“The hard thing isn't setting a big, hairy, audacious goal. The hard thing is laying people off when you miss the big goal.” Ben Horowitz · The Hard Thing About Hard Things, 2014
“Take care of the people, the products, and the profits — in that order.” Ben Horowitz · The Hard Thing About Hard Things, 2014
“Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure. Only the paranoid survive.” Andrew Grove · Only the Paranoid Survive, 1996
“Train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough so they don't want to.” Richard Branson · Interviews
“The glass ceiling will go away when women help other women break through that ceiling.” Indra Nooyi · Interviews
“People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Maya Angelou · Widely attributed
“It is hard to think that a $2 billion company with 4,300-plus people couldn't compete with six people in blue jeans.” Steve Jobs
“To design something really well you have to get it. You have to really grok what it’s all about. It takes a passionate commitment to thoroughly understand something — chew it up, not just quickly swallow it. Most people don’t take the time to do that.” Steve Jobs
“The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste. They have absolutely no taste. And I don't mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way, in the sense that they don't think of original ideas, and they don't bring much culture into their products.” Steve Jobs
“We hired truly great people and gave them the room to do great work. A lot of companies [...] hire people to tell them what to do. We hire people to tell us what to do. We figure we're paying them all this money; their job is to figure out what to do and tell us.” Steve Jobs
“But in the end, for something this complicated, it's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.” Steve Jobs
“Communication is a sign of dysfunction. It means people aren’t working together in a close, organic way. We should be trying to figure out ways for teams to communicate less with each other, not more.” Jeff Bezos
“To create a new standard, it takes something that's not just a little bit different; it takes something that's really new and really captures people's imagination — and the Macintosh, of all the machines I've ever seen, is the only one that meets that standard.” Bill Gates
“If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today.... The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can.” Bill Gates
“What we're saying to people is that every idea about ease-of-use, we can develop in software, for the PC, without asking them to buy new hardware, without asking them to throw away their old applications.” Bill Gates
“If you show people the problems and you show people the solutions they will be moved to act.” Bill Gates
“Microsoft's early mobile strategy was clearly a mistake. There's a lot of things like cellphones where we didn't get out in the lead early. We didn't miss cellphones, but the way that we went about it didn't allow us to get the leadership.” Bill Gates
“The greatest mistake ever is the whatever mismanagement I engaged in that caused Microsoft not to be what Android is, meaning Android is the standard non-Apple phone form platform.” Bill Gates
“I don’t have an issue with serving in the military per se, but serving in the South African army suppressing black people just didn’t seem like a really good way to spend time.” Elon Musk
“When Henry Ford made cheap, reliable cars people said, "Nah, what's wrong with a horse?" That was a huge bet he made, and it worked.” Elon Musk
“It doesn’t do a great deal to advance the goal of humanity. I would pay $20 million not to spend six months in Russia. And besides this, my interest is how do we enable many other people to go to space, not necessarily me, personally.” Elon Musk
“Starting and growing a business is as much about the innovation, drive and determination of the people who do it as it is about the product they sell.” Elon Musk
“My approach is simply to seek out very talented people, ensure that the environment at SpaceX is as motivating & enjoyable as possible and establish clear & measurable objectives.” Elon Musk
“Connectivity just can’t be a privilege for people in the richest countries. We believe that connecting everyone in the world is one of the great challenges of our generation. And that’s why we are happy to play whatever small part in that that we can.” Mark Zuckerberg
“The idea of a single eureka moment is a dangerous lie. It makes us feel inadequate since we haven’t had ours. It prevents people with seeds of good ideas from getting started.” Mark Zuckerberg
“We understand the great arc of human history bends towards people coming together in ever greater numbers — from tribes to cities to nations — to achieve things we couldn’t on our own.” Mark Zuckerberg
“Mark Zuckerberg went from selling the idea that Facebook would lead to a flourishing of human friendship to, now, selling the notion that Meta will provide you with AI friends to replace the human pals you have lost in our alienated social-media age.” Mark Zuckerberg
“You're dealing with a lot of silly people in the marketplace'''; it's like a great big casino and everyone else is boozing. If you can stick with Pepsi, you should be O.K.” Warren Buffett
“Wall Street is the only place that people ride to work in a Rolls Royce to get advice from those who take the subway.” Warren Buffett
“Success in investing doesn't correlate with I.Q. once you're above the level of 125. Once you have ordinary intelligence, what you need is the temperament to control the urges that get other people into trouble in investing.” Warren Buffett
