Sublime
An inspiration engine for ideas
IBM’s Bill Lowe also suffered from tunnel vision when he maintained an IBM-centric view of the future. In 1985, he gave Microsoft the rights to sell the jointly developed DOS operating system to other manufacturers in return for IBM’s free use of it on IBM PCs. IBM, after all, had 80 percent of the DOS market. Microsoft’s Bill Gates saw that this w
... See moreMichael E. McGrath • Product Strategy for High Technology Companies
Goldman Sachs: “You learn from day one around here that we gang-tackle problems. If your ego won’t permit that, you won’t be effective here.”2
David H. Maister • Managing The Professional Service Firm
In retrospect I understand that this was utter insanity. Wider, faster, treeless roads not only ruin our public places, they kill people. Taking highway standards and applying them to urban and suburban streets, and even county roads, costs us thousands of lives every year. There is no earthly reason why an engineer would ever design a 14-foot lane
... See moreJeff Speck • Walkable City: How Downtown Can Save America, One Step at a Time
Managers who knew relatively little about automobiles but a great deal about process took control of auto factories and tried to operate a range of businesses, from autos to finance. General Motors became so diffuse and entangled in so many industries that it could not compete in the core markets with Japanese and German companies,
George Friedman • The Storm Before the Calm: America's Discord, the Coming Crisis of the 2020s, and the Triumph Beyond
... See moreRussell was for twenty-six years either Chairman or dominant member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, which oversaw the battle readiness of the nation’s far-flung legions and armadas. As senators of Rome had insisted that, regardless of the cost, the legions must be kept at full complement because the peace and stability of the known world—th
are multibillion-dollar revenue companies, what matters is having: (1) the right strategy in the right market, (2) an A management team, and (3) financial discipline. The difference between an A and a B CEO produces an order of magnitude difference in the return.”
Randy Street • Who: The A Method for Hiring
Quality, price, service: pick two.
Michael W. Preis • 101 Things I Learned® in Business School (Second Edition)
Ford was not an expert, and he didn’t rely upon experts, whether they were scientists, engineers, railroad men, economists, educators, business executives, or bankers. He was an individualist who arrived at conclusions—both right and wrong —by independent thought.