Art isn’t only a painting. Art is anything that’s creative, passionate, and personal. And great art resonates with the viewer, not only with the creator.What makes someone an artist? I don’t think is has anything to do with a paintbrush. There are painters who follow the numbers, or paint billboards, or work in a small village in China, painting reproductions. These folks, while swell people, aren’t artists. On the other hand, Charlie Chaplin was an artist, beyond a doubt. So is Jonathan Ive, who designed the iPod. You can be an artists who works with oil paints or marble, sure. But there are artists who work with numbers, business models, and customer conversations. Art is about intent and communication, not substances.An artists is someone who uses bravery, insight, creativity, and boldness to challenge the status quo. And an artists takes it personally.That’s why Bob Dylan is an artist, but an anonymous corporate hack who dreams up Pop 40 hits on the other side of the glass is merely a marketer. That’s why Tony Hsieh, founder of Zappos, is an artists, while a boiler room of telemarketers is simply a scam.Tom Peters, corporate gadfly and writer, is an artists, even though his readers are businesspeople. He’s an artists because he takes a stand, he takes the work personally, and he doesn’t care if someone disagrees. His art is part of him, and he feels compelled to share it with you because it’s important, not because he expects you to pay him for it.Art is a personal gift that changes the recipient. The medium doesn’t matter. The intent does.Art is a personal act of courage, something one human does that creates change in another.
- Seth Godin
Notable Quotables
NO PURCHASE SHOULD EVER BE MADE IN A BUSINESS UNLESS IT IS JUSTIFIED BY AN INCREASE IN SALES.
- Robert Kiyosaki
For no matter what we achieve, if we don’t spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect, we cannot possibly have a great life. But if we spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect – people we really enjoy being on the bus with and who will never disappoint us – then we will almost certainly have a great life, no matter where the bus goes. The people we interviewed from the good-to-great companies clearly loved what they did, largely because they loved who they did it with.
- James C. Collins
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
I think art is the ability to change people with your work, to see things as they are and then create stories, images, and interactions that change the marketplace.
- Seth Godin
I’ve done a number of Super Bowl ads. And that is the best advertising of the year. That is when people realize they’re going to be compared directly against other ads.
- Jerry Seinfeld
I try to look on all the great things God’s done, and not focus on the negative. It’s a perspective.
- Joel Olsteen
I always knew I was going to be rich. I don’t think I ever doubted it for a minute.
- Warren Buffett
If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values – that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
The time has come to act.
- Theodore Roosevelt
You don’t overcome challenges by making them smaller but by making yourself bigger.
- John C. Maxwell
This has been a very positive test for Kawasaki.
- Yoda
Politics is almost as exciting as war, and quite as dangerous. In war you can only be killed once, but in politics many times.
- Winston Churchill
Company culture” doesn’t exist apart from the company itself: no company has a culture; every company is a culture. A startup is a team of people on a mission, and a good culture is just what that looks like on the inside.
- Peter Thiel
Visionary companies pursue a cluster of objectives, of which making money is only one—and not necessarily the primary one.
- James C. Collins
Fail openly.
- Jack Dorsey
So to hype up PolyGram we placed fake orders for the record into their system by telling retailers and wholesalers to order the 12 inch through PolyGram. PolyGram didn’t own it yet, but we created an appetite for Christmas Rappin that led them to buy it…So in the fall of 1979 Kurtis Blow signed with Mercury Records a division of Polygram Records, making him the first rapper on a major label…Christmas eve 1979 was the first time that I heard Christmas Rappin’ on the radio; I was upstairs at my family’s house. Frankie Crocker the biggest radio DJ in New York played it on WBLS.
- Russell Simmons
I like money, but it’s never been about the money.
- Jerry Seinfeld
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
One reason to buy a watch (or a book) is because you want to possess it, show it off, give it to your grandchildren. Holding a book is a luxury, one for which you pay a premium.