“A very low cost index fund where you don't put in all your money at one time ... If you accumulate a low cost index fund over 10 years ... with fairly regular sums, I think you will probably do better than 90% of the people around you that take up investing at a similar time.” Warren Buffett
“You want to be greedy when others are fearful. You want to be fearful when others are greedy. It's that simple. ... They're pretty fearful. In fact, in my adult lifetime, I don't think I've ever seen people as fearful economically as they are right now.” Warren Buffett
“Management's objective is to achieve a return on capital over the long term which averages somewhat higher than that of American industry generally — while utilizing sound accounting and debt policies.” Warren Buffett
“An irresistible footnote: in 1971, pension fund managers invested a record 122% of net funds available in equities — at full prices they couldn't buy enough of them. In 1974, after the bottom had fallen out, they committed a then record low of 21% to stocks.” Warren Buffett
“It's simply to say that managers and investors alike must understand that accounting numbers is the beginning, not the end, of business valuation.” Warren Buffett
“The hard part of the process for most people is the first $100,000. If you have a standing start at zero, getting together $100,000 is a long struggle for most people.” Charlie Munger
“In the modern corporation the decisive power, that of the managers, is derived from no one but the managers themselves controlled by nobody and nothing and responsible to no one. It is in the most literal sense unfounded, unjustified, uncontrolled and irresponsible power.” Peter Drucker
“A man should never be appointed into a managerial position if his vision focuses on people's weaknesses rather than on their strengths.” Peter Drucker
“- A manager sets objectives - A manager organizes - A manager motivates and communicates - A manager, by establishing yardsticks, measures - A manager develops people.” Peter Drucker
“The moment people talk of "implementing" instead of "doing," and of "finalizing" instead of "finishing," the organization is already running a fever.” Peter Drucker
“The people are on the side of sound money. They are so unalterably on the side of sound money that it is a serious question how they would regard the system under which they live, if they once knew what the initiated can do with it.” Henry Ford
“The average man won't really do a day's work unless he is caught and cannot get out of it. There is plenty of work to do if people would do it.” Henry Ford
“Let them fail; let everybody fail! I made my fortune when I had nothing to start with, by myself and my own ideas. Let other people do the same thing. If I lose everything in the collapse of our financial structure, I will start in at the beginning and build it up again.” Henry Ford
“It is perhaps well enough that the people of the Nation do not know or understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning.” Henry Ford
“Variant: If the American people knew the corruption in our money system there would be revolution before morning.” Henry Ford
“Industrialist Henry Ford hated jazz. He thought it was a Jewish conspiracy to use black music to get good white people into booze, cigarettes and sex.” Henry Ford
“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” Thomas Edison
“Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.” Thomas Edison
“All right. I'm corny. But I think there's just about a-hundred-and-forty-million people in this country that are just as corny as I am.” Walt Disney
“All you've got to do is own up to your ignorance honestly, and you'll find people who are eager to fill your head with information.” Walt Disney
“I am interested in entertaining people, in bringing pleasure, particularly laughter, to others, rather than being concerned with "expressing" myself with obscure creative impressions.” Walt Disney
“Around here, however, we don't look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors and doing new things, because we're curious… and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.” Walt Disney
“Animation offers a medium of story telling and visual entertainment which can bring pleasure and information to people of all ages everywhere in the world.” Walt Disney
“I became an entrepreneur by mistake. Ever since then I've gone into business, not to make money, but because I think I can do it better than it's been done elsewhere. And, quite often, just out of personal frustration about the way it's been done by other people.” Richard Branson
“The talents of young people must not be stifled. Education is not just about getting the right grades in exams but it should encourage all students to develop their optimum capacity, whatever that may be. Schools and colleges should prepare young people for life.” Richard Branson
“If we want to balance out leadership roles in the workplace, we have to balance out responsibilities in the home.” Sheryl Sandberg
“The data show that success and likability are positively correlated for men and negatively correlated for women. Which means that as women get more successful, they are liked less—both by men and by other women. That’s because we want people to conform to our stereotypes.” Sheryl Sandberg
“We expect men to have leadership qualities, to be assertive and competent, to speak out. We expect women to have communal qualities, to be givers and sharers, to pursue the common good.” Sheryl Sandberg
“I think women in leadership suffer from stereotyping, and when people expect a stereotype and are reminded of a stereotype, that actually makes the stereotype stronger.” Sheryl Sandberg
“What has happened is that there aren’t women in leadership roles, therefore people don’t expect there to be women in leadership roles, therefore, there aren’t women in leadership roles.” Sheryl Sandberg
