I always arrive late at the office, but I make up for it by leaving early
Charles Lamb
Discover
Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi
Own business
When you own your own business, you only have to work half a day. You can do anything you want with the other twelve hours.
If you know the author of this quote, please react.
If you know the author of this quote, please react.
Millionaires
Bart, with $10,000 we’d be millionaires! We could buy all kinds of useful things like…love!
Homer Simpson
Homer Simpson
Survival in Africa
Reminds me of my safari in Africa. Somebody forgot the corkscrew and for several days we had to live on nothing but food and water.
W. C. Fields
W. C. Fields
Bad for business
Things that are bad for business are bad for the people who work for the business.
Thomas Dewey
Thomas Dewey
First law in advertising
Advertising
Doing business without advertising is like winking at a girl in the dark. You know what you are doing, but nobody else does.
Stuart Henderson
Stuart Henderson
What counts
Failures
Failures are divided into two classes – those who thought and never did, and those who did and never thought.
John Charles Salak
John Charles Salak
The illusion of communication
The single biggest problem in communication is the illusion that it has taken place.
quote by George Bernard Shaw
quote by George Bernard Shaw
Prosperous friend
It is in the character of very few men to honour without envy a friend who has prospered.
Aeschylus
Aeschylus
Distrust quantitative data
You can use all the quantitative data you can get, but you still have to distrust it and use your own intelligence and judgment.
Alvin Toffler
Alvin Toffler
Learning technologies
The best technologies for learning are conversations and beer.
Jay Cross at Online Educa 2006, Berlin
Jay Cross at Online Educa 2006, Berlin
Electricity
Electricity is actually made up of extremely tiny particles called electrons, that you cannot see with the naked eye unless you have been drinking.
Dave Barry
Dave Barry
Home computers
There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.
Ken Olsen , President, Digital Equipment, 1977
Ken Olsen , President, Digital Equipment, 1977
Talent and courage
Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads.
Erica Jong
Erica Jong
Native American wisdom
Never criticize a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins.
Native American Proverb
Native American Proverb
Finishing things
One worthwhile task carried to a successful conclusion is worth half-a-hundred half-finished tasks.
Malcolm Forbes
Malcolm Forbes
Empowered organization - Stephen Covey
An empowered organization is one in which individuals have the knowledge, skill, desire, and opportunity to personally succeed in a way that leads to collective organizational success.
Stephen Covey
Stephen Covey
Empowerment
The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling with them while they do it.
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt
Courageous decision
Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.
Peter F. Drucker
Peter F. Drucker
Opportunities
A pessimist is one who sees a difficulty in every opportunity. An optimist is one who sees an opportunity in every difficulty.
If you know the author of this quote, please react.
If you know the author of this quote, please react.
Ignorance and knowledge
The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.
Daniel Boorstin
Daniel Boorstin
Do it now
The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is now.
If you know the author of this quote, please react
If you know the author of this quote, please react
Empowerment - Bill Gates
As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who empower others.
Bill Gates
Bill Gates
Criminal
A criminal is a person with predatory instincts who has not sufficient capital to form a corporation.
Howard Scott
Howard Scott
Bicycle - Einstein
Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Big/small/fast/slow
The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow.
Rupert Murdoch
Rupert Murdoch
Entrepreneur
An entrepreneur tends to bite off a little more than he can chew hoping he’ll quickly learn how to chew it.
Roy Ash
Roy Ash
Just do it
A good plan, violently executed now, is better than a perfect plan next week.
George Patton
George Patton
Be prepared
If I had nine hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend the first six sharpening my ax.
Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln
Can - cannot
Those who say it cannot be done should get out of the way of those who are doing it.
If you know the author of this quote, please react
If you know the author of this quote, please react
Follow the leader
A leader is a person you will follow to a place you wouldn’t go by yourself.
Joel Barker
Joel Barker
Fantasy
When I examine myself and my methods of thought, I come to the conclusion that the gift of fantasy has meant more to me than any talent for abstract, positive thinking
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein
Taking risks
And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.
Anais Nin
Anais Nin
Winning - Sun Tzu
He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight. He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces. He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks. He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared. He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign.
Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Trust
Trust comes on foot, but leaves on horseback.
Johan Thorbecke
(heard at the Fortis information session August 18, 2008)
Johan Thorbecke
(heard at the Fortis information session August 18, 2008)
Meetings
Meetings are events in which minutes are kept and hours are lost.
If you know the author of this quote, please react
If you know the author of this quote, please react
Design
Designing your product for monetization first, and people second will probably leave you with neither.
Tara Hunt
Tara Hunt
Successful teams
Successful teams know who they are, what they want and take ownership and responsibility to achieve it.
Sean Chapple
Sean Chapple
Tax avoidance
The avoidance of taxes is the only intellectual pursuit that carries any reward.
John Maynard Keynes
John Maynard Keynes
Good and bad
Price and value
What is a cynic? A man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Dead horse strategies
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from generation to generation , says that, "When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."
Updated for the 21st century this could mean:
Updated for the 21st century this could mean:
- Appointing a top advertising agency to promote the benefits of the reduced carbon hoofprint of a dead horse compared to the ridiculously out-dated and unsustainable notion of a living horse.
- Off-shoring the stabling and veterinary support of the dead horse to somewhere in the Indian sub-continent.
- Sending the dead horse on an outward bound weekend with other dead horses.
Leadership vs management - Stephen Covey
Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.
Stephen Covey
Stephen Covey
Statistics as a science
Statistics: The only science that enables different experts using the same figures to draw different conclusions.
Evan Esar
Evan Esar
The use of computers
Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done.
Andy Rooney
Andy Rooney
Change
There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered.
Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela
Money can't buy happiness ?
Whoever said money can't buy happiness simply didn't know where to go shopping.
Bo Derek
Bo Derek
Home computers
There is no reason for any individual to have a computer in his home.
Ken Olsen , President, Digital Equipment, 1977
Ken Olsen , President, Digital Equipment, 1977
Creativity and salesmanship
In the modern world of business, it is useless to be a creative original thinker unless you can also sell what you create. Management cannot be expected to recognize a good idea unless it is presented to them by a good salesman.
David Ogilvy
David Ogilvy
Crime in Germany
The reason there is so little crime in Germany is that it's against the law.
Alex Levin
Alex Levin
Tax
Fine - a tax for doing wrong. Tax - a fine for doing fine
If you know the author of this quote, please react
(also published on http://www.taxtalk.be)
If you know the author of this quote, please react
(also published on http://www.taxtalk.be)
The power of statistics
USA Today has come out with a new survey - apparently, three out of every four people make up 75% of the population.
David Letterman
Technorati Profile
David Letterman
Technorati Profile
Insurance
Got a good business quote ?
Business quotes enthousiasts around the world, unite !
Please react if you know smart, funny, cynical, useful quotes on all aspects of business and management.Simply react to this post or mail to quotesforbusiness@gmail.com
Please react if you know smart, funny, cynical, useful quotes on all aspects of business and management.Simply react to this post or mail to quotesforbusiness@gmail.com
Courage
Courage is doing what you're afraid to do. There can be no courage unless you're scared.
Eddie Rickenbacker
Eddie Rickenbacker
Communication
Let us make a special effort to stop communicating with each other, so we can have some conversation.
Judith Martin
Judith Martin
Banks
A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain.
Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Income tax
The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.
Albert Einstein
(also published on http://www.taxtalk.be)
Albert Einstein
(also published on http://www.taxtalk.be)
China
When China will wake up, the world will shake.
Napoleon
(Translated from French: "Quand la Chine s'éveillera, le monde tremblera ")
Napoleon
(Translated from French: "Quand la Chine s'éveillera, le monde tremblera ")
Choices and decisions
We can try to avoid making choices by doing nothing, but even that is a decision.
Gary Collins
Gary Collins
Football wisdom
If we have the ball, they can't score.
Johan Cruyff
(translated from Dutch: "Als wij de bal hebben kunnen zij niet scoren")
Johan Cruyff
(translated from Dutch: "Als wij de bal hebben kunnen zij niet scoren")
React and contribute to Quotes for business
Business quotes enthousiasts around the world, unite !