- Seth Godin
Leadership is a combination of strategy and character. If you must be without one, be without the strategy.”
- General H. Norman Schwarzkopf
My home is in Moscow and I have no plans to change this.
- Alisher Usmanov
If you can deny your talents, if you can conceal them from others or, even better, persuade yourself that they weren’t even given to you, you’re off the hook. And being off the hook is a key element of the industrialized school’s promise. It lets parents off the hook, certainly, since the institution takes over the teaching. It lets teachers off the hook, since the curriculum is preordained and the results are tested. And it lets students off the hook, because the road is clearly marked and the map is handed to everyone. If you stay on the path, do your college applications through the guidance office and your job hunting at the placement office, the future is not your fault. That’s the refrain we hear often from frustrated job seekers, frustrated workers with stuck careers, and frustrated students in too much debt. ‘I did what they told me to do and now I’m stuck and it’s not my fault.’ What they’ve exchanged for that deniability is their dreams, their chance for greatness. To go off the path is to claim responsibility for what happens next.
- Seth Godin
It’s absolutely true we set out to expose Microsoft’s covert activities, I feel very good about what we did … Maybe our investigation organization may have done things unsavory, but it’s not illegal. We got the truth out.
- Larry Ellison
You can’t win by being more average than average.
- Seth Godin
PR is gift-wrapping. If you package a bracelet in a Tiffany box, it will have a higher perceived value than if you presented it in a Kmart box.
- Michael Levine
We have an ideal location for a couple of organic wineries on the island. But the reintroduction of commercial agriculture to Lanai is 100% dependent upon increasing the available water on the island. So we’re going to use solar energy to convert seawater to fresh water.
- Larry Ellison
St Patrick was a Roman Briton of good family dwelling probably in the Severn valley.
- Winston Churchill
Pleasure in the job puts perfection in the work.
- Aristotle
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
Well we know that people in Austrailia love the idea of both Impulse and Virgin Blue getting up and adding a bit of competition, and it’s fun to be able to deliver it.
- Richard Branson
We think we’re going to be especially strong in platform where we have our two platform brands: our database brand is the Oracle Database 12c, and our programming language brand is this thing called Java.
- Larry Ellison
The better at communicating you are, and the more people you communicate to, the better your cash flow will be.
- Robert Kiyosaki
In a litigation-happy society, clear agreements often prevent small disagreements from becoming big ones.
- Harvey Mackay
The unsuccessful person is burdened by learning, and prefers to walk down familiar paths. Their distaste for learning stunts their growth and limits their influence.
- John C. Maxwell
Fact: If standard of living is your number one objective, quality of life almost never improves. But if quality of life is your number one objective, standard of living invariably improves.
- Zig Ziglar
I really don’t think in the past. I sit down with many friends at dinner, and they like to talk about the good old days. I’m respectful of the good old days, but I find myself spending very little time reminiscing. I’m really looking forward.
- Donald Bren
What most people know but don’t realize they know is that the world is almost entirely solar-powered already. If the sun wasn’t there, we’d be a frozen ice ball at three degrees Kelvin, and the sun powers the entire system of precipitation. The whole ecosystem is solar-powered.
- Elon Musk
Always keep your eyes open for people with potential.
- Napoleon Hill
It was not her sex appeal but the obvious relish with which she devoured the hamburger that made my pulse begin to hammer with excitement.
- Ray Kroc
Be remarkable Be generous Create art Make judgment calls Connect people and ideas . . . and we have no choice but to reward you.
- Seth Godin
If that doesn’t seem dominant enough, consider the fact that the word “google” is now an official entry in the Oxford English Dictionary—as a verb.
- Peter Thiel
The hardest thing about being a leader is demonstrating or showing vulnerability… When the leader demonstrates vulnerability and sensibility and brings people together, the team wins.
