20th-century Businessman Quotes

There is nothing that makes a man more self-satisfied than a poor memory.

Herbert V. Prochnow

Money is like manure. If you spread it around it does a lot of good, but if you pile it up in one place it stinks like hell.

Clint Murchison, Jr.

Well, with regard to Syria, I do think that it's a mess. I think that the only way that we deal with Syria is to join hands with Russia to diplomatically bring that at an end. But when we've aligned ourselves with — when we've supported the opposition of the Free Syrian Army — the Free Syrian Army is also coupled with the Islamists.

If there's one piece of wisdom that this simple pilgrim would like to impart upon you: have the courage to start with the customer. My biggest regrets are the moments that I let a lack of data override my intuition on what's best for our customers. This leadership change gives you some breathing room to break bad habits and deliver sustainable customer happiness — don't waste the opportunity!

We still have a long way to go—or as I have written so many times, and said at the end of hundreds of speeches: We are just at the beginning. A glorious future!

Liberals love the first amendment until you say something they don't agree with.

Donald Trump Jr.

If this planet lasts for another thousand years people will still be talking about the terrible event we are now living through.

Mohamed Al-Fayed

With the advent of genetic engineering the time required for the evolution of new species may literally collapse.

If you consider the contribution of plumbing to human life, the other sciences fade into insignificance.

James P. Gorman

The first rule of luck in business is that you should persevere in doing the right thing. Opportunities will come your way if you do.

What I saw generically on the pro-biotech side was the attitude that the technology was good and that it was almost immoral to say that it wasn't good because it was going to solve the problems of the human race and feed the hungry and clothe the naked. And there was a lot of money that had been invested in this, and if you're against it, you're Luddites, you're stupid. There was rhetoric like that even here in this department. You felt like you were almost an alien, disloyal, by trying to present an open-minded view on some of the issues being raised. So I pretty much spouted the rhetoric that everybody else around here spouted; it was written into my speeches.

Software production is unlike any other production that preceded it. No raw materials are required, no time is required, and no effort is required. You can make a million copies of a piece of software instantaneously for free. It's a totally new paradigm of production.

Leaders who want to increase joy and success in the workplace must learn to take most of their personal satisfaction from the achievements of the people they lead, not from the power they exercise.

One problem we discovered, for example, was that our "create a new account" button was in the wrong place...By simply moving it to the left side, mirroring the way people read, we saw a huge improvement in the way people used the site.

The United States Senate has been hijacked by the Democratic leadership. Once again, it shows the Democrats use scare tactics. They have no convictions, they have no principles, they have no ideas. But this is the ultimate. Since I've been majority leader, I'll have to say, not with the previous Democratic leader or the current Democratic leader have ever I been slapped in the face with such an affront to the leadership of this grand institution.

The most brilliant idea, with no execution, is worth $20. The most brilliant idea takes great execution to be worth $20,000,000.

Success can only be achieved through repeated failure and introspection.

Until you make the effort to get to know someone or something, you don't know anything.

The key to success is to risk thinking unconventional thoughts. Convention is the enemy of progress. As long as you've got slightly more perception that the average wrapped loaf, you could invent something.

When it's too easy to get money, then you get a lot of noise mixed in with the real innovation and entrepreneurship. Tough times bring out the best parts of Silicon Valley.

You should be neither an opportunist nor a mere observer. Nor should you be a defeatist. What you should have is a broad vision of what you can do for the nation and the people, and furthermore what you can contribute to the history of mankind.

You must develop one all-important ability — being able to enlist the help of other people. You have to reach a state where others want to help you. This includes giving credit... which will come back to you a hundredfold. Your reputation stems from what people say when you're not present.

Cecil Howard Green

I couldn't type on it and I still can't type on it, and a lot of my friends can't type on it. It's hard to type on a piece of glass.

... if the Legislative Council really ends up with no representatives of industry and commerce, then it is possible that these sectors will comprehensively divest from Hong Kong.

It's Microsoft versus mankind, with Microsoft having only a slight lead