Communication

Communication

I`m in favor of free expression, provided it`s kept rigidly under control.
Allen Bennett

Think like a wise man but communicate in the language of the people.
William Butler Yeats 1865 – 1939

Remember that silence is sometimes the best answer.
The Dalai Lama

Social organizations are flagrantly open systems in that the input of energies and the conversion of output into further energic input consists of transactions between the organization and its environment.
Daniel Katz and Robert L. Kahn in The Social Psychology of Organizations (1966)

For the wise man, one word is enough.
Plautus 251BC-184BC, Greek writer of comedies

The purest treasure mortal times afford is spotless reputation.
William Shakespeare 1564-1616, English dramatist

If you can`t convince them, confuse them.
Harry S. Truman 1884-1972, thirty-third President of the United States (1945-1953)

Myth is the secret opening through which the inexhaustible energies of the cosmos pour into human manifestation.
Joseph Campbell

There is nothing so annoying as to have two people talking when you`re busy interrupting.
Mark Twain 1835-1910, American humorist and writer, famous for Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn

Good communication is just as stimulating as black coffee, and just as hard to sleep after.
Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Your premium brand had better be delivering something special, or it`s not going to get the business.
Warren Buffett 1930-, American Investment Entrepreneur

Argument is the worst sort of conversation.
Jonathan Swift

Those who know, do not speak, those who speak, do not know.
Lao Tse, 6th century BC, Chinese philosopher

Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress.
Mahatma Gandhi 1869 – 1948, Indian deep thinker and constant experimenter

I believe in the discipline of silence, and could talk for hours about it.
G.B. Shaw 1856-1950, Irish critic and poet

In some mergers there truly are synergies - though often times the acquirer pays too much for them - but at other times the cost and revenue benefits that are projected prove illusory. Of one thing, however, be certain: if a CEO is enthused about a particularly foolish acquisition, both his internal staff and his outside advisors will come up with whatever projections are needed to justify his stance. Only in fairy tales are emperors told that they are naked.
Warren Buffet 1930-, American investment entrepreneur

A verbal contract isn`t worth the paper it`s written on.
Samuel Goldwyn

I gotta use words when I talk to you.
T.S. Elliot 1888-1965, Anglo-American poet and critic

Words are just words and without heart they have no meaning.
Chinese proverb

The most important thing in communication is hearing what isn`t said.
Peter F. Drucker 1909-, American management guru

In a philosophical dispute, he gains most who is defeated, since he learns most.
Epicurus, 4th century B.C.

To do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.
Bible, Hebrews 13:16

The opposite of talking is not listening. The opposite of talking is waiting.
Fran Lebowitz 1951-, American journalist and writer

Mine honour is my life; both grow in one: Take honour from me, and my life is done.
William Shakespeare 1564-1616, English dramatist

Only free men can negotiate; prisoners cannot enter into contracts.
Nelson Mandela 1918-, first democratically elected President of South Africa and Nobel Prize winner

You can have brilliant ideas, but if you can not get them across, your ideas will not get you anywhere.
Lee Iacocca

Quality

Quality

There is hardly anything in the world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper.
John Ruskin 1819–1900, English critic and social theorist

Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of intelligent efforts.
John Ruskin 1819-1900, English author and social critic

We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit.
Aristotle 384BC-322BC, Greek philosopher and scientist

As natural selection works solely by and for the good of each being, all corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress towards perfection.
Charles Darwin 1809-1882, English naturalist and originator of the evolution theory

If you can not describe what you are doing as a process, you do not know what you are doing.
W. Edwards Deming 1900-1993, American continuous improvement management guru

It is quality rather than quantity that matters.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca 5BC-65AD, Roman tragedian, philosopher, and counselor to Nero, Epistles

Quality is free, but only to those who are willing to pay heavily for it.
Philip Crosby 1926-2001, American business philosopher and writer on quality

It is the quality of our work which will please God and not the quantity.
Mahatma Gandhi 1869 – 1948, Indian deep thinker and constant experimenter

Professionalism means consistency of quality.
Frank Tyger

Strategy

Imagination is more important than knowledge.
Albert Einstein 1879-1955; German-born American theoretical physicist

Running a company on market research is like driving while looking in the rear mirror.
Anita Roddick 1942-, American businesswoman

Know the other and know thyself: Triumph without peril. Know nature and know the situation: Triumph completely.
Sun Tzu c. 490 BC, Chinese military strategist

For every complex problem there is a simple solution that is wrong.
George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950; Irish playwright and critic

