Organizations that achieve both market and operating focus are nearly unbeatable Customers don’t buy products or services. They buy results. They were designed to break what Schlesinger and his colleagues called the cycle of failure practiced by many of Au Bon Pain’s competitors who paid their employees and managers low wages, offered them little training and other support, and suffered high turnover of employees and limited customer loyalty as a result.
- James L. Heskett, W. Earl Sasser and Leonard
Notable Quotables
Work hard and persevere.
- Lee Shau Kee
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
Surround yourself with people who are smarter than you. Pick people who are interested in what you’re interested in.
- Russell Simmons
The biggest difference is that cults tend to be fanatically wrong about something important. People at a successful startup are fanatically right about something those outside it have missed.
- Peter Thiel
Names are the sweetest, most important sound in any language.
- Dale Carnegie
A waitress goes up to Winston Churchill and says, ‘Sir, your drunk.’ To which he replies, ‘I may be drunk, miss, but in the morning I will be sober and you will still be ugly.
- Winston Churchill
The time has come to act.
- Theodore Roosevelt
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
I find my greatest pleasure, and so my reward, in the work that precedes what the world calls success.
- Thomas Edison
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 you are starting a business I believe it has to be your passion.
- David Robinson
My kids probably started drinking coffee in their late teens.
- Howard Schultz
The Group launched the ‘Create a New World for Children’ Corporate Alliance Campaign with UNICEF in August 2003 to help and ease the plight of the underprivileged in our society. We both share the same commitment in creating a better environment for disadvantaged children and improving their education opportunities.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Run your business in harmony with God’s laws.
- David Green
Creating value is not enough—you also need to capture some of the value you create.
- Peter Thiel
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
We think when God speaks to us, there’s going to be a boom out of Heaven or we’re going to get some chill bumps, but I really believe God’s talking to us all the time. He’s talking to us right in here. I call it our heart, our conscience, but it’s the Holy Spirit talking to us.
- Joel Olsteen
Hitler is a monster of wickedness, insatiable in his lust for blood and plunder. Not content with having all Europe under his heel, or else terrorized into various forms of abject submission, he must now carry his work of butchery and desolation among the vast multitudes of Russia and of Asia. The terrible military machine, which we and the rest of the civilized world so foolishly, so supinely, so insensately allowed the Nazi gangsters to build up year by year from almost nothing, cannot stand idle lest it rust or fall to pieces. It must be in continual motion, grinding up human lives and trampling down the homes and the rights of hundreds of millions of men. Moreover it must be fed, not only with flesh but with oil.
- Winston Churchill
If you don’t have a competitive advantage — don’t compete.
- Jack Welch
I hate nobody except Hitler–and that is professional.
- Winston Churchill
To my mind the old masters are not art, their value is in their scarcity.
- Thomas Edison
Every day were saying, ‘How can we keep this customer happy?’ How can we get ahead in innovation by doing this, because if we don’t, somebody else will.
- Bill Gates
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
The reason you might choose to embrace the artist within you now is that this is the path to (cue the ironic music) security.
- Seth Godin
When you are the first person whose beliefs are different from what everyone else believes, you are basically saying, ‘I’m right and everyone else is wrong.’ That’s a very unpleasant position to be in. It’s at once exhilaration and the same time an invitation to be attacked.
- Larry Ellison
There certainly is a case to be made that taxes should be more progressive.
- Bill Gates
Flattery is telling the other person precisely what he thinks about himself.
- Dale Carnegie
A narrow mind and a fat head invariably come on the same person.
- Zig Ziglar
At the end of the day … Nexium is Nexium, Lipitor is Lipitor, drugs are drugs, and it shouldn’t matter that much who’s counting to 30.
- George Paz
Sometimes I look out there and I get goosebumps…
- Phil Knight
Positive energy is the ability to get other people revved up. People who energize can inspire their team to take on the impossible and enjoy the hell out of doing it. In fact, people would arm wrestle for a chance to work with them.
- Jack Welch
Brevity is the soul of wit.
- William Shakespeare
I built a steel plant from the grassroots, so I learned all the nuts and bolts. When there was a problem, I would be able to guide them, though I am not a technical person.
- Lakshmi Mittal
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
technology is important—you can’t remain a laggard and hope to be great. But technology by itself is never a primary cause of either greatness or decline.
- James C. Collins
Science is the pursuit of pure truth, and the systematizing of it.