- Howard Schultz
And yet the real success goes to those who obsess. The focus that leads you through the Dip to the other side is rewarded by a marketplace in search of the best in the world.
- Seth Godin
The secret to being wrong isn’t to avoid being wrong! The secret is being willing to be wrong. The secret is realizing that wrong isn’t fatal.
- Seth Godin
The men who have succeeded are men who have chosen one line and stuck to it.
- Andrew Carnegie
The internet was supposed to homogenize everyone by connecting us all. Instead what it’s allowed is silos of interest.
- Seth Godin
If he trips he must be sustained. If he makes mistakes they must be covered. If he sleeps he must not be wantonly disturbed. If he is no good he must be pole-axed.
- Winston Churchill
Winners are not afraid of losing. But losers are. Failure is part of the process of success. People who avoid failure also avoid success.
- Robert Kiyosaki
A startup is the largest group of people you can convince of a plan to build a different future. A new company’s most important strength is new thinking: even more important than nimbleness, small size affords space to think.
- Peter Thiel
Business in Russia was not being done like in the West, with contracts. In Russia, hundreds of millions of dollars were going forward and backward by word of mouth.
- David Reuben
Three-fourths of the people you will ever meet are hungering and thirsting for sympathy. Give it to them, and they will love you.
- Dale Carnegie
Most of our wives are planners and meticulous budgeters. In fact, only 18 percent of us disagreed with the statement Charity begins at home. Most of us will tell you that our wives are a lot more conservative with money than we are.
- Thomas J Stanley
People still think of me as a cartoonist, but the only thing I lift a pen or pencil for these days is to sign a contract, a check, or an autograph.
- Walt Disney
No one person controls Microsoft. The board and the shareholders decide whether they want to have me as CEO.
- Bill Gates
Don’t fall in love with your wit. Your cleverly turned phrase may not, as you hope, show off how much gray matter you have, especially if the phrase is at someone else’s expense.
- Harvey Mackay
Time is free, but it’s priceless. You can’t own it, but you can use it. You can’t keep it, but you can spend it. Once you’ve lost it you can never get it back.
- Harvey Mackay
Above all, you want to create something you’re proud of. This has always been my philosophy of business. I can honestly say that I have never gone into any business purely to make money. If that is the sole motive, then I believe you are better off not doing it.
- Richard Branson
Look, if you had one shot, or one opportunity To seize everything you ever wanted in one moment Would you capture it? Or just let it slip?
- Marshall Bruce Mathers III
Without failure there is no achievement.
- John C. Maxwell
Bush’s war in Iraq has done untold damage to the United States. It has impaired our military power and undermined the morale of our armed forces. Our troops were trained to project overwhelming power. They were not trained for occupation duties.
- George Soros
I’m not looking to exclude people, I’m looking to include them.
- Joel Olsteen
Chambers have numerous committees and serving on one of them provides numerous networking opportunities as well as professional leadership development.
- American Business Magazine
It is easy to think that the things that bother you will upset your people more. That’s not true. The opposite is true. Nobody takes the losses harder than the person most responsible. Nobody feels it more than you.
- Ben Horowitz
Exercise is better than any medicine I can take, exercise and sleep.
- Aliko Dangote
When growth is slower-than-expected, stocks go down. When inflation is higher-than-expected, bonds go down. When inflation is lower-than-expected, bonds go up.
- Ray Dalio
Most of the fans have ideas about their perfect phone. But many of them can’t do it because building a phone is tough. So they would give us feedback about the features that they think should be included in our next model. And if we incorporated that in our new phone, they will share the good news with their friends.
- Lei Jun
If you’re a person struggling to eat and stay healthy, you might have heard about Michael Jordan or Muhammad Ali, but you’ll never have heard of Bill Gates.
- Bill Gates
And obviously, from our own personal point of view, the principal challenge is a personal challenge.
- Richard Branson
Focus on being productive instead of busy.