Smart people also learn from their enemies.
Aristophanes 445BC-385BC, Greek poet

Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749-1832, German poet, dramatist and scientist

Drive thy business; let it not drive thee.
Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790; American writer and statesman

What we anticipate seldom occurs; what we least expect generally happens.
Benjamin Disraeli 1804-1881, British prime minister and novelist

A gladiator makes his plan in the arena (too late).
Seneca 4BC-65AC, Roman writer and moralist

How many things are looked upon as quite impossible until they have been actually effected.
Pliny the Elder 23-79, Roman writer

A wise man also fears a weak enemy.
Publilius Syrus ~100 BC

The processes used to arrive at the total strategy are typically fragmented, evolutionary, and largely intuitive.
James Quinn in Strategic Change: Logical Incrementalism, 1978

Perception is strong and sight weak. In strategy it is important to see distant things as if they were close and to take a distanced view of close things.
Miyamoto Musashi 1584-1645, legendary Japanese swordsman

Consider the little mouse, how sagacious an animal it is which never entrusts its life to one hole only.
Plautus 254BC-184 BC, Roman playwright

There is always a better strategy than the one you have; you just haven`t thought of it yet.
Sir Brian Pitman, former CEO of Lloyds TSB, Harvard Business Review, April 2003

To conquer the enemy without resorting to war is the most desirable. The highest form of generalship is to conquer the enemy by strategy.
Sun Tzu c. 490 BC, Chinese military strategist

The pilot cannot mitigate the billows or calm the winds.
Plutarch 46-120, Greek biographer and philosopher

However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.
Sir Winston Churchill 1874-1965, English statesman

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.
`Sherlock Holmes`, Arthur Conan Doyle 1859-1930, English novelist

To plan, v. To bother about the best method of accomplishing an accidental results.
Ambrose Bierce 1842-1914, American columnis

Alliance, n. In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their hands so deeply inserted in each other`s pocket that they cannot seperately plunder a third.
Ambrose Bierce 1842-1914, American columnist

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.
Sir John Harvey-Jones, Former CEO of ICI

The first percept was never to accept a thing as true until I knew it was such without a single doubt.
René Descartes 1596-1650, French rationalist philosopher and mathematician

Advantage is a better soldier than rashness.
William Shakespeare 1564-1616, English dramatist

Uncertainty is not a result of ignorance or the partiality of human knowledge, but is a characteristic of the world itself.
M. Taylor in The Moment of Complexity: Emerging Network Culture, 2001

We are not all capable of everything.
Virgil 70-19BC, Roman philosopher

Your most dangerous competitors are those that are most like you. The differences between you and your competitors are the basis of your advantage.
Bruce Henderson, Founder Boston Consulting Group, HBR 1989

Performance

Performance

One`s only rival is one`s own potentialities. One`s only failure is failing to live up to one`s own possibilities. In this sense every man can be a king and must therefore be treated like a king.
Abraham Maslow 1908-1970, American anthropologist

His promises were, as he then was, mighty; But his performance, as he is now, nothing.
William Shakespeare 1564-1616, English dramatist in Henry VIII (1613), act 4, sc. 2

The pretension is nothing; the performance every thing. A good apple is better than an insipid peach.
Leigh Hunt 1784-1859, English poet and essayist

My lifes work has been accomplished. I did all that I could.
Mikhail Gorbachev 1931-, President and transformer of the USSR and Russian political leader

Failure is the foundation of success... success the lurking place of failure.
Lao Tzu c.604BC-531BC, Chinese philosopher, founder of Taoism

Remember that not getting what you want is sometimes a wonderful stroke of luck.
The Dalai Lama

It is no use saying "we are doing our best." You have to succeed in doing what is necessary.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during World War II

After you reach a certain point, money becomes unimportant. What matters is success.
Aristotle Onassis 1906-1970, Greek shipping empire giant who married Jacky Kennedy

We are all failures - at least, all the best of us are.
J.M. Berrie, Engish playwright

Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes.
Peter F. Drucker 1909-, American management guru

Talent hits a target no one else can hit; Genius hits a target no one else can see.
Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860, German philosopher

The essence of competitiveness is liberated when we make people believe that what they think and do is important - and then get out of their way while they do it.
Jack Welch, former CEO of GE

Do not expect too much of the future, but also do not bother too much about the past.
Chinese proverb

Wealth does not bring about excellence, but excellence brings about wealth and all other public and private blessings for men.
Aristotle 384BC-322BC, Greek philosopher and scientist