- P.T. Barnum
Do not assume anything Obi-Wan. Clear your mind must be if you are to discover the real villains behind this plot.
- Yoda
If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way.
- Napoleon Hill
It’s hard to make a living when you are in school…
- Michael Dell
I just believe that the interesting time in a career is pre-success, what shaped things, how did you get to this point.
- Steve Martin
Never consider the possibility of failure. As long as you persist, you will be successful.
- Brian Tracy
Librarians who are arguing and lobbying for clever e-book lending solutions are completely missing the point. They are defending the library-as-warehouse concept, as opposed to fighting for the future, which is librarian as producer, concierge, connector, teacher, and impresario.
- Seth Godin
Zero to One is about how to build companies that create new things. It draws on everything I’ve learned directly as a co-founder of PayPal and Palantir and then an investor in hundreds of startups, including Facebook and SpaceX.
- Peter Thiel
It isn’t enough to think outside the box. Thinking is passive. Get used to acting outside the box.
- Timothy Ferriss
There are no shortcuts to knowledge, especially knowledge gained from personal experience. Following conventional wisdom and relying on shortcuts can be worse than knowing nothing at all.
- Ben Horowitz
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
It’s lonely at the top. Ninety-nine percent of people in the world are convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for the mediocre. The level of competition is thus fiercest for ‘realistic’ goals, paradoxically making them the most time and energy-consuming.
- Timothy Ferriss
Actually, King Abdullah, under his supervision and guidance, has established a dialogue in Saudi Arabia whereby all the population, whether Shiite or Sunnis from north, south, west or east, they can get together and exchange their views.
- Prince Al Waleed Bin Talal Alsaud
Hong Kong has gone through countless difficult moments in the past. Our belief in our abilities and our determination to work for a better future have helped us overcome all obstacles.
- Cheng Yu-tung
God, You said Your favor is not for a season but for a lifetime.
- Joel Olsteen
Let us accept the natural order in which we move. Let us reconcile ourselves to the mysterious rhythm of our destinies, such as they must be in this world of space and time. Let us treasure our joys but not bewail our sorrows. The glory of light cannot exist without its shadows. Life is a whole, and good and ill must be accepted together. The journey has been enjoyable and well worth making – once.
- Winston Churchill
The power of this new era is simple: if you want to (need to, must!) lead, then you can. It’s easier than ever and we need you. But if this isn’t the right moment, if this isn’t the right cause, then hold off. Generous and authentic leadership will always defeat the selfish efforts of someone doing it just because she can.
- Seth Godin
It is predicated on the assumption that you dislike what you are doing during the most physically capable years of your life. This is a nonstarter—nothing can justify that sacrifice.
- Timothy Ferriss
I learned that people don’t buy anything from unknown stores.
- Tadashi Yanai
A hero is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom.
- Bob Dylan
Learning to be a CEO through classroom training would be like learning to be an NFL quarterback through classroom training.
- Ben Horowitz
Any time a company grows as fast as Wal-Mart has, pockets of duplication are going to build up, and there will be areas of the business which we may no longer need. No boss or employee really likes to dwell on such matters; it’s only human nature not to want to have your job, or the jobs of the people who work for you, eliminated. But it is absolutely the responsibility of a company’s top management to be thinking about this issue all the time – to ensure the sound future for the overall company.
- Sam Walton
While 9:00 to 5:00 and what happens in the job is important… what happens from 5:00 – 9:00 while you’re off the job is INFINITELY more important.
- Zig Ziglar
It occurs to me, Jim, that you spend too much time trying to be interesting. Why don’t you invest more time being interested?
- James C. Collins
What is the use of living, if it be not to strive for noble causes and to make this muddled world a better place for those who will live in it after we are gone? How else can we put ourselves in harmonious relation with the great verities and consolations of the infinite and the eternal? And I avow my faith that we are marching towards better days. Humanity will not be cast down. We are going on swinging bravely forward along the grand high road and already behind the distant mountains is the promise of the sun.
- Winston Churchill
Look at our society. Everyone wants to be thin, but nobody wants to diet. Everyone wants to live long, but few will exercise. Everybody wants money, yet seldom will anyone budget or control their spending.
- John C. Maxwell
It was always a challenge for me to prove that a Russian financial investor can be as successful in the West as back at home in Russia.
- Alisher Usmanov
Why talk about what we want? That is childish. Absurd. Of course you are interested in what you want. You are eternally interested in it. But no one else is. The rest of us are just like you: we are interested in what we want.
