Transcript
Our “Top” Quotes
“Do one thing every day that scares you.”—Eleanor Roosevelt
As the global financial crisis hits us deeper every day, we tend (well, I tend) to think a little bit
philosophically - to wonder what tomorrow will bring and to imagine the future.
As I began to think about this, I stumbled across the Eleanor Roosevelt remark above.
And it got me thinking…
So to add a little fuel to the fire I mined a few presentations for more spurs of reflection
forethought and inspiration. What emerged follows.
It is not a listing of “business quotes,” though 100% are applicable to business.
It is not purely a set of “motivational” or “inspirational” quotes though most are in some sense
motivational and inspirational.
This list of quotes is simply there to help you think differently in tough times, to realise that
nothing is impossible…your future is in your hands, now, how do you really want that to look…?
“If you think you can, or you think you
can’t, you’re probably right”
“Do one thing every day that scares you.”—Eleanor Roosevelt
“Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.”—Helen Keller
“Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
—Mary Oliver
“When it comes to the future there are three kinds of
people: Those who let it happen, those who make it
happen and those who wonder what happened” —
John MRichard Junior
“Dreamas if you’ll live forever. Live as if you’ll die today.”—James Dean
“The two most powerful things in existence: a kind word and a thoughtful gesture.”—Ken
Langone, founder, Home Depot
“The deepest human need is the need to be appreciated.”—William James
“Don’t belittle!”—OD Consultant, on the essence of a well-functioning human community
“If you don’t listen, you don’t sell anything.”—Carolyn Marland /
MD/Guardian Group
“It was much later that I realized Dad’s secret. He gained respect by giving it. He talked and
listened to the fourth-grade kids in Spring Valley who shined shoes the same way he talked
and listened to a bishop or a college president. He was seriously interested in who you were
and what you had to say.”—Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, Respect
“You pile up enough Tomorrows, and you’ll find you’ve collected a lot of
empty yesterdays”—Professor Harold Hill (The Music Man)
“What creates trust, in the end, is the leader’s manifest respect for the followers.”—Jim
O’Toole, Leading Change
“If you can’t state your position in eight words or less, you don’t have a position.”—Seth Godin
“Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world.
Indeed it is the only thing that ever has.”—Margaret Mead
“Make your life itself a creative work of art.”—Mike Ray, The Highest Goal
“Have you invested as much this year in your career as in your car?” —Molly Sargent, OD
consultant and trainer
“In walking just walk, in sitting just sit. Above all, don’t wobble”
—Yun-Men
“The most successful people are those who are good at plan B.”—James Yorke,
mathematician, on chaos theory in The New Scientist
“Tom, what have you done this year?”—Jessica Sutherland, Director, Institute for
International Research/Middle East
“To live is the rarest thing in
the world. Most people exist,
that is all.”
—Oscar Wilde
“People want to be part of something larger than themselves. They want to be part of
something they’re really proud of, that they’ll fight for, sacrifice for, that they trust.”—Howard
Schultz, Starbucks
“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most
responsive to change.”—Charles Darwin
“We may not be interested in chaos but chaos is interested in us.”—Robert Cooper, The
Breaking of Nations: Order and Chaos in the Twenty-first Century
“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”—General Eric Shinseki,
retired Chief of Staff, U. S. Army
“Be the change you want to see.”—Gandhi
“We eat change for breakfast!”—Harry Quadracci, founder, QuadGraphics
“If things seem under control, you’re just not going fast enough.”—Mario Andretti
“You can’t behave in a calm, rational manner. You’ve got to be out there on the lunatic fringe.”
—Jack Welch, retired CEO, GE
“We have a ‘strategic’ plan. It’s called doing things.”—Herb Kelleher, founder, Southwest
Airlines
“In any moment of decision the best thing you can
do is the right thing, the next best thing is the wrong
thing, and the worst thing you can do is nothing.” —
Attributed to Theodore Roosevelt. Ack DC
A man approached JP Morgan, held up an envelope, and said, “Sir, in my hand I
hold a guaranteed formula for success, which I will gladly sell you for $25,000.”
“Sir,” JP Morgan replied, “I do not know what is in the envelope, however if you
show me, and I like it, I give you my word as a gentleman that I will pay you what
you ask.” The man agreed to the terms, and handed over the envelope. JP
Morgan opened it, and extracted a single sheet of paper. He gave it one look, a
mere glance, and then handed the piece of paper back to the gent. He then paid
him the agreed-upon $25,000.
The Paper read:
1. Every morning, write a list of the things that need to be done that day.
2. Do them.
“I guess it comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living, or get busy dying.”—The
Shawshank Redemption (Tim Robbins)
“Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.”—Steve Jobs, Apple
“Groups become great only when everyone in them, leaders and members alike, is free to do
his or her absolute best.”—Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman, Organising Genius
“A wise man will make more opportunities than he finds” –Frances Bacon
“The best thing a leader can do for a Great Group is to allow its members to discover their
greatness.”—Warren Bennis and Patricia Ward Biederman, Organizing Genius
“You are the storyteller of your own life, and you can create your own legend or not.”—Isabel
Allende
“Nobody can prevent you fromchoosing to be exceptional.”—Mark
Sanborn, The Fred Factor
“A leader is a dealer in hope.”—Napoleon
“Nothing is so contagious as enthusiasm.”—Samuel Taylor Coleridge
“We can’t solve problems by using the
same kind of thinking we used when we
created them”– Albert Einstein
“If you’re enthusiastic about the things you’re working on, people will come ask you to do
interesting things.”—James Woolsey, former CIA director
“Before you can inspire with emotion, you must be swamped with it yourself. Before you can
move their tears, your own must flow. To convince them, you must yourself believe.”—Winston
Churchill
“A man without a smiling face must not open a shop.”—Chinese Proverb
“If your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are
a leader."—John Quincy Adams
The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aimis too high and we
miss it, but that it is too lowand we reach it. —Michelangelo
“A year fromnow you may wish you had
started today.” —Karen Lamb
“Success is an inside job” – Ralph M Ford
“When you reach for the stars you may not get
one, but you won’t come up with a handful of
mud either” – Readers Digest
“What we see mainly depends on what we are looking for” – John Lubbock
“Ability is what you’re capable of doing. Motivation determines
what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it” – Lou Holtz
“We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit” – Aristotle
“A man who wants to do
something will find a way; a
man who doesn’t will find an
excuse”– Stephen Dolley Jr.