Success is a lousy teacher

Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can't lose.

Bill Gates Microsoft co-founder, philanthropist
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One bite at a time

Ants eat the elephant one bite at a time.
The late Felix DuBose, a candy store owner in Cincinnati, citing an ancient African-American proverb

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Successful Women

The one area of business development that no leader can really control is most critical: employees' self-development. Self-development of others cannot be delegated, says Marion Luna Brem, author of The 7 Greatest Truths about Successful Women (Penguin). “I always try to remind myself of that. That helps me to let go of other things.”
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Bill Russell

The idea is not to block every shot. The idea is to make your opponent believe that you might block every shot.

Bill Russell
NBA legend

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Work with Meaning, Work with Joy

If spirit and work can be summed up in one word, that word would be integrity, says Pat McHenry Sullivan in Work with Meaning, Work with Joy (Sheed & Ward). “When we live and work with integrity, we are authentic and whole,” Sullivan writes. “We can express our unique viewpoint and gifts while surrendering to the call of spirit to go beyond all sense of self.”
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The End of Detroit

The Detroit auto industry must abandon bigger is better, contends Micheline Maynard in The End of Detroit (Currency). It is time for other companies to do the same. “Slimming down to a realistic size just isn’t part of the way Detroit does things,” Maynard writes. “Companies are becoming an upside-down pyramid - a smaller and smaller tip trying to balance the expense of vehicle development against employee and retiree expenses.”
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The Marine Corps Way

Never tell the troops how to do something. Tell them what needs to be done, says Jason A. Santamaria, Vincent Martino and Eric Clemons, Ph.D., authors of The Marine Corps Way: Using Maneuver Warfare to Lead a Winning Organization (McGraw-Hill). "In contrast to his peers, who communicated plans to large forces through lengthy documents, Patton stated what needed to be done and left the how to subordinates."
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New Law of Demand and Supply

In The New Law of Demand and Supply (Currency) author Rick Kash looks at MTV Networks and how the network takes the pulse of teen tastes. “Understand your target customer,” Kash writes. “Demand strategy recognizes two basic categories of demand — current and emerging.” The challenge is to spot emerging demand and accurately predict and adjust for its developing shape.
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The Success Effect

In The Success Effect (S&R) by John Eckberg, Edward E. Potter of the Employment Policy Foundation, talks about the workplace: "One family-friendly policy is telecommuting. A 1999 poll from Wirthlin Worldwide 65 percent of workers are very committed but believed their employer was only committed to them at 35 percent. A telecommuter? 78 percent very committed, and they believe their employer is committed 56 percent.
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Think as you work

Think as you work, for in the final analysis, your worth to your company comes not only in solving problems, but also in anticipating them.
Journalist Harold Wallace Ross (1892-1951)

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Email Rules

If your email lands on a laptop be doubly careful, says Nancy Flynn and Randolph Kahn in Email Rules (AMACOM Books): “Leaving laptops in hotel rooms, rental cars and at airports means the company’s assets and confidential information is up for grabs. Laptop theft in the United States accounted for as much as $5 million in losses in 2002 – a fivefold increase over losses reported in 1997.”
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Poet Robert Frost

By working faithfully eight hours a day you may eventually get to be boss and work twelve hours a day.

Poet Robert Frost

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Dr. Seuss

You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose. You're on your own. And you know what you know. You are the guy who'll decide where to go.

Dr. Seuss
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

Initiative must come from the top, Robert B. Tucker says in Driving Growth Through Innovation: How Leading Firms are Transforming Their Futures (Berrett-Koehler). How to do more with chicken sent Donald Tyson to McDonald's in the early 1980s to convince the fast-food giant to sell chicken nuggets. "The result was a growth explosion for Tyson, which grew annually at rates of 36 percent for the decade that followed," Tucker says.
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

With many companies focusing on fewer products and services, why take in another company's cast-off, wonders Andrew J. Birol, author of Focus.Accomplish.Grow. The Business Owners Guide to Growth (Birol). “Ask your customers which products and services their supplier is ignoring,” Birol writes. “Find treasure in the orphan products and services of other companies.”
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Homer Simpson

If something is too hard to do, then it's not worth doing.