Please react if you know smart, funny, cynical, useful quotes on all aspects of business and management.
Simply react to this post or mail to quotesforbusiness@gmail.com
Please react if you know smart, funny, cynical, useful quotes on all aspects of business and management.
Simply react to this post or mail to quotesforbusiness@gmail.com
Management vs. leadership
Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.
Stephen Covey
Stephen Covey
Gerstner on culture
Until I came to IBM, I probably would have told you that culture was just one among several important elements in any organization’s makeup and success—along with vision, strategy, marketing, financials, and the like…
I came to see, in my time at IBM, that culture isn't just one aspect of the game, it is the game. In the end, an organization is nothing more than the collective capacity of its people to create value.
Lou Gerstner
I came to see, in my time at IBM, that culture isn't just one aspect of the game, it is the game. In the end, an organization is nothing more than the collective capacity of its people to create value.
Lou Gerstner
Methods
You can't do today's job with yesterday's methods and be in business tomorrow
If you know the author of this author, please let us know
If you know the author of this author, please let us know
Dead horse strategies
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from generation to generation , says that, "When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."
Updated for the 21st century this could mean:- Buying a computer program to enhance dead horse performance
- Declaring a dead horse less costly than a live one
- Forming a workgroup to find uses for dead horses
- Changing performance requirements for the horse
- Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position
Dead horse strategies
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from generation to generation , says that, "When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."
Updated for the 21st century this could mean:
Updated for the 21st century this could mean:
- Bringing in a team of external consultants to focus on dead horse optimisation.
- Re-branding the dead horse a 'Fair Trade Horse', and affixing prominent Fair Trade insignia to its hind-quarters.
- Asking Richard Branson if he'd be interested in running a Virgin Dead Horse joint venture.
- Setting up an inquiry into the dead horse, preferably headed by a dead horse and answerable to other dead horses.
- Forming a task force to investigate the dead horse's positive benefits on social enterprise.
- Blaming the dead horse on the sub-prime credit crunch, thereby absolving (and enabling the obscenely generous rewarding of) those responsible for the decision to recruit an emaciated horse, starve it, and keep it in a frozen field (because the stables were sold to property developers years ago).
- Unmasking the dead horse to be in illegal immigrant, therefore author of its own misfortune, and to blame for a lot more than simply being dead on the job.
Technology in business
The first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency.
The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency
Bill Gates
The second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will magnify the inefficiency
Bill Gates
Infinity
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former
Einstein
Einstein
Dead horse strategies
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from generation to generation , says that, "When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount."
updated for the 21st century this could mean:
updated for the 21st century this could mean:
- Nationalising the dead horse
- Re-aligning the organizational aims to better fit the needs of the dead horse. Giving dead horse and rider a good bollocking (a favourite in previous centuries too).
- Re-structuring the dead horse's reward scale to contain a performance-related element (obviously..)
- Suspending the horse's access to the executive grassy meadow until it improves its attitude and makes good all productivity shortfalls.
- Finding a mentor or buddy for the dead horse.
- Examining the cost-savings accruing from de-skilling the dead horse function.
- Outsourcing the management and/or the riding of the dead horse to a specialist dead horse management company
RAM
"640K ought to be enough for anybody."
Misattributed to Bill Gates of Microsoft, 1981 :
"I've said some stupid things and some wrong things, but not that. No one involved in computers would ever say that a certain amount of memory is enough for all time... I keep bumping into that silly quotation attributed to me that says 640K of memory is enough. There's never a citation; the quotation just floats like a rumor, repeated again and again. "
Bloomberg Business News (19 January 1996); also WIRED (16 January 1997)
(Thanks for the correction, Paul Cobbaut)
Misattributed to Bill Gates of Microsoft, 1981 :
"I've said some stupid things and some wrong things, but not that. No one involved in computers would ever say that a certain amount of memory is enough for all time... I keep bumping into that silly quotation attributed to me that says 640K of memory is enough. There's never a citation; the quotation just floats like a rumor, repeated again and again. "
Bloomberg Business News (19 January 1996); also WIRED (16 January 1997)
(Thanks for the correction, Paul Cobbaut)
Prediction
"I think there's a world market for maybe five computers."
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)