Notable Quotables

I wanted to be an artist. They see the world in a very different way.

- Jack Dorsey

Always go to the expert.

- Jack Nadel

Building a better you is the first step to building a better America.

- Zig Ziglar

The conditions of suffering that exist today in our impoverished communities are not acceptable. The reflection of those conditions are less concerning to me. And I work everyday about changing the conditions.

- Russell Simmons

Focus on being productive instead of busy.

- Timothy Ferriss

Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard.

- Guy Kawasaki

The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.

- William Arthur Ward

Sound managerial decisions are at the very root of their impending fall from industry leadership.

- Clayton M. Christensen

A business that looks orderly says to your customer that your people know what they’re doing.

- Michael Gerber

I sold my most valuable possession, but I knew that because I worked at Hewlett Packard, I could buy the next model calculator the very next month for a lower price than I sold the older one for!

- Steve Wozniak

There are not many companies in China that dare to say in public, ‘We don’t offer bribes’, or companies that operate only by market rules.

- Wang Jianlin

Being a good company is an end in itself.

- Ben Horowitz

The spread of online information isn’t just good for charities. It’s also good for donors. You can go to a site like Charity Navigator, which evaluates nonprofits on their financial health as well as the amount of information they share about their work.

- Bill Gates

But Governments and peoples do not always take rational decisions. Sometimes they take mad decisions, or one set of people get control who compel all others to obey and aid them in folly.

- Winston Churchill

Customers have different need states and life experiences.

- Howard Schultz

True success is when you reach back and bring somebody along with you.

- Joel Olsteen

If you will live like no one else, later you can live like no one else.

- Dave Ramsey

I am wired like a CEO and care a great deal about the bottom line, but I care about my customers even more than that. That’s always been my competitive advantage.

- Gary Vaynerchuk

On Facebook, the definition of great content is not the content that makes the most sales, but the content that people most want to share with others.

- Gary Vaynerchuk

People ask me all the time, ‘How can I become a successful entrepreneur?’ And I have to be honest: It’s one of my least favorite questions, because if you’re waiting for someone else’s advice to become an entrepreneur, chances are you’re not one.

- Michael Dell

The flexibility of Hong Kong businessmen should soon twist a way to success again.

- Cheng Yu-tung

Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.

- Winston Churchill

Start where you are, with what you have. Make something of it and never be satisfied.

- George Washington Carver

You have to act and act now.

- Larry Ellison

Stop doing things that waste time. Don’t replace time with your family or things that you need to do. I needed to put together two fantasy teams this weekend because that’s something I enjoy, but I did stop playing Nintendo Wii for hours on end.

- Gary Vaynerchuk

Real leaders don’t care [about receiving credit]. If it’s about your mission, about spreading the faith, about seeing something happen, not only do you not care about credit, you actually want other people to take credit…There’s no record of Martin Luther King, Jr. or Gandhi whining about credit. Credit isn’t the point. Change is.

- Seth Godin

True happiness… is not attained through self-gratification, but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.

- Helen Keller

No man has a right to expect to succeed in life unless he understands his business, and nobody can understand his business thoroughly unless he learns it by personal application and experience.

- P.T. Barnum

You want to have a future where you’re expecting things to be better, not one where you’re expecting things to be worse.

- Elon Musk

That was annoying but not entirely unexpected. It’s not a huge shock, given what’s going on down there.

- Ed Clark

Let’s simplify this entire world.

- Jack Dorsey

The led must not be compelled. They must be able to choose their own leader.

- Albert Einstein

Do or do not. There is no try.

- Yoda

You know, the diversity that America has is so special. It’s starting to really become a cool thing for young people.

- Russell Simmons

AP pleaded guilty to criminal theft of our software. Let me be clear. I’m not accusing SAP of anything. What did SAP do? Did you engage in criminal behavior and steal lots of Oracle software? Yes. That’s SAP. Who was CEO when you were doing all this criminal stuff? Leo.

- Larry Ellison

The group has continued to dedicate itself to its core businesses in property, infrastructure development, hotel operations and telecommunications. As for our operations in China, we expect to reap good returns from the investments in infrastructure, government housing and city core redevelopment projects as time goes by. Our strategic foothold in telecommunications will allow us to become an important player in the telecom industry.