Homer Simpson

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When You Mean Business About Yourself

Tempted to obfuscate or answer obscurely? Better think again, Ray Capp says in When You Mean Business About Yourself: Achieving Personal Success through Lessons from the World's Best Corporations (Conduit). "Honesty is the smartest option," he suggests. "Being honest is the most efficient way to operate. The truth requires the least energy to explain and maintain. It allows people to choose to interact with you time and time again."
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

The world is full of willing people: some willing to work, the others willing to let them.
Poet Robert Frost

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Speak Like Churchill — Stand Like Lincoln

When delivering a speech, surprise your audience by making it brief, says James C. Humes, author of Speak Like Churchill — Stand Like Lincoln: 21 Powerful Secrets of History's Greatest Speakers (Prima Publishing). “If your audience is anticipating a 20-minute or 30-minute speech, astonish them by speaking for five minutes,” says Humes. “Terse is far better than long-winded. How long was the Gettysburg Address? Two minutes.”
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The Natural Step Story

The world doesn't need another business guru, Karl-Henrik Robert says in his book The Natural Step Story: Seeding a Quiet Revolution (New Society Publishers). “I think we should even fear them,” Robert writes. “For change today, we need cooperation and shared ownership for responsibility and power; to that end, we need every person to identify the guru within himself or herself.”
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Intrinsic Exerciser

It may drive your co-workers crazy but Jay Kimiecik, author of The Intrinsic Exerciser (Mariner Press/Houghton Mifflin) and an associate professor at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, suggests that fidgeting can help burn calories and keeps workers healthier. “That's right,” he writes, “fidget. One study at the Mayo Clinic found that fidgeters burn hundreds of extra calories a day. Start tapping those fingers and feet.”
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

Make a point never to answer the telephone on the first ring, suggests Debra Koontz Traverson in Outsmarting Goliath: How to Achieve Equal Footing with Companies that are Bigger, Richer, Older and Better Known (Bloomberg Press). First ring answers mean you don't have anything better to do. “Don't wait until the fourth ring,” Ms. Koontz says. “Callers imagine reasons - such as customer service is a low priority.”
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

Intuition can be developed, according to The Innovative Woman (Career Press) by Norma Carr-Ruffino, a professor of management at San Francisco State University: “Meditate every day to tap into subconscious and super conscious levels. Practice using your intuition every day, beginning with small predictions and messages and graduating to more important visioning, problem-solving and decision-making.”
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The Success Effect

In The Success Effect (S&R) by John Eckberg, management guru Peter Block talks about why performance reviews are pointless: "They are punitive, demeaning and reinforce that somebody has sovereignty. Most people are so anxious in a performance review, they don't know what they are saying. The A students don't mind but everybody else, you have to threaten people to hold them. That tells me maybe that conversation isn't useful.
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Career Survival Guide

In the Career Survival Guide (McGraw-Hill) by Brian O’Connell, the author says to avoid the blame game when it comes to office politics. While some insist that the only way to play office politics is to ensure that somebody else loses, O’Connell suggests a defensive approach: “Expect the worst from some people. The key is to not let your guard down. Don’t underestimate what some people will do to get what you have.”
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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

Make the workmanship surpass the materials.
Ovid

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Hassle-Free Business Travel

Have a few hours before your flight leaves? Do not obsess over your work while waiting in the airport, suggests William J. Mitchell in his book Hassle-Free Business Travel (Ten Speed Press). Instead, take some time for yourself. “Do not wait in an uncomfortable airport,” he says. “Take a walk, go shopping or visit whatever cultural or tourist attractions are close by. These are great ways to unwind and reduce stress.”
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Paul Brown

A winner never whines.
- NFL coaching great Paul Brown

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Pot of Gold Daily Quote

Andrea R. Nierenberg, author of Nonstop Networking: How to Improve Your Life, Luck and Career (Capital Books), sees seven traits of great networkers: they are confident - unafraid to ask for what they need, they appreciate helpers, nurture relationships, tenaciously go around obstacles, are excellent listeners, rebound from rejection and are friendly: “Enthusiasm is a quiet passion that shines and makes people want to be part of it.”
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