I never perfected an invention that I did not think about in terms of the service it might give others… I find out what the world needs, then I proceed to invent….
- Thomas Edison
Notable Quotables
Small businesses don’t exist without the nucleus.
- Bryan Smith
There is a good saying to the effect that when a new book appears one should read an old one.
- Winston Churchill
The odds of me coming into the rocket business, not knowing anything about rockets, not having ever built anything, I mean, I would have to be insane if I thought the odds were in my favor.
- Elon Musk
Whenever you go out-of-doors, draw the chin in, carry the crown of the head high, and fill the lungs to the utmost; drink in the sunshine; greet your friends with a smile, and put soul into every handclasp. Do not fear being misunderstood and do not waste a minute thinking about your enemies. Try to fix firmly in your mind what you would like to do; and then, without veering off direction, you will move straight to the goal. Keep your mind on the great and splendid things you would like to do, and then, as the days go gliding away, you will find yourself unconsciously seizing upon the opportunities that are required for the fulfillment of your desire, just as the coral insect takes from the running tide the element it needs. Picture in your mind the able, earnest, useful person you desire to be, and the thought you hold is hourly transforming you into that particular individual . . . Thought is supreme. Preserve a right mental attitude – the attitude of courage, frankness, and good cheer. To think rightly is to create. All things come through desire and every sincere prayer is answered. We become like that on which our hearts are fixed. Carry your chin in and the crown of your head high. We are gods in the chrysalis.
- Dale Carnegie
The quality of our integration will be judged, not by the ultimate costs in hitting our targets, but instead by the level of service we give to our clients throughout the process. That’s kind of my 8-to-5 job. My 5-to-8 job is what’s the next move? Where else in health care do we see inefficiencies, that we see a splintered system with tremendous cost overruns?
- George Paz
The [Henderson] Group adopted a conservative approach in replenishing its land bank and focused its resources to convert agricultural land holdings in hand into development land in the past year with a view to bringing down the cost of land replenishment and good progress has been made in this respect.
- Lee Shau Kee
It’s hard for me to imagine how a $50 million marketing campaign is ever appropriate for any business to launch an ideavirus. If you need to interrupt that many people, you’re doing something wrong.
- Seth Godin
Money isn’t the most important thing in life, but it’s reasonably close to oxygen on the ‘gotta have it’ scale.
- Zig Ziglar
Arrange to meet with the members of your Master Mind group at least twice a week, and more often if possible, until you have jointly perfected the necessary plan or plans for the accumulation of money.
- Napoleon Hill
A wise man is a confirmed optimist.
- Andrew Carnegie
I totally understand that people are upset about it and I think that is a reasonable point of view to take.
- Sergey Brin
Once Microsoft lost its grip on developers, it became only a matter of time before it lost its monopoly on operating systems.
- Ben Horowitz
Entrepreneurship is living a few years of your life like most people won’t so you can spend the rest of your life like most people cant.
- Warren G. Tracy
We could see that he was a charismatic guy who jumps over the moon and is very competitive, but nobody could have predicted what he would become to our culture.
- Phil Knight
Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes… but no plans.
- Peter Drucker
If you’re interested in ‘balancing’ work and pleasure, stop trying to balance them. Instead make your work more pleasurable.
- Donald Trump
I DECLARE God is going before me making crooked places straight. He has already lined up the right people, the right opportunities and solutions to problems I haven’t had. No person, no sickness, no disappointment, can stop His plan. What he promised will come to pass.
- Joel Olsteen
Today, if you want to access a typical out-of-print book, you have only one choice – fly to one of a handful of leading libraries in the country and hope to find it in the stacks.
- Sergey Brin
Christopher Colombus’ big mistake was that he was looking for a trade route to China, and accidentally bumped into America, the richest, most powerful country in the world.
- Robert Kiyosaki
Embrace what you don’t know, especially in the beginning because what you don’t know can become your greatest asset. It ensures that you will be doing things absolutely differently from everybody else.
