Lessons From People No Smarter Than You

“If you do the right thing, the right thing will come to you”
Berry Gordy

“The reasonable man adapts himself to the world, the unreasonable man doesn’t do that; all progress comes from unreasonable people”
G.B. Shaw

“I have yet to meet a scientist who wants to maintain status quo”
Eli Broad

“That urgency, daily drive, that constant self-questioning integral in editing a paper, the ceaseless curiosity, are what I have stood upon every day of my career, taking me and our business further than my young self ever imagined”
Rupert Murdoch

“You seem to be spending a lot of energy on how to be successful. But that is the wrong question. The question is, how to be useful”
Peter Drucker as told to Jim Collins

“When hiring, if forced to choose between virtue and talent, choose virtue. Talented people who lack virtues will do far more damage than virtuous people with lesser talent”
Charles Koch

“I try my best to practice what is known as Shin Zen Bi, Truth, Goodness and Beauty.”
Tadashi Yanai

“The best way to stay ahead is to learn from the younger generation”
Dhanin Chearavanont

Lessons From People No Smarter Than You

“Don’t worry about reputation but about character. You should build character by practicing empathy, practicing moral courage, practicing determination.”
Jacqueline Novogratz

“The revolution is going to happen without us. We were sure that software was going to change the world, and we worried that if we didn’t join the digital revolution soon, it would pass us by.”
Bill Gates

“We sometimes fall flat on our face. But people don’t mind people who try things and fall.”
Richard Branson

“Nobody’s job was to say, ‘I think it’s wonderful.”. Instead, I insisted on everyone coming together to analyze potential problems that could lose investor money”
Stephen Schwarzman

“I was fired from Salomon Brothers in 1981 in part because no one at the firm thought much of my idea for computerizing financial data and analysis and presenting it in real time….Organizations resist innovation- and those that do inevitably fail -because people are more comfortable with what they know than with what they don’t….innovation requires hiring smart, creative and driven people, empowering them to take risks and standing behind them…”
Michael Bloomberg

“Don’t think of a specific job, so to speak, or a specific career, like “I’d like to be this” or “I’d like to be that”. You should find an area that interests you and just get on the highway, and it will lead you wherever you lead it.”
Barry Diller

“Making other people happy is a super-happiness….We believe all human beings are entrepreneurs. They are not born to work for somebody else. Their early history is about being hunters, gatherers and problem-solvers. It remained as an essential part of our DNA; we are not job-seekers, we are job creators. Job seeking is a wrong turn in our history.”
Muhammad Yunus

“In a world of unlimited choices and voices, those who can bring people together and tell a good story have power”
Shonda Rhimes

“First 20 years of my career I worked hard to make money. Second 20 years I worked for my ideals. Next 20 years I will work for issues that are my passion…to nurture the next generation so they can make their own contribution to building a better world”
Terry Gou

Lessons From People No Smarter Than You

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“Don’t take ‘no’ when your gut tells you ‘yes'”
James Patterson

“Whatever drives us, we all derive happiness from finding purpose. We find joy in thinking, doing and discovering – in improving people’s lives and catalyzing positive change in the world.”
Robert Smith

“I should have done this a long time ago”
Lou Gerstner

“Truly great artists, they always get better”
Jeff Koons

“I read. I listen. I try to surround myself with smart people of all ages and backgrounds. Wednesday nights me and my wife host college students for dinner to share their world-views and work, they inspire me with their potential and passion to change the world.”
John Doerr

“Be a voice that is respected and abreast of developments”
Ratan Tata

“By the end of the day, I’ve learned something that shows how dumb I was yesterday”
Bernard Marcus

“I believe in telling like it is and not worrying about it”
Vinod Khosla

“I believe in work and being connected to the world we live in”
Miuccia Prada