had not already learned to do what needs to be done in this assignment? The answer: it depends. In a start-up company where there are no processes in place to get things done, then everything that is done must be done by individual people–resources. In this circumstance, it would be risky to draft someone with no experience to do the job–because in the absence of processes that can guide people, experienced people need to lead. But in established companies where much of the guidance to employees is provided by processes, and is less dependent upon managers with detailed, hands-on experience, then it makes sense to hire or promote someone who needs to learn from experience.
- Clayton M. Christensen
We don’t get a chance to do that many things, and every one should be really excellent. Because this is our life. Life is brief, and then you die, you know? And we’ve all chosen to do this with our lives. So it better be damn good. It better be worth it.
- Steve Jobs
[In January 2011] We have built the simplest way to accept credit cards. It’s a little tiny device that we give away for free, and you just download some softwares from the app store and plug it in to your mobile phone or iPad and suddenly you can take credit cards. So if you’re a tax accountant or a lawyer or doctor or even a hair stylist, you can now accept credit cards.
- Jack Dorsey
If there is a Swedish style, I cannot identify it.
- Stefan Persson