- Sara Blakely
But this “spray and pray” approach usually produces an entire portfolio of flops, with no hits at all. This is because venture returns don’t follow a normal distribution overall. Rather, they follow a power law: a small handful of companies radically outperform all others. If you focus on diversification instead of single-minded pursuit of the very few companies that can become overwhelmingly valuable, you’ll miss those rare companies in the first place.
- Peter Thiel
We learn by doing.
- Aristotle
Happiness is a Choice.
- Joel Olsteen
There are some people that can get things done, and it seems there are others who just can’t. That’s why we move heaven and earth to retain our stars and the main reason we manage out our lowest performers – the bottom 10% at least – each year.
- David Novak
When you’re in comedy, people always come up and say, ‘Oh, it must be so hard.’ It really isn’t hard unless you’re not good at it. If you can do it, its really kind of fun and easy.
- Jerry Seinfeld
I think it’s too early to tell.
- John Chambers
Unrelenting confidence was necessary.
- Ben Horowitz
Every time I read a management or self-help book, I find myself saying, “That’s fine, but that wasn’t really the hard thing about the situation.” The hard thing isn’t setting a big, hairy, audacious goal. The hard thing is laying people off when you miss the big goal. The hard thing isn’t hiring great people. The hard thing is when those “great people” develop a sense of entitlement and start demanding unreasonable things. The hard thing isn’t setting up an organizational chart. The hard thing is getting people to communicate within the organization that you just designed. The hard thing isn’t dreaming big. The hard thing is waking up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat when the dream turns into a nightmare.
- Ben Horowitz
The secret of his success? I will speak ill of no man, and speak all the good I know of everybody.
- Dale Carnegie
1. Why is it foolish to launch a new business with millions of dollars in TV ads?2. Are the market leaders in every industry more vulnerable to sudden successes by the competition than ever before?3. Should book publishers issue the paperback edition of a book before the hardcover?4. What’s the single most important asset a company can create—and what is the simple thing that can kill it?5. Every ad needs to do one of two things to succeed…yet most ads do neither. What’s the right strategy?6. Does the Net create a dynamic that fundamentally changes the way everything is marketed?7. How can every business…big and small…use ideavirus marketing to succeed?
- Seth Godin
The only way to get ahead is to find errors in conventional wisdom.
- Larry Ellison
Do it. Try it. Fix it.
- Sam Walton
That’s why it is important to enjoy the journey not just the destination. In this world, we will never arrive at a place where everything is perfect and we have no more challenges. As admirable as setting goals and reaching them maybe, you can’t get so focused on accomplishing your goals that you make the mistake of not enjoying where you are right now.
- Joel Olsteen
The Group will continue to press ahead steadily with an open mindset, a practical attitude, a broad vision and a unique insight, adhering to its ultimate objective of serving the nation and the wider community in the changing landscape.
- Cheng Yu-tung
Battles are won by slaughter and maneuver. The greater the general, the more he contributes in maneuver, the less he demands in slaughter.
- Winston Churchill
Should surveillance be usable for petty crimes like jaywalking or minor drug possession? Or is there a higher threshold for certain information? Those aren’t easy questions.
- Bill Gates
That was annoying but not entirely unexpected. It’s not a huge shock, given what’s going on down there.
- Ed Clark
If humanity doesn’t land on Mars in my lifetime, I would be very disappointed.
- Elon Musk
There is a revolution happening, and within two years I think that Wi-Fi and Netflix will be built into all the televisions.
- Reed Hastings
Simply put, your job is to prepare yourself and your business for growth.
- Michael Gerber
If we say it long enough eventually we’re going to reap a harvest. We’re going to get exactly what we’re saying.
- Joel Olsteen
I think the definition of a book is changing.
- Jeff Bezos
Today, not starting is far, far worse than being wrong. If you start, you’ve got a shot at evolving and adjusting to turn your wrong into a right. But if you don’t start, you never get a chance.
- Seth Godin
This is just going to be a great event and we have an outstanding speaker.