The superior man is distressed by his lack of ability.
Confucius, Chinese philosopher

The man who starts out going nowhere, generally gets there.
Dale Carnegie 1888-1955, author and pioneer in self-improvement and interpersonal skills

Organization

Organization

Reengineering must be fundamental, radical and drastic.
Michael Hammer & James Champy 1993, American management consultants

A mechanistic management system is appropriate to stable conditions. (...) The organic form is appropriate to changing conditions, which give rise constantly to fresh problems and unforseen requirements for action which cannot be broken down or distributed automatically arising from the functional roles defined within a hierarchic structure.
Tom Burns and G.M. Stalker, sociologists, in The Management of Innovation (1961)

No institution can possibly survive if it needs geniuses or supermen to manage it. It must be organized in such a way as to be able to get along under a leadership composed of average human beings.
Peter F. Drucker 1909-, American management guru

From the earliest times it has been recognized that nothing but confusion arises under multiple command.
Luther Gulick in Notes on the Theory of Organization

Always change processes and structures while they still function.
Unknown

Organization may be viewed from two standpoints which are analytically distinct but which are empirically united in a context of reciprocal consequences. On the one hand, any concrete organizational system is an economy; at the same time, it is an adaptive social structure.
Philip Selznick, sociologist, in Foundations of the Theory of Organization (1948)

Innovation has never come through bureaucracy and hierarchy. It’s always come from individuals.
John Scully, Chairman, Apple Computers

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 R. Covey, American management guru

Nothing is illegal if one hundred well-placed businessmen decide to do it.
Andrew Young 1932-, American diplomat

35 years of research have convinced me that managerial hierarchy is the most efficient, the hardiest, and in fact the most natural structure ever devised for large organizations.
Elliott Jacques, in In Praise of Hierarchy, in Harvard Business Review (Jan-Feb 1990)

It must be considered that there is nothing more difficult to carry out nor more doubtful of success nor more dangerous to handle than to initiate a new order of things.
Machiavelli 1446-1507, Italian statesman and philosopher

The ingenuity and the perseverance of industrial management in the pursuit of economic ends have changed many scientific and technological dreams into commonplace realities. It is now becoming clear that the application of these same talents to the human side of enterprise will not only enhance substantially these materialistic achievements, but will bring us one step closer to `the good society`.
Douglas Murray McGregor, psychologist, in The Human Side of the Enterprise (1957)

An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man.
Ralph Waldo Emerson 1803-1882, American essayist and poet

Guidelines for bureaucrats: 1. When in charge, ponder. 2. When in trouble, delegate. 3. When in doubt, mumble.
James H. Boren 1925-, American bureaucrat

It is impossible to understand the nature of a formal organization without investigating the networks of informal relations and the unofficial norms as well as the formal hierarchy of authority and the official body of rules, since the formally instituted and the informally emerging patterns are inextricably intertwined.
Peter M. Blau and W. Richard Scott in Formal Organizations: A Comparative Approach (1962)

It is a commonplace executive observation that businesses exist to make money, and the observation is usually allowed to go unchallenged. It is, however, a very limited statement about the purposes of business.
Daniel Katz and Robert L. Kahn in The Social Psychology of Organizations (1966)

Too little liberty brings stagnation and too much brings chaos.
Bertrand Russell 1872 - 1970, Brittish philosopher and writer

Leadership

Leadership

The way to achieve success is first to have a definite, clear, practical ideal - a goal, an objective. Second, have the necessary means to achieve your ends - wisdom, money, materials, and methods. Third, adjust all your means to that end.
Aristotle 384BC-322BC, Greek philosopher and scientist, student of Plato and teacher of Alexander the Great

Never tell people how to do things. Tell them what to do, and they will surprise you with their ingenuity.
George S. Patton, World War II General

Leadership is practiced not so much in words as in attitude and in actions.
Harold S. Geneen 1910-1997, Communications executive described by R.J. Schoenberg as an executive who pursued growth and increased earnings "with no larger vision whatever"

Great minds have purposes; others have wishes.
Washington Irving 1783-1859, American author

Leadership has a harder job to do than just choose sides. It must bring sides together.
Jesse Jackson 1941-, Civil rights leader with an exceptional drive and empathy for the oppressed

Leadership is not magnetic personality--that can just as well be a glib tongue. It is not making friends and influencing people --that is flattery. Leadership is lifting a person’s vision to higher sights, the raising of a person’s performance to a higher standard, the building of a personality beyond its normal limitations.
Peter Drucker 1909-2005, Management Guru