- Cheng Yu-tung

The general idea of the rich helping the poor, I think, is important.

- Bill Gates

If you’re passionate about something and you work hard, then I think you will be successful.

- Pierre Omidyar

Luck Follows Persistence.

- Jim Collins

Leaders who fail to prune their pride will meet demise. That’s not a guess, it’s a guarantee. With pride, it’s not a matter of ‘if’ we will fall, but ‘when.’ There are no exceptions.

- John C. Maxwell

Just as the process of repealing national alcohol prohibition began with individual states repealing their own prohibition laws, so individual states must now take the initiative with respect to repealing marijuana prohibition laws.

- George Soros

If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have the time to do it over?

- John Wooden

We need to, you know, restore people. We need to show mercy. I mean, because as much mercy as you show people, that’s the mercy you’re going to be receiving.

- Joel Olsteen

You can live your life angry, bitter, mad at somebody or even guilty, not letting go of your own mistakes, but you won’t receive the good things God has in store.

- Joel Olsteen

You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

- Wayne Gretzky

I have heard, in such a way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the army and the Government needed a dictator. Of course, it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you command. Only those generals who gain successes can set up as dictators. What I now ask of you is military success and I will risk the dictatorship.

- Dale Carnegie

The first rule of organizational design is that all organizational designs are bad.

- 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

I find my greatest pleasure, and so my reward, in the work that precedes what the world calls success.

- Thomas Edison

My big advantage was to have my father accept me as first-generation.

- Mukesh Ambani

Success is never final. Failure is never fatal. It is courage that counts.

- Winston Churchill

Network effects businesses must start with especially small markets.

- Peter Thiel

After putting economics aside, I found that there were two primary reasons why people quit: They hated their manager; generally the employees were appalled by the lack of guidance, career development, and feedback they were receiving. They weren’t learning anything: The company wasn’t investing resources in helping employees develop new skills.

- Ben Horowitz

It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.

- Babe Ruth

It is equally important that diversification is an ongoing process.

- Cheng Yu-tung

Many of the people that you lay off will have closer relationships with the people who stay than you do, so treat them with an appropriate level of respect.

- Ben Horowitz

You need editors, not brand managers,who will push the envelope to make [a brand media property] go forward.

- Seth Godin

You know, if it’s a three-way race, the public has more choice than if it’s a two-way race, and has more choice in a two-way race than a one-way race.

- Michael Bloomberg

Culture is one of the most precious things a company has…So you must work harder on it than anything else.

- Herb Kelleher

Most people want to avoid pain, and discipline is usually painful.

- John C. Maxwell

Fact is, the first 100 years of our country’s history were about who could build the biggest, most efficient farm. And the second century focused on the race to build factories. Welcome to the third century, folks. The third century is about ideas.

- Seth Godin

Visionary companies pursue a cluster of objectives, of which making money is only one—and not necessarily the primary one.

- James C. Collins

“Someday” is a disease that will take your dreams to the grave with you. Pro and con lists are just as bad. If it’s important to you and you want to do it eventually, just do it and correct course along the way.

- Timothy Ferriss

The best customer service is if the customer doesn’t need to call you, doesn’t need to talk to you. It just works.

- Jeff Bezos

When men are fighting for their lives they are not often disposed to be complimentary to those who are trying to kill them.

- Winston Churchill

There is one quality which one must possess to win, and that is definiteness of purpose, the knowledge of what one wants, and a burning desire to possess it.

- Napoleon Hill

So at that stage you might as well keep growing, to get the advantages of scale.

- Sergey Brin

Of all the small nations of this earth, perhaps only the ancient Greeks surpass the Scots in their contribution to mankind.

- Winston Churchill

A business with a good definite plan will always be underrated in a world where people see the future as random.

- Peter Thiel

People who are unable to motivate themselves must be content with mediocrity, no matter how impressive their other talents.

- Andrew Carnegie

If I was down to my last dollar, I would spend it on public relations.

- Bill Gates

You have to BE before you can DO, and DO before you can HAVE.

