Business Quotes - Page 5

I never ask a man what his business is, for it never interests me. What I ask him about are his thoughts and dreams.

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.

When the facts change, I change my mind.

Planning is an unnatural process; it is much more fun to do something. The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression.

There is nothing as easy as denouncing. It don't take much to see that something is wrong, but it does take some eyesight to see what will put it right again

Some people regard private enterprise as a predatory tiger to be shot. Others look on it as a cow they can milk. Not enough people see it as a healthy horse, pulling a sturdy wagon.

If ethics are poor at the top, that behavior is copied down through the organization.

The farmer and manufacturer can no more live without profit than the labourer without wages.

The five essential entrepreneurial skills for success are concentration, discrimination, organization, innovation and communication.

Quality is free. It's not a gift, but it's free. The 'unquality' things are what cost money.

The price of inaction is far greater than the cost of making a mistake.

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.

Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice, and discipline.

You have to know accounting. It's the language of practical business life. It was a very useful thing to deliver to civilization. I've heard it came to civilization through Venice which of course was once the great commercial power in the Mediterranean. However, double entry bookkeeping was a hell of an invention.

The magic formula that successful businesses have discovered is to treat customers like guests and employees like people.

Opportunity often comes disguised in the form of misfortune, or temporary defeat.

If there is such a thing as good leadership, it is to give a good example. I have to do so for all the Ikea employees.

The task we must set for ourselves is not to feel secure, but to be able to tolerate insecurity.

I have no use for bodyguards, but I have very specific use for two highly trained certified public accountants.

A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject.

The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next.

If you work just for money, you'll never make it, but if you love what you're doing and you always put the customer first, success will be yours.

The game of speculation is the most uniformly fascinating game in the world. But it is not a game for the stupid, the mentally lazy, the person of inferior emotional balance, or the get-rich-quick adventurer. They will die poor.

Economic depression cannot be cured by legislative action or executive pronouncement. Economic wounds must be healed by the action of the cells of the economic body - the producers and consumers themselves.

The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.