A leader is most effective when people barely know he exists. When his work is done, his aim fulfilled, his troops will feel they did it themselves.
Lao Tzu c.604BC-531BC, Chinese philosopher, founder of Taoism

The final test of a leader is that he leaves behind him in other men the conviction and the will to carry on.
Walter Lippmann 1889-1974, American journalist in the New York Herald Tribune, 14 April 1945

The most important quality in a leader is that of being acknowledged as such.
André Maurois 1885-1967, French biographer, novelist, and essayist

Leaders must encourage their organizations to dance to forms of music yet to be heard.
Warren G. Bennis 1925-, American scholar, particularly in the field of leadership

I say that over whatever a man may preside, he will, if he knows what he needs, and is able to provide it, be a good president, whether he have the direction of a chorus, a family, a city, or an army.
Socrates 469-399 BC, Ancient Greek ethicist-philosopher

Treating people with respect will gain one wide acceptance and improve the business.
Tao Zhu Gong 500BC, Assistant to the Emperor of Yue, 2nd Business Principle

The greatest power available to man is not to use it.
Meister Eckhart

There are two tragedies in a man`s life. One is not having reached one`s goal and the other is having reached it.
Friedrich Nietzsche 1894-1900, German philosopher, known as the father of nihilism

I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me.
Abraham Lincoln 1809-1865, sixteenth American president

Personal leadership is the process of keeping your vision and values before you and aligning your life to be congruent with them.
Stephen Covey, American leadership consultant and writer

So long as men worship the Caesars and Napoleons, Caesars and Napoleons will duly arrive and make them miserable.
Aldous Huxley 1894-1963, English novelist

Leadership is the ability to decide what is to be done and then get others to do it.
Dwight D. Eisenhower 1890-1969, general and thirty-fourth President of the United States

I can no longer obey; I have tasted command, and I cannot give it up.
Napoleon Bonaparte 1769-1821, Emperor of France, One of the greatest military commanders and a risk taking gambler

Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.
Stephen Covey, American leadership consultant and writer

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm.
Publilius Syrus ~100 BC

What you think is the top, is only a step.
Seneca 4BC-65AC, Roman writer and moralist

It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.
Epictetus c. 60-120, Roman philosopher

Therefore the skilful leader subdues the enemy`s troups without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field. With his forces intact he will dispute the mastery of the Empire, and thus, without losing a man, his triumph will be complete. This is the method of attacking by stratagem.
Sun Tzu c. 490 BC, Chinese military strategist

Vision without action is hallucination.
Manfred Kets de Vries, Dutch Professor and writer on leadership

To the person who does not know where he wants to go there is no favorable wind.
Lucius Annaeus Seneca 5BC-65AD, Roman tragedian, philosopher, and counsellor to Nero

Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, in the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side.
James Russell Lowell 1819-1891, Romantic poet, critic, satirist, writer, diplomat and abolitionist

Executive ability is deciding quickly and getting someone else to do the work.
J.G. Pollard

Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great.
Mark Twain 1835-1910, American Humorist and Writer

All of the great leaders have had one thing in common: it was the willingness to confront unequivocally the major anxiety of their people in their time. This, and not much else, is the essence of leadership.
J.K. Galbraith 1908-, American economist

Know thyself.
Plato 428 BC-347 BC, ancient Greek philosopher

The most important obligation of every leader is to do whatever is in his power to protect and prolong the life of the community, following the order of the universe established by the ancestors and transmitted by tradition. Neglect of this duty has consequences to the authority the leader wields.
Laurenti Magesa, African Writer

The Greeks believed that when a man had too much power for his own good, the Gods ruined him by helping him increase his power at the expense of wisdom... and humanity, until it led automatically to his own destruction.
Thomas Merton

Charisma knows only inner determination and inner restraint... The charismatic leader gains and maintains authority solely by proving his strength in life.
Max Weber 1864-1920, German political economist and sociologist

To lead the people, walk behind them.
Lao Tzu c.604BC-531BC, Chinese philosopher, founder of Taoism

I learned that a great leader is a man who has the ability to get other people to do what they don`t want to do and like it.
Harry S. Truman 1884-1972, 33rd president of the U.S.