- Jack Taylor
I got a call from the Oprah Winfrey Show. Oprah had chosen Spanx as one of her favorite products in 2000. I had boxes of product in my apartment and I had two weeks notice that she was going to say she loved it on TV and I had no shipping department.
- Sara Blakely
To all of us comes that moment in life when we are literally tapped on the shoulder to do a very special thing unique to ourselves and our talents. What a pity if that moment finds us unprepared.
- Winston Churchill
People who add value to others do so intentionally. I say that because to add value, leaders must give of themselves, and that rarely occurs by accident.
- John C. Maxwell
“High expectations are the key to everything.”
- Sam Walton
If David our CEO, devotes so much of his time to this, then all this stuff about teamwork and learning how to be a great leader must be pretty important.
- David Novak
You cannot underestimate people’s ability to spot a soulless, bureaucratic tactic a million miles away. It’s a big reason why so many companies that have dipped a toe in social media waters have failed miserably.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
God didn’t make a mistake when He made you. You need to see yourself as God sees you.
- Joel Olsteen
Freedom does not come automatically, it is achieved. And it is not gained in a single bound
- Rollo May
Socialism needs to pull down wealth; liberalism seeks to raise up poverty. Socialism would destroy private interests, Liberalism would preserve [them] … by reconciling them with public right. Socialism would kill enterprise; Liberalism would rescue enterprise from the trammels of privilege and preference. Socialism assails the preeminence of the individual; Liberalism seeks … to build up a minimum standard for the mass. Socialism exalts the rule; Liberalism exalts the man. Socialism attacks capitalism; Liberalism attacks monopoly.
- Winston Churchill
You will never change your life until you change something you do daily.
- John Maxwell
I have never met a geologist or leading scientist who believes adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will have any significant effect on climate change.
- Gina Rinehart
Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak, courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.
- Winston Churchill
We shape our buildings, thereafter they shape us.
- Winston Churchill
We were looking to guide and help people who want to start small businesses.
- David Nilssen
Every day we have plenty of opportunities to get angry, stressed or offended. But what you’re doing when you indulge these negative emotions is giving something outside yourself power over your happiness. You can choose to not let little things upset you.
- Joel Olsteen
In Germany they had no kings. They developed them in Britain from leaders who claimed descent from the ancient gods.
- Winston Churchill
Persistent people are able to visualize the idea of light at the end of the tunnel when others can’t see it.
- Seth Godin
The doctors actually told my family there was a five percent chance of me living.
- Ed Clark
Legacy is greater than currency.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
The sad truth is, if you push hard enough, and if you’re so stubborn that you must have things your way, God will sometimes allow you to undertake a project without His blessing or at the wrong time. The problem with that, of course, is when you start something in your own strength and in your own timing, you’re going to have to finish it and maintain it in your own strength.
- Joel Olsteen
One of the great things about Lanai is that the weather is always fabulous. Always 82 degrees and sunny. The problem is that, like California now, Lanai needs more water.
- Larry Ellison
I’m for the Wall Street Occupiers. But will they accept me when they find out I sell packaged mortgage default instruments to children?
- Steve Martin
I am excited for the opportunity to pursue new interests, including my work with a few public company boards, several universities in the U.S. and the UK and ophthalmic charities whose goals are to improve eye health in emerging markets.
- David Pyott
Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.
- John Wooden
In order for us to have a future that’s exciting and inspiring, it has to be one where we’re a space-bearing civilization.
- Elon Musk
Life, we learn too late, is in the living, in the tissue of every day and hour.
- Dale Carnegie
Stealing Coach Wooden’s sets of three, I have come up with a formula for success no matter what kind of business you happen to be in: 1) Make sure you have the right people around you; 2) Have fun and drive results by recognizing the achievements of others; and 3) Be a passionate learner, and pass on what you know to others. Not only will this make you a success in business, but it will make you a success in life.
- David Novak
Watching how customers actually use a product provides much more reliable information than can be gleaned from a verbal interview or a focus group.
- Clayton M. Christensen
Innovation is the specific instrument of entrepreneurship…the act that endows resources with a new capacity to create wealth.
