In the 1950s, people welcomed big plans and asked whether they would work. Today a grand plan coming from a schoolteacher would be dismissed as crankery, and a long-range vision coming from anyone more powerful would be derided as hubris. You can still visit the Bay Model in that Sausalito warehouse, but today it’s just a tourist attraction: big plans for the future have become archaic curiosities.
- Peter Thiel
Notable Quotables
So, if you look at what’s common among some of the companies I have, including the Four Seasons, NewsCorp, George V, the Plaza, these are all irreplaceable brands in their own fields.
- Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal Alsaud
I was myself so smitten in public opinion that it was the almost universal view that my political life was at last ended.
- Winston Churchill
I’ve been to Disneyland, like, 10 times. I’m getting really tired of Disneyland.
- Elon Musk
I want to promote poetry to the point where you got all the baldhead kids running around doing poetry, getting the music out of the way and having only words, the spoken word, and then see what happens.
- Russell Simmons
New research shows that you will be dead longer than you will be alive.
- Zig Ziglar
The only discipline that lasts is self-discipline.
- Bum Phillips
I had learned that for any big idea you had to sell, sell, sell to move the needle at all.
- Jack Welch
For PayPal to work, we needed to attract a critical mass of at least a million users. Advertising was too ineffective to justify the cost. Prospective deals with big banks kept falling through. So we decided to pay people to sign up. We gave new customers $10 for joining, and we gave them $10 more every time they referred a friend. This got us hundreds of thousands of new customers and an exponential growth rate.
- Peter Thiel
There’s no reason why the future should happen only at Stanford, or in college, or in Silicon Valley.
- Peter Thiel
The victory of success is half won when one gains the habit of setting goals and achieving them. Even the most tedious chore will become endurable as you parade through each day convinced that every task, no matter how menial or boring, brings you closer to fulfilling your dreams.
- Og Mandino
Ultimately, it comes down to taste. It comes down to trying to expose yourself to the best things that humans have done and then try to bring those things into what you’re doing. Picasso had a saying: good artists copy, great artists steal. And we have always been shameless about stealing great ideas, and I think part of what made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians and poets and artists and zoologists and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world.
- Steve Jobs
Look at the way celebrities and politicians are using Facebook already. When Ashton Kutcher posts a video, he gets hundreds of pieces of feedback. Maybe he doesn’t have time to read them all or respond to them all, but he’s getting good feedback and getting a good sense of how people are thinking about that and maybe can respond to some of it.
- Mark Zuckerberg
I believe that visualization is one of the most powerful means of achieving personal goals.
- Harvey Mackay
The arrival of the 21st century precedes the onslaught of turmoil and tsunami. The business environment has become unpredictable and the global economy even harsher…
- Cheng Yu-tung
Money motivates neither the best people nor the best in people.
- Dee Hock
When someone expresses some feeling, attitude or belief, our tendency is almost immediately to feel that’s right,” or that’s stupid,” that’s abnormal,” that’s unreasonable,” that’s incorrect,” that’s not nice.” Very rarely do we permit ourselves to understand precisely what the meaning of the statement is to the other person.
- Dale Carnegie
Being a CEO is the nuts! A whole jumble of thoughts come to mind: Over the top. Wild. Fun. Outrageous. Crazy. Passion. Perpetual Motion. The give and take. Meetings into the night. Incredible friendships. Fine wine. Celebrations. Great golf courses. Big decisions in the real game. Crises and pressure. Lots of swings. A few home runs. The thrill of winning and the pain of losing. It’s as good as it gets. You get paid a lot, but the real payoff is the fun…
- Jack Welch
We are making these changes at a time when we are beginning to see signs that our business is stabilizing.
- John Chambers
I kind of thought that stand-up comedy would suffer from the Internet because people seem to know more about the craft of stand-up than ever before. I thought it would seem trite. Kind of like if you know more about magicians, you wouldn’t love them.
- Jerry Seinfeld
I guarantee you it will not be anyone from the outside.
- Jack Welch
When I hung in, he saw character, and that was the end of it. Later, it was funny to watch him hazing other guys the same way – funny after you’d been through the cycle.
- Phil Knight
I just want to retire before I go senile because if I don’t retire before I go senile, then I’ll do more damage than good at that point.
- Elon Musk
Word of mouth works now, much more than ever. @-reply every single person.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
Certainly there’s a phenomenon around open source. You know free software will be a vibrant area. There will be a lot of neat things that get done there.
- Bill Gates
Seeds of discouragement cannot take root in a grateful heart.