- Timothy Ferriss
Try to build bridges of understanding. Don’t build higher barriers of misunderstanding.
- Dale Carnegie
I don’t think it’s a good idea to plan to sell a company.
- Elon Musk
We woke up one day, and all the sudden Starbucks was in the middle of this political crossfire between the people who want to bring a gun into Starbucks and the people who want to prevent it. It is a very difficult, fragile situation.
- Howard Schultz
One thing that most comic artists avoid is showing decisions. They show action, sure, and they show results, but they don’t show (because it’s difficult to show) the hero or the villain making a choice.
- Seth Godin
There is a real magic in enthusiasm. It spells the difference between mediocrity and accomplishment.
- Norman Vincent Peale
If you get up in the morning and think the future is going to be better, it is a bright day. Otherwise, it’s not.
- Elon Musk
I was not strong enough to defeat him. Like his master before him, be destroyed, he must.
- Yoda
I am a man who has always needed heros.
- Phil Knight
But at the Lychgate we may all pass our own conduct and our own judgments under a searching review. It is not given to human beings, happily for them, for otherwise life would be intolerable, to foresee or to predict to any large extent the unfolding course of events. In one phase men seem to have been right, in another they seem to have been wrong. Then again, a few years later, when the perspective of time has lengthened, all stands in a different setting. There is a new proportion. There is another scale of values. History with its flickering lamp stumbles along the trail of the past, trying to reconstruct its scenes, to revive its echoes, and kindle with pale gleams the passion of former days. What is the worth of all this? The only guide to a man is his conscience; the only shield to his memory is the rectitude and sincerity of his actions. It is very imprudent to walk through life without this shield, because we are so often mocked by the failure of our hopes and the upsetting of our calculations; but with this shield, however the fates may play, we march always in the ranks of honor.
- Winston Churchill
When you deal with change, you have a couple choices: you can lead it and make the rules, or you can be a fast follower, or you can be a slow follower.
- Charles Ergen
I can go into restaurants and a whole table will get up and clap if they recognize me, because they love Fox News. Other places – or even the same place – people will turn the other way.
- Rupert Murdoch
If everybody is doing it one way, there’s a good chance you can find your niche by going exactly in the opposite direction.
- Sam Walton
We’re not in the hamburger business. We’re in show business.
- Ray Kroc
“High expectations are the key to everything.”
- Sam Walton
We are in control of the one asset that we all give the most f#%ks about, and that is time.
- Gary Vaynerchuk
If a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live.
- Martin Luther King Jr.
In day-to-day life, you have stimulus to behave unethically, but in the long term, it always pays off to be ethical.
- Jorge Paulo Lemann
Be careful not to compromise what you want most for what you want now.
- Zig Ziglar
Anything that’s not necessary for you to do personally should be delegated or eliminated.
- John Maxwell
RULE 2. Leaders make sure people not only see the vision, they live and breathe it.
- Jack Welch
No man ever achieved worthwhile success who did not, at one time or other, find himself with at least one foot hanging well over the brink of failure.
- Napoleon Hill
Over three hundred years ago Galileo said: You cannot teach a man anything, you can only help him to find it within himself.
- Dale Carnegie
and the rare individual who honestly satisfies this heart hunger will hold people in the palm of his or her hand”
- Dale Carnegie
We’re taking these steps because of the continuing slowdown in the U.S. economy and initial signs of a slowdown expanding to other parts of the world.
- John Chambers
The man who has no imagination has no wings.
- Muhammad Ali
If you can get better at your job, you should be an active member of LinkedIn, because LinkedIn should be connecting you to the information, insights and people to be more effective.
- Reid Hoffman
Allowing your kids to watch TV doesn’t have to mean they have no choice but to see commercials for junk food and alcohol.
- Charles Ergen
You must go through the process before you get the product.
- Paul Pressey
If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.
- W. Clement Stone
Most men go to their graves with their dreams still inside them.
- Zig Ziglar
