Great Throughts Treasury

"Solve it. Solve it quickly, solve it right or wrong. If you solve it wrong, it will come back and slap you in the face, and then you can solve it right. Lying dead in the water and doing nothing is a comfortable alternative because it is without risk, but it is an absolutely fatal way to manage a business."

"The ability to ask the right question is more than half the battle of finding the answer."

"Speech celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the opening of the Brooklyn Bridge, May 24, 1933: It was courage, faith, endurance and a dogged determination to surmount all obstacles that built this bridge."

"Success is an individual proposition."

"The future is going to demand more of us."

"The business leaders of tomorrow will be the young men of today-men like you who are preparing now for the great future which lies ahead. You may view the future with confidence, knowing that from the youth of today will emerge the leaders of tomorrow."

"The great accomplishments of man have resulted from the transmission of ideas and enthusiasm."

"The man who bases his actions on independent thought; who reflects and considers before doing anything, and whose judgments are arrived at through logic, is the man who will go farthest today."

"The man who does not take pride in his own performance performs nothing in which to take pride."

"The only way that we want you men to handle the competition proposition is the only way we can afford to allow you men to handle it, that is, strictly on the merits of our goods. . . . You people when you come down to competition-must not do anything that's in restraint of trade, anything that will restrain the other fellow from selling his goods, anything that could be construed by anybody as unfair competition," he said, stammering in his earnestness. "You know, gentlemen, it is bad policy to do anything unfair with anybody, anywhere at any time, isn't it, in business or outside of business? No man ever won except in the one honest, fair and square way in which you men are working." The audience burst into applause, interrupting Watson again and again as he assured them that he would uphold fairness no matter what the competition did.. . The spirit of the meeting quickened; and Watson, for the first time, began to take command."

"The future of this business is far beyond the vision of any of us."

"The passing of Thomas Alva Edison serves to direct our attention to the multitude of benefactions he bestowed upon all humanity during his many years of fruitful activity. It reminds us of the debt of gratitude we owe him as members of the human race. By his achievements, he laid the foundation for continued and greater development. His persistent efforts and indefatigable spirit multiplied many times the valuable opportunities for man, especially the young man. To each and every young man, Mr. Edison left a legacy of opportunities."

"The success of every major executive depends on the men under him. Really successful men are pushed up, not pulled up."

"The time who utilizes every minute of every hour becomes a bigger, better being every minute."

"The toughest thing about the power of trust is that it's very difficult to build and very easy to destroy. The essence of trust building is to emphasize the similarities between you and the customer."

"The way to succeed is to double your error rate."

"The young man requires wisdom as well as knowledge."

"There is very little difference between the general manager, the sales manager, the factory manager, the office manager, the factory man, the office man and the salesman. We have different ideas and different work, but when you come down to it, there is just one thing we have to deal with throughout the whole organization - that is the "MAN." Here is the way it lines up: The Manufacturer general manager sales manager factory manager office manager factory man office man salesman. This is a man proposition pure and simple; that includes the ladies too, by the way-all mankind. I think this one point is something we should keep in mind at all times regardless of what our occupations or duties are; we are just men-men standing together, shoulder to shoulder, all working for one common good; we have one common interest, and the good of each of us as individuals affects the greater good of the company."

"This kind of intense loyalty, then, became the well-spring of the IBM spirit, the family spirit as it was called."

"There is no saturation point in education if you follow sound principles, and you must apply this motto to business... You must acquire wisdom in addition to knowledge. Wisdom is the power which enables you to use your knowledge to advantage."

"Time is the substance of life - and recording it, the most important thing with which a man has to deal."

"Time is your chief stock in trade."

"To be successful, you have to have your heart in your business and your business in your heart."

"There is more real need for the pioneering spirit today than ever before."

"To the salesmen, Watson preached individuality and conservatism at the same time: Some men think that personality can be acquired by wearing unusual clothes or by saying something unusual. That is where many young men are wrong. Present your proposition in your own natural way, always keeping your personality behind your product."

"When I speak about the future development of our business, I want to include every other business in the United States. In my judgment, every legitimate business in our country today has a far better future ahead of it than it has ever had before."

"Watson clearly spelled out his attitude about drinking, prohibiting liquor at IBM functions, on IBM premises, for IBM purposes: You can mix your drinking with pleasure, but not with our business."

"We are willing to spend any reasonable amount of money on education in our organization, because we have a group of men and women in our business who are constantly seeking knowledge, knowing that is the way to make themselves more valuable to the company and, automatically, more valuable to themselves. We are working out a plan that is going to take in everybody in the organization. We are going to have post graduate schools for our men in the field, and post graduate schools for our executives-and many of them."

"We must all take time to do enough thinking to formulate our own conclusions."

"We are all trying to learn how to do a better job."

"We progress because we are willing to change."

"What we do with our leisure time has considerable bearing on what we accomplish during our working hours, and very largely determines the degree of our success, Young men who, like yourselves, devote a predetermined amount of their leisure hours to study and to serious thinking, are the men who are going to progress far and fast. The business leaders of tomorrow will be the young men of today-men like you who are preparing now for the great future which lies ahead. You may view the future with confidence, knowing that from the youth of today will emerge the leaders of tomorrow."

"What synchronism means to a clock, a convention means to our organization; it enables those of us who are behind to catch up and get in step with the others."

"We must never feel satisfied."

"What we need in this country today is more courage and more belief in the things that we have."

"You cannot stay in one place: you either go forward or go backward."

"Wisdom is the power to put our time and our knowledge to the proper use."

"Would you like me to give you a formula for... success It's quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure... You're thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn't at all... You can be discouraged by failure--or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because, remember that's where you'll find success. On the far side."

"You have to have your heart in the business and the business in your heart."

"Within us all there are wells of thought and dynamos of energy which are not suspected until emergencies arise. Then oftentimes we find that it is comparatively simple to double or treble our former capacities and to amaze ourselves by the results achieved. Quotas, when set up for us by others, are challenges which goad us on to surpass ourselves. The outstanding leaders of every age are those who set up their own quotas and constantly exceed them."

"Whenever an individual or a business decides that success has been attained, progress stops."

"Wisdom is the power that enables us to use knowledge for the benefit of ourselves and others."

"You don't hear things that are bad about your company unless you ask. It is easy to hear good tidings, but you have to scratch to get the bad news."

"You can be discouraged by failure, or you can learn from it. So go ahead and make mistakes, make all you can. Because, remember that's where you'll find success - on the far side of failure."

"You work the first eight hours of each day for survival. Anything after that is an investment."

"Your company is your friend. That is my hope and aim and ambition. [Watson's motto at the first CTR conventions]"