- Peter Drucker
Surround yourself with people who want the best for you and the people you love!
- Zig Ziglar
The lower and individual’s ability to lead, the lower the lid on his potential.
- John Maxwell
I cut the feet off of a pair of panty hose and it allowed me to wear a pair of great strappy sandals. I didn’t see lines but the hose rolled up at my feet – and that’s how Spanx born.
- Sara Blakely
My best friend is the one who brings out the best in me.
- Henry Ford
Always keep your eyes open for people with potential.
- Napoleon Hill
By the time we see that climate change is really bad, your ability to fix it is extremely limited… The carbon gets up there, but the heating effect is delayed. And then the effect of that heat on the species and ecosystem is delayed. That means that even when you turn virtuous, things are actually going to get worse for quite a while.
- Bill Gates
I think that more flow of information, the ability to stay connected to more people makes people more effective as people. And I mean, that’s true socially. It makes you have more fun, right. It feels better to be more connected to all these people. You have a richer life.
- Mark Zuckerberg
All of us, in a sense, struggle continuously all the time, because we never get what we want. The important thing which I’ve really learned is how do you not give up, because you never succeed in the first attempt.
- Mukesh Ambani
I can become someone’s miracle.
- Joel Olsteen
Most people spend more time and energy going around problems than in trying to solve them.
- Henry Ford
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
The laws of business physics have been broken in terms of how many customers you can acquire and how fast. No one in history has ever acquired 450 million customers in the same amount of time that WhatsApp did
- Ben Horowitz
Too often, sales reps simply regurgitate their presentations and expect to land the sale. It doesn’t work.
- Harvey Mackay
What gets measured gets managed.
- Peter Drucker
Humor is the great thing, the saving thing. The minute it crops up, all our irritations and resentments slip away, and a sunny spirit takes their place.
- Mark Twain
There is scarcely anything that drags a person down like debt.
- P.T. Barnum
Yes, the Bible should be taught in our schools because it is necessary to understand the Bible if we are to truly understand our own culture and how it came to be. The Bible has influenced every part of western culture from our art, music, and history, to our sense of fairness, charity, and business.
- Joel Olsteen
I believe that the science of chemistry alone almost proves the existence of an intelligent creator.
- Thomas Edison
We were always trying to look for people who could help us beyond what we were doing.
- Phil Knight
There are few words which are used more loosely than the word “Civilization.” What does it mean? It means a society based upon the opinion of civilians. It means that violence, the rule of warriors and despotic chiefs, the conditions of camps and warfare, of riot and tyranny, give place to parliaments where laws are made, and independent courts of justice in which over long periods those laws are maintained. That is Civilization—and in its soil grow continually freedom, comfort, and culture. When Civilization reigns, in any country, a wider and less harassed life is afforded to the masses of the people. The traditions of the past are cherished, and the inheritance bequeathed to us by former wise or valiant men becomes a rich estate to be enjoyed and used by all.
- Winston Churchill
[On stopping working and focussing 100% on his company Nike] I was still teaching accounting, but the next year, I told Penny [married in 1968] if we sell $300,000 worth of product, I’m going to go full-time. She was pregnant and a little anxious. We hit $290,000. I said, that ‘s close enough.
- Phil Knight
A business with a good definite plan will always be underrated in a world where people see the future as random.
- Peter Thiel
Some city-council people are really awesome, but most are uninspired. I meet with them as little as possible.
- Travis Kalanick
Movies can and do have tremendous influence in shaping young lives in the realm of entertainment towards the ideals and objectives of normal adulthood.
- Walt Disney
Politeness and civility are the best capital ever invested in business. Large stores, gilt signs, flaming advertisements, will all prove unavailing if you or your employees treat your patrons abruptly. The truth is, the more kind and liberal a man is, the more generous will be the patronage bestowed upon him.
- P.T. Barnum
The garden gleams with summer jewelry. We live vy simply—but with all the essentials of life well understood & well provided for—hot baths, cold champagne, new peas, & old brandy.
- Winston Churchill