- Joel Olsteen
The average person puts only 25% of his energy and ability into his work. The world takes off its hat to those who put in more than 50% of their capacity, and stands on its head for those few and far between souls who devote 100%.
- Andrew Carnegie
It’s not manufacturers trying to rip anybody off or anything like that. There’s nobody getting rich writing software that I know of.
- Bill Gates
We are gods in the chrysalis.
- Dale Carnegie
I do feel, in a sense, the rules of engagement for citizenship has changed, and we must encourage other people to speak up and to take action.
- Howard Schultz
We bring together the best ideas – turning the meetings of our top managers into intellectual orgies.
- Jack Welch
At the end of the day you have to keep emotions away.
- Lakshmi Mittal
His friends, drunk to the point of speaking in tongues, were asleep.
- Timothy Ferriss
When I grew up, the Devil was a reason why I had a headache or the Devil was the reason I got mad today. We always blamed the Devil. I think today when I say the Enemy, I like to make it broader. Sometimes the Enemy can be our own thoughts.
- Joel Olsteen
Being able to see an activity log of where a kid has been going on the Internet is a good thing.
- Bill Gates
In his rigidgly compartmentalized life, each hour was tightly budgeted, whether for business, religion, family or exercise. Perhaps those daily rituals helped him deal with the underlying tensions that might otherwise have become ungovernable, for although he tried to project to an air of unhurried calm, he was under terrific strain the surface, was constantly on edge. In one of his few admissions of weakness he recalled, for years on end I never had a solid night’s sleep, worrying about how it was to come out…I tossed about in bed night after night worrying over the outcome…All the fortune that I have made has not served to compensate for the anxiety of that period.
- Ron Chernow
For my part, I consider that it will be found much better by all parties to leave the past to history, especially as I propose to write that history myself.
- Winston Churchill
Stones of judgment, discouragement or doubt may be thrown at you. You can’t stop them, but you can make the choice to keep your walls up and not let them affect you.
- Joel Olsteen
With residential property prices having dropped by around two-thirds from their peak in 1997 and local interest rates dropping to their historic lows, mortgage payments currently falls below rental payment. This positive carry has led to property purchases by both home purchasers as well as investors. Further, with the local stock market becoming active again and reaching its highest level in the past 17 months, this has resulted in an increase in the number of transactions and a price for the luxury properties.
- Lee Shau Kee
I usually have my yellow legal pad with me, with a list of ten or fifteen things we need to be working on as a company. My list drives the executives around here crazy, but it’s probably one of my more important contributions.
- Sam Walton
CREATIVE MONOPOLY means new products that benefit everybody and sustainable profits for the creator. Competition means no profits for anybody, no meaningful differentiation, and a struggle for survival.
- Peter Thiel
The problem with pity parties is very few people come, and those who do don’t bring presents.
- Zig Ziglar
Our investment in more than 100 projects in China’s property, infrastructure and other sectors makes us one of the country’s largest investors.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Get the facts.
- David Novak
Initiative and starting are about neither of these. They are about “let’s see” and “try.” If there’s no clear right answer, perhaps the thing you ought to do is something new. Something new is often the right path when the world is complicated.
- Seth Godin
Only engage in mutually beneficial relationships.
- Clay Clark
You reach a point where you don’t work for money.
- Walt Disney
I don’t have a magic formula for prioritizing the world’s problems.
- Bill Gates
Business has only two functions — marketing and innovation.
- Peter Drucker
Mars is the only place in the solar system where it’s possible for life to become multi-planetarian.
- Elon Musk
Steve really took over the project when I had a plane crash and wasn’t there. He took over the project, and it was really my own opinion — only my opinion — that he wanted to compete with the Lisa group that had kicked him out.
- Steve Wozniak
In life, you don’t have a level of confrontation and the nonsense you run into when you’re a CEO. CEOs aren’t born.
- Ben Horowitz
I don’t know how you can justify leaving any engagement behind in the social Web of 2011.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
I may be wrong. I frequently am. Let’s examine the facts.
- Dale Carnegie
I mean, there’s no arguing. There is no anything. There is no beating around the bush. ‘You’re fired’ is a very strong term.
- Donald Trump
Since all of them overestimated the competition, no one even showed up.
- Timothy Ferriss
The real question for me is, do people have the tools that they need in order to make those decisions well? And I think that it’s actually really important that Facebook continually makes it easier and easier to make those decisions… If people feel like they don’t have control over how they’re sharing things, then we’re failing them.
- Mark Zuckerberg
IT’S SAID that you can only live life forward and understand it backward.
- Jack Welch
Atari is a very sad story.
- Steve Wozniak
In business, the idea of measuring what you are doing, picking the measurements that count like customer satisfaction and performance… you thrive on that.