“I think we need to expect and encourage our girls and women to lead and contribute.” Sheryl Sandberg
“Real choice would mean that people were choosing based on their interests and personal passions, not based on their gender.” Sheryl Sandberg
“My own answer to the contrarian question is that most people think the future of the world will be defined by globalization, but the truth is that technology matters more. ... In a world of scarce resources, globalization without new technology is unsustainable.” Peter Thiel
“By far the most difficult skill I learned as a C.E.O. was the ability to manage my own psychology. Organizational design, process design, metrics, hiring and firing were all relatively straightforward skills to master compared with keeping my mind in check.” Ben Horowitz
“The important thing about mobile is, everybody has a computer in their pocket. The implications of so many people connected to the Internet all the time from the standpoint of education is incredible.” Ben Horowitz
“Every time you make the hard, correct decision you become a bit more courageous and every time you make the easy, wrong decision you become a bit more cowardly. If you are CEO, these choices will lead to a courageous or cowardly company.” Ben Horowitz
“At every period of history, people have believed things that were just ridiculous, and believed them so strongly that you risked ostracism or even violence by saying otherwise. If our own time were any different, that would be remarkable. As far as I can tell it isn't.” Paul Graham
“As a rule of thumb, the more qualifiers there are before the name of a country, the more corrupt the rulers. A country called The Socialist People's Democratic Republic of X is probably the last place in the world you'd want to live.” Paul Graham
“I've seen occasional articles about how to manage programmers. Really there should be two articles: one about what to do if you are yourself a programmer, and one about what to do if you're not. And the second could probably be condensed into two words: give up.” Paul Graham
“European public opinion will apparently tolerate people being fired in industries where they really care about performance. Unfortunately the only industry they care enough about so far is soccer.” Paul Graham
“Why do people move to suburbia? To have kids! So no wonder it seemed boring and sterile. The whole place was a giant nursery, an artificial town created explicitly for the purpose of breeding children.” Paul Graham
“Another reason people don't work on big projects is, ironically, fear of wasting time. What if they fail? Then all the time they spent on it will be wasted. (In fact it probably won't be, because work on hard projects almost always leads somewhere.)” Paul Graham
“The more you realize that most judgements are greatly influenced by random, extraneous factors—that most people judging you are more like a fickle novel buyer than a wise and perceptive magistrate—the more you realize you can do things to influence the outcome.” Paul Graham
“At the heart of this culture is an understanding that an '''organization's ability to learn, and translate that learning into action rapidly, is the ultimate competitive business advantage.” Jack Welch
“The best way to support dreams and stretch is to set apart small ideas with big potential, then give people positive role models and the resources to turn small projects into big businesses.” Jack Welch
“I wanted to change the rules of engagement, asking for more— from fewer. I was insisting that we had to have only the best people...If you wanted excellence, at a minimum, the ambience had to reflect excellence.” Jack Welch
“Getting the right people in the right jobs is a lot more important than developing a strategy.” Jack Welch
“CEO of General Electric for 30 years, Jack Welch was declared the greatest manager of the 20th century. Focusing firmly on results, he revolutionized management to achieve phenomenal growth for his company.” Jack Welch
“It's hard to keep things moving. And that's always a big trick. I think for me, the key is setting really big goals. And, you know, with YouTube, I think we've had tremendous leadership, both with the founders and now with Salar, who's been running it.” Larry Page
“We came up with the notion that not all web pages are created equal. People are – but not web pages.” Sergey Brin
“... whenever I have met with our elected officials they are invariably thoughtful, well-meaning people. And yet collectively 90% of their effort seems to be focused on how to stick it to the other party.” Sergey Brin
“I will continue to use my voice. I believed from the beginning that [the lawsuit] was an attempt to muzzle my voice, and I come from a people who have struggled and died in order to have a voice in this country. And I refused to be muzzled.” Oprah Winfrey
“What other people label or might try to call failure, I have learned is just God's way of pointing you in a new direction.” Oprah Winfrey
“I had a lot of wealthy men calling, telling me that they would run my campaign and raise $1 billion for me. I am actually humbled by the fact that people think that I could be a leader of the free world, but it's just not in my spirit. . . it's not in my DNA” Oprah Winfrey
“I know where my lane is, and I know how to stay in my lane. My lane is evolving the consciousness of people.” Oprah Winfrey
“[Contradicting an assertion from Angela Davis] Small steps lead to big accomplishments.” Oprah Winfrey
“Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.” Stephen Covey
“Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.” Stephen Covey
“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand; they listen with the intent to reply.” Stephen Covey