When the eagles are silent, the parrots begin to jabber.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, British politician and Prime Minister

What you cannot enforce, do not command.
Sophocles 496-406 BC, ancient Greek playwright

We shape our environments, then our environments shape us.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, British statesman and writer

I don`t want any "yes-men" around me. I want everybody to tell me the truth even if it costs them their jobs.
Samuel Goldwyn 1882-1974, American (Polish-born) movie producer

The art of leadership is saying no, not saying yes. It is very easy to say yes.
Tony Blair 1953-, British Prime Minister in The Mail on October 2nd, 1994

If you are not criticized, you may not be doing much.
Donald Rumsfeld 1932-, American Republican politician and businessman.

Leadership is not about being nice. Its about being right and being strong.
Paul Keating 1944-, Australian statesman and Prime Minsiter in Time, January 9th, 1995

Nothing is more difficult, and therefore more precious, than to be able to decide.
Napoleon Bonaparte 1769-1821, Emperor of France, One of the greatest military commanders and a risk taking gambler

Treating people with respect will gain one wide acceptance and improve the business.
Tao Zhu Gong 500BC, Assistant to the Emperor of Yue, 2nd Business Principle

Effective leadership is not about making speeches or being liked; leadership is defined by results not attributes.
Peter F. Drucker 1909-, American management guru

Education makes a people easy to lead, but difficult to drive; easy to govern but impossible to enslave.
Henry Peter Brougham 1778-1868, Lord High Chancellor of Great Britain

There is no such thing as a perfect leader either in the past or present.
Liu Shao-Chi 1898-1969, Chinese leader and Chairman of the Peoples Republic of China

Finance

Finance

Sometimes your best investments are the ones you don`t make.
Donald Trump 1946-, American Businessman

Last month I blew $5000 on a reincarnation seminar. I figured, hey, you only live once.
Randy Shakes

A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don`t need it.
Bob Hope

Capital as such is not evil; it is its wrong use that is evil. Capital in some form or other will always be needed.
Mahatma Gandhi 1869–1948, Indian deep thinker and constant experimenter

Money doesn`t talk, it swears.
Bob Dylan 1941-, influential Rock musician

If you want quick and effective results you must put the money in.
Edward Bullard 1907-1980, British geophysicist

If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank.
Woody Allen 1935-, brilliant comedian, actor, director, screenwriter and playwright

Making money is art and working is art and good business is the best art.
Andy Warhol 1928-1987, artist and filmmaker

Never ask of money spent, where the spender thinks it went. Nobody was ever meant, to remember or invent, what he did with every cent.
Robert Frost 1874-1963, American poet

Don`t stay in bed, unless you can make money in bed.
George Burns 1896-1996, legendary vaudeville comedian and film maker

Neither a borrower nor a lender be; For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.
William Shakespeare 1564-1616, Hamlet, Act 1 scene 3

Ethics

Ethics

No moral system can rest solely on authority.
A.J. Ayer 1910-1989, British philosopher

The responsibility of the executive is (1) to create and maintain a sense of purpose and moral code for the organization; (2) to establish systems of formal and informal communication; and (3) to ensure the willingness of people to cooperate.
Chester Barnard in The Functions of the Executive (1938)

Never take anybody`s advice.
G.B. Shaw 1856-1950, Irish critic and poet

We have, in fact, two kinds of morality side by side: one which we preach but do not practise, and another which we practise but seldom preach.
Bertrand Russell 1872-1970, British philosopher and mathematician

Food comes first, then morals.
Bertolt Brecht 1898-1956, German dramatist

Corporation, n., An ingenious device for obtaining profit without individual responsibility.
Ambrose Bierce 1842-1914, American columnist, The Devils Dictionary 1906

A business that makes nothing but money is a poor kind of business.
Henry Ford 1863 – 1947, American industrialist

To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.
Confucius 551BC - 479BC, Chinese philosopher, The Analects, Book II, Chapter XXIV

If ethics are poor at the top, that behavior is copied down through the organization.
Robert Noyce, inventor of the silicon chip

About morals, I know only that what is moral is what you feel good after and what is immoral is what you feel bad after.
Ernest Hemingway 1899-1961,American writer of novels and short stories

No moral system can rest solely on authority.
A.J. Ayer 1910-1989, British philosopher

Decision Making

Decision-Making

It seems that the necessary thing to do is not to fear mistakes, to plunge in, to do the best that one can, hoping to learn enough from blunders to correct them eventually.
Abraham Maslow 1908-1970, American humanistic psychologist and originator of the Hierarchy of Needs

More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads: One path leads to despair and hopelessness, and the other to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.
Woody Allen 1935-, American author, director, producer and writer

In these matters the only certainty is that nothing is certain.
Plinius the Elder (Gaius Plinius Secundus) circa 23-79, Roman natural historian