- Dale Carnegie
There is a real magic in enthusiasm. It spells the difference between mediocrity and accomplishment.
- Norman Vincent Peale
There is no expedient to which a man will not go to avoid the real labor of thinking.
- Thomas Edison
You cannot push any one up a ladder unless he be willing to climb a little himself.
- Andrew Carnegie
Just like Mark Snider told the Board of Elections within a couple hours of when he first became aware of it… first of all, Mike and I didn’t even know anything about this till March 16, … Second of all, nobody benefited from this in any way, shape or form whatsoever.
- Michael Ward
We always live in an uncertain world. What is certain is that the United States will go forward over time.
- Warren Buffett
When I hear Mitt Romney say that he believes that Jesus is the Son of God, that He’s the Christ, raised from the dead, that He’s his savior – that’s good enough for me.
- Joel Olsteen
It is not enough to say we must not wage war. It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
We shall go on to the end. We shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.
- Winston Churchill
The majority of people begin to drift as soon as they meet with opposition, and not one out of ten thousand (people) will keep on trying after failing two or three times.
- Napoleon Hill
I’m not averse to making a lot of money. But where does that end? I hang out with people with hundreds of millions of dollars. Is that the standard by which I should measure myself? Where does that take you if you’re in my business? I think it takes you to pretty dark, corrupt places.
- Timothy Ferriss
One thing is certain in business. You and everyone around you will make mistakes.
- Richard Branson
You must find something that you deeply love and are passionate about and are willing to sacrifice a lot to achieve.
- Howard Schultz
That’s not a Puma, that’s a Nike. [‘What’s a Nike?’] A new brand.
- Phil Knight
I have Internet fame. Real fame is more intense.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
If my mind can conceive it and my heart can believe it, then I can achieve it.
- Muhammad Ali
We were trading things before we were using language to communicate.
- Jack Dorsey
If I were to retire, I would keep my family’s interest in the company the same and say, Don’t sell.
- Sheldon Adelson
There’s never been a doctor who served many patients who, despite their best efforts, did not lose some of them to death. But they understood that was part of life itself.
- Zig Ziglar
What is not started will never get finished
- Johann Wolf gang von Goethe
An individual artist needs only a thousand true fans in her tribe. It’s enough.
- Seth Godin
It’s so easy to tweet from wherever you are.
- Jack Dorsey
We are continuing to see a number of signs that could be interpreted with the appropriate caveats as optimistic.
- John Chambers
The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint to keep form meddling with them while they do it.
- Theodore Roosevelt
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
Maintain ‘baseball cards’ and/or ‘believability matrixes’ for your people. Imagine if you had baseball cards that showed all the performance stats. 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
If you want to increase your success rate, double your failure rate.
- Thomas J Watson
Ally yourself with a group of as many people as you may need for the creation and carrying out of your plan or plans for the accumulation of money…Compliance with this instruction is absolutely essential. Do not neglect it.
- Napoleon Hill
These endless legal challenges that define elections in New York are a joke in this country, and they are the reason why it is so expensive, or one of the reasons, it’s so expensive to run here and why so many people decide not to run.
- Michael Bloomberg
We have more than six and one-half times the level of wealth of our non-millionaire neighbors, but, in our neighborhood, these nonmillionaires outnumber us better than three to one. Could it be that they have chosen to trade wealth for acquiring high-status material possessions?
- Thomas J Stanley
To me, failure means not trying; failure isnt the outcome. If i have to look at myself in the mirror and say, ‘I didnt try that because I was scared,’ that is failure.
- Sara Blakely
I have ten marathons under my belt, including four New York races and one Boston.
- Harvey Mackay
Unwavering courage based upon knowledge of self, and of one’s occupation. No follower wishes to be dominated by a leader who lacks self-confidence and courage. No intelligent follower will be dominated by such a leader very long.
- Napoleon Hill
Sometimes we look at gay being a bigger sin than being proud or not telling the truth. I don’t think God categorizes sins.
- Joel Olsteen
My friends are people who like building cool stuff. We always have this joke about people who want to just start companies without making something valuable. There’s a lot of that in Silicon Valley.
- Mark Zuckerberg
Always two there are, no more, no less. A master and an apprentice.
- Yoda
Show me a thoroughly satisfied man and I will show you a failure.
- Thomas Edison