“Trust is the glue that holds everything together. It creates the environment in which all of the other elements — win-win stewardship agreements, self-directing individuals and teams, aligned structures and systems, and accountability — can flourish.” Stephen Covey
“My major hobby is teasing people who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously and those who don’t have the guts to sometimes say: I don’t know....” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“Trading forces someone to think hard; those who merely work hard generally lose their focus and intellectual energy. In addition, they end up drowning in randomness; work ethics draw people to focus on noise rather than the signal.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“From the standpoint of an institution, the existence of a risk manager has less to do with actual risk reduction than it has to do with the impression of risk reduction.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“There are hordes of thoughtful journalists... [I]t is just that prominent media journalism is a thoughtless process of providing the noise that captures people's attention and there exists no mechanism for separating the two.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“I... found a significant advantage in selecting aged traders, using as a selection criterion their cumulative years of experience rather than their absolute success... [O]lder people have been exposed longer to the rare event and can be, convincingly, more resistant to it.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“A trader's mental construction should direct him to do precisely what other people do not do.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“Why do [people] confuse probability and expectation, that is, probability [vs.] probability times payoff? Mainly because much... schooling comes from examples in symmetric environments... the... bell curve... is entirely symmetric.” Nassim Nicholas Taleb
“A reliable way to make people believe in falsehoods is frequent repetition, because familiarity is not easily distinguished from truth.” Daniel Kahneman
“There is no evidence that risk takers in the economic domain have an unusual appetite for gambles on high stakes; they are merely less aware of risks than more timid people are.” Daniel Kahneman
“The ability to deal with people is as purchasable a commodity as sugar or coffee, and I will pay more for that ability than for any other under the sun.” John D. Rockefeller
“Next to doing the right thing, the most important thing is to let people know you are doing the right thing.” John D. Rockefeller
“Good management consists of showing average people how to do the work of superior people.” John D. Rockefeller
“It would be thought a hard Government that should tax its People one-tenth Part of their Time, to be employed in its Service.” Benjamin Franklin
“In 200 years will people remember us as traitors or heros? That is the question we must ask.” Benjamin Franklin
“Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed to be no hope at all.” Dale Carnegie
“If out of reading this book you get just one thing—an increased tendency to think always in terms of other people’s point of view, and see things from their angle—if you get that one thing out of this book, it may easily prove to be one of the building blocks of your career.” Dale Carnegie
“Let's never try to get even with our enemies, because if we do we will hurt ourselves far more than we hurt them. Let's do as General Eisenhower does: let's never waste a minute thinking about people we don't like.” Dale Carnegie
“The "Master Mind" may be defined as: "Coordination of knowledge and effort, in a spirit of harmony, between two or more people, for the attainment of a definite purpose.” Napoleon Hill
“It is hard to think that a $2 billion company with 4,300-plus people couldn't compete with six people in blue jeans.” Steve Jobs
“To design something really well you have to get it. You have to really grok what it’s all about. It takes a passionate commitment to thoroughly understand something — chew it up, not just quickly swallow it. Most people don’t take the time to do that.” Steve Jobs
“The only problem with Microsoft is they just have no taste. They have absolutely no taste. And I don't mean that in a small way, I mean that in a big way, in the sense that they don't think of original ideas, and they don't bring much culture into their products.” Steve Jobs
“We hired truly great people and gave them the room to do great work. A lot of companies [...] hire people to tell them what to do. We hire people to tell us what to do. We figure we're paying them all this money; their job is to figure out what to do and tell us.” Steve Jobs
“But in the end, for something this complicated, it's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.” Steve Jobs
“Communication is a sign of dysfunction. It means people aren’t working together in a close, organic way. We should be trying to figure out ways for teams to communicate less with each other, not more.” Jeff Bezos
“To create a new standard, it takes something that's not just a little bit different; it takes something that's really new and really captures people's imagination — and the Macintosh, of all the machines I've ever seen, is the only one that meets that standard.” Bill Gates
“If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today's ideas were invented, and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today.... The solution to this is patent exchanges with large companies and patenting as much as we can.” Bill Gates
“What we're saying to people is that every idea about ease-of-use, we can develop in software, for the PC, without asking them to buy new hardware, without asking them to throw away their old applications.” Bill Gates