To think is to differ.
Clarence Darrow 1857-1938, American lawyer famous for his wit

Among the safest courses, the safest of all is to doubt.
Spanish proverb

He that is overcautious will accomplish little.
Johann Friedrich von Schiller 1759-1805, German dramatist and poet

To trust everybody is as disasterous as to distrust everybody.
Hesiodus ca 700BC, Greek epic poet

Life is the sum of all your choices.
Albert Camus 1913-1960, French author and philosopher. Winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1957

To make a mistake is only human; to persist in a mistake is idiotic.
Cicero 106BC-43BC, Roman orator, politician and philosopher

It is not because it is so difficult that we do not try something, it is because we do not try that makes something so difficult.
Seneca 4BC-65AC, Roman writer and moralist

Some problems are so complex that you have to be highly intelligent and well informed just to be undecided about them.
Laurence J. Peter, American business humorist

Basing our happiness on our ability to control everything is futile.
Stephen R. Covey, American management guru

The ability to foretell what is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next month and next year. And to have the ability afterwards to explain why it didn`t happen.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, British prime minister and writer

Whatever you do, or dream you can do, begin it. Boldness has genius, power and magic in it.
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749-1832, German poet, novelist and dramatist

Take the first step in faith. You do not have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.
Martin Luther King Jr 1929-1968, American pastor and fighter for civil rights

It is a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link of the chain of destiny can be handled at a time.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, British prime minister and writer

Change

Change

No great thing is created suddenly, any more than a bunch of grapes or a fig. If you tell me that you desire a fig, I answer that there must be time. Let it first blossom, then bear fruit, then ripen.
Epictetus c. 60-120, Roman philosopher

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man.
George Bernard Shaw 1856-1950, Irish playwright and critic

Our ideas are only intellectual instruments which we use to break into phenomena; we must change them when they have served their purpose, as we change a blunt lancet that we have used long enough.
Claude Bernard 1813-1878, French physiologist

God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.
Reinhold Niebuhr 1892-1971, Protestant theologian

Management must guide the forces of change.
John W. Teets, former chairman, Greyhound

Softness triumphs over hardness, feebleness over strenght. What is malleable is always superior to that what is immovable. This is the principle of controlling things by going along with them, of mastery through adaptation.
Lao Tzu c.604BC-531BC, Chinese philosopher, founder of Taoism

Slow and steady wins the race.
Aesop c. 620-560 BC, Greek writer

Be not afreaid of going slowly; be only afraid of standing still.
Chinese Proverb

"Bury me on my face," said Diogenes; and when he was asked why, he replied, "Because in a little while everything will be turned upside down."
Diogenes 412BC-323BC, Greek philosopher

Change alone is eternal, perpetual, immortal.
Arthur Schopenhauer 1788-1860, German philosopher and notorious pessimist

Change is scientific, progress is ethical; change is indubitable, whereas progress is a matter of controversy.
Bertrand Rusell 1872-1970, British philosopher and mathematician

You are young, my son, and, as the years go by, time will change and even reverse many of your present opinions. Refrain therefore awhile from setting yourself up as a judge of the highest matters.
Plato 428 BC-347 BC, ancient Greek philosopher, Laws, 888

All things are in a state of flux.
Heraclites 540BC–480BC, Greek Philosopher

Do not repeat the tactics which have gained you one victory, but let your methods be regulated by the infinite variety of circumstances.
Sun Tzu c. 490 BC, Chinese military strategist

Wisdom lies neither in fixity nor in change, but in the dialectic between the two.
Octavio Paz 1914-1998, Mexican poet and essayist

Chaos often breeds life, when order breeds habit.
Henry Brooks Adams 1838-1919, American writer and historian

The real problem is what to do with problem solvers after the problem is solved.
Gay Talese 1932-, American (Italian-born) journalist

It is change, continuing change, inevitable change, that is the dominant factor in society today. No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it will be... This, in turn, means that our statesmen, our business men, our everyman must take on a science fictional way of thinking.
Isaac Asimov 1920-1992, Russian pioneer in science fiction writing

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it is not the same river and he is not the same man.
Heraclitus 540 BC – 480 BC, Greek Philosopher

A fanatic is one who can`t change his mind and won`t change the subject.
Winston Churchill 1874-1965, British prime minister and writer

Management that wants to change an institution must first show it loves that institution.
John Tusa 1936-, British radio journalist

If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it.
Albert Einstein 1879-1955; German-born American theoretical physicist