- Zig Ziglar

Failure comes part and parcel with invention. It’s not optional. We understand that and believe in failing early and iterating until we get it right. When this process works, it means our failures are relatively small in size (most experiments can start small), and when we hit on something that is really working for customers, we double-down on it with hopes to turn it into an even bigger success.

- Jeff Bezos

The most expensive piece of real estate is the six inches between your right and left ear. It’s what you create in that area that determines your wealth. We are only really limited by our mind.

- Dr. Dolf de Roos

My financial service business is the absolute best thing I have done to empower the poor. I run many charities and fight many political causes, but my financial service company is the greatest gift I’ve given.

- Russell Simmons

Substantial growth in GDP, rising wages, improved employment prospects and favourable bank mortgage terms have all resulted in a buoyant property market.

- Lee Shau Kee

Desire Is Born With Vision.

- Zig Ziglar

The most valuable companies in the future won’t ask what problems can be solved with computers alone. Instead, they’ll ask: how can computers help humans solve hard problems?

- Peter Thiel

If you want to understand what drives Cisco, look at our approach to customers. The manner in which we serve our customers defines our company values and demonstrates our priorities. Cisco is proud to be honored with this important certification that recognizes the foundation of our culture — the importance that we place on ensuring our customers are successful with Cisco technology.

- John Chambers

Either people challenge each other to the point where they don’t like each other or they become complacent about each other’s feedback and no longer benefit from the relationship.

- Ben Horowitz

The ‘morality of compromise’ sounds contradictory. Compromise is usually a sign of weakness, or an admission of defeat. Strong men don’t compromise, it is said, and principles should never be compromised.

- Andrew Carnegie

I think the high-tech industry is used to developing new things very quickly. It’s the Silicon Valley way of doing business: You either move very quickly and you work hard to improve your product technology, or you get destroyed by some other company.

- Elon Musk

I don’t know about you, but most of my exchanges with cashiers are not that meaningful.

- Jeff Bezos

We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

- Martin Luther King Jr.

Often, it is in trying times that the greatest endeavours are realised.

- Cheng Yu-tung

Teaching’s hard! You need different skills: positive reinforcement, keeping students from getting bored, commanding their attention in a certain way.

- Bill Gates

Therefore, every startup should start with a very small market. Always err on the side of starting too small. The reason is simple: it’s easier to dominate a small market than a large one. If you think your initial market might be too big, it almost certainly is.

- Peter Thiel

Worry is interest paid before it’s due.

- Zig Ziglar

It’s only lonely at the top if you forget all the people you met along the way and fail to acknowledge their contributions to your success.

- Harvey Mackay

We got to know a lot of investors and know what they like and don’t like. Through many co-investments opportunities, we have built trust among these investors. So when it came to investing in Xiaomi, things were a lot easier.

- Lei Jun

Q1 was a solid quarter for Cisco, with balanced execution across most of our geographies, market segments and product categories, … We are especially pleased with the improving business momentum in the U.S. and Asia Pacific, the strength of our product families and the accelerated growth of the commercial marketplace, which has become our fastest growing customer segment.

- John Chambers

I don’t know what would have happened to Wal-Mart if we had laid low and never stirred up the competition. My guess is that we would have remained a strictly regional operator.

- Sam Walton

What you sow you reap. What you give.

- Zig Ziglar

One of the huge mistakes people make is that they try to force an interest on themselves. You don’t choose your passions, your passions choose you.

- Jeff Bezos

Outlook 2003 did create the idea of search folders and the whole Longhorn philosophy. You can see it at work in search folders, where instead of having to drop things into individual folders, and things exist only in one folder, you create these search folders and you have the criteria for the search folder.

- Bill Gates

Life’s a journey. It’s a journey about discovering limits.

- Larry Ellison

Revolution has values, revolution has purpose. Revolution has direction. Revolution has leaders. Revolution looks at the intersection ahead and pushes people to do the right thing. And it doesn’t always have to be loud. It doesn’t always have to be violent. It’s just as powerful in it’s stillness.

- Jack Dorsey

In the end, I hope there’s a little note somewhere that says I designed a good computer.

- Steve Wozniak

Every man I meet is my superior in some way. In that, I learn of him.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

In this business, by the time you realize you’re in trouble, it’s too late to save yourself. Unless you’re running scared all the time, you’re gone.

- Bill Gates