- Bill Gates
Control your temper. Remember, you can measure the size of a person by what makes him or her angry.
- Dale Carnegie
Develop an attitude of gratitude, and give thanks for everything that happens to you, knowing that every step forward is a step toward achieving something bigger and better than your current situation.
- Brian Tracy
I was the only westerner to succeed in a place that’s like a toilet, and you always come out of a toilet with a smell.
- David Reuben
There is nothing either good or bad.
- William Shakespeare
Being surrounded by educated people makes democracy stronger, and it benefits our entire economy.
- Seth Godin
I’m a voracious reader.
- Howard Schultz
I believe the true road to preeminent success in any line is to make yourself master of that line.
- Andrew Carnegie
What this implies at a deeper level is that many of what are now widely accepted principles of good management are, in fact, only situationally appropriate. There are times at which it is right not to listen to customers, right to invest in developing lower-performance products that promise lower margins, and right to aggressively pursue small, rather than substantial, markets.
- Clayton M. Christensen
I want people to know their palate is a snowflake. We all like different things. Why should we all have the same taste in wines?
- Gary Vaynerchuk
Still, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed; if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.
- Winston Churchill
To a guy like me, a laugh is full of information.
- Jerry Seinfeld
As kids, we all worked for the company in one way or another. I got to work behind the candy counter or run the popcorn stand when I was five years old. The business was part of life, and it was always included in the dinner conversation. We learned a lot about the debt it took to open new stores, and I worried about it. I remember confiding to my girlfriend one time – crying and saying, I don’t know what we’re going to do. My daddy owes so much, and he won’t quit opening.
- Alice Walton
If we open a quarrel between past and present, we shall find that we have lost the future.
- Winston Churchill
The dreams and passions stored within hearts are powerful keys which can unlock a wealth of potential.
- John C. Maxwell
Most People have a desire to look for the exception instead of the desire to become exceptional.
- John C. Maxwell
If 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. Unreasonable and unrealistic goals are easier to achieve for yet another reason.
- Timothy Ferriss
Manufacture, don’t just trade. There’s money in manufacturing even though it is capital intensive.
- Aliko Dangote
It’s tangible, it’s solid, it’s beautiful. It’s artistic, from my standpoint, and I just love real estate.
- Donald Trump
If people want capital gains taxed more like the highest rate on income, that’s a good discussion. Maybe that’s the way to help close the deficit.
- Bill Gates
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
Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius.
- Peter Thiel
There’s an entire universe in every single tweet, and it all really depends on the content as far as how it’s going to spread.
- Jack Dorsey
Live to learn, and you will really learn to live.
- John C. Maxwell
I cannot remember a moment in my life when I have not felt the love of my family that would have killed for each other – and we still are. x
- Richard Branson
Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny, consume you it will.
- Yoda
Common Core is a big win for education.
- Bill Gates
Desire is the ingredient that changes the hot water of mediocrity to the steam of outstanding success.
- Zig Ziglar
Good leaders must communicate vision clearly, creatively, and continually. However, the vision doesn’t come alive until the leader models it.
- John C. Maxwell
Darwinism may be a fine theory in other contexts, but in startups, intelligent design works best.
- Peter Thiel
Since belief determines behavior, doesn’t it make sense that we should be teaching ethical, moral values in every home and in every school in America?
- Zig Ziglar
My blogging life is basically goalless. I like the zen nature of that, and paradoxically, it improves results.
- Seth Godin
It’s been a long career, and I’ve made some mistakes along the way.
- Rupert Murdoch
Success is doing what you want, where you want, when you want, with whom you want and as much as you want.
- Tony Robbins
I encourage all my key people to bring their mobiles when they travel.
- Raymond Kwok
Going from PayPal, I thought: ‘Well, what are some of the other problems that are likely to most affect the future of humanity?’ Not from the perspective, ‘What’s the best way to make money?
- Elon Musk
Rockefeller never clarified why he dropped out of high school around May 1855, just 2 months shy of commencement, excercises on July 16…
- Ron Chernow
Properties that were sold by the Group during this financial year amounted to approximately HK$15.6 billion, comprising around 8,000 residential units.
- Lee Shau Kee
In the end, the customer doesn’t know, or care, if you are small or large as an organization. She or he only focuses on the garmenthanging on the rail in the store.
- Giorgio Armani
Information technology and business are becoming inextricably interwoven. I don’t think anybody can talk meaningfully about one without the talking about the other.
- Bill Gates
Good shareholder activists have incredible interest in the company because they own a lot of it.
- Ben Horowitz
