Great Throughts Treasury

"The two pillars of a future-proof education: # 1 Teach kids how to lead. # 2 Help them learn to solve interesting problems."

"The type of low-risk, high stability jobs that three-quarters of us crave have turned into dead-end traps of dissatisfaction and unfair risk."

"The typical factory-centric organization places a premium on not-wrong, and spends no time at all weeding out those who don?t start. In the networked economy, the innovation-focused organization has no choice but to obsess about those who don?t start. Today, not starting is far, far worse than being wrong. If you start, you?ve got a shot at evolving and adjusting to turn your wrong into a right. But if you don?t start, you never get a chance."

"The value we create is directly related to how much valuable information we can produce, how much trust we can earn, and how often we innovate."

"The very structure of today's workplace means that it's easier than ever to change things and that individuals have more leverage than ever before."

"The way to work with a bully is to take the ball and go home. First time, every time. When there?s no ball, there?s no game. Bullies hate that. So they?ll either behave so they can play with you or they?ll go bully someone else."

"The very thing you are afraid of occurs, precisely because you?re afraid of it."

"Then, if your idea catches on, you can sell the souvenir edition. The book. The thing people keep on their shelf or lend out or get from the library. Books are wonderful (I own too many!) but they're not necessarily the best vessel for spreading your idea. And the punchline, of course, is that if you do all these things, you won't need a publisher. And that's exactly when a publisher will want you! That's the sort of author publishers do the best with."

"There are lots of good reasons to abandon a project. Having a little competition is not one of them."

"Then the factory fell apart. And what?s left for us to work with? Art."

"There are only two tools available to the educator. The easy one is fear. Fear is easy to awake, easy to maintain, but ultimately toxic. Other tool is passion."

"There are no longer any great jobs where someone else tells you precisely what to do."

"There are more rich people than ever before, and they demand to be treated differently."

"There is a difference between how many and who. Old marketing was about how many. New marketing is about who. If 12 people are coming to your blog, but they are the right 12 people with large amounts of buying power, that?s what matters."

"There is no longer a clear path to satisfaction in working for the man."

"There?s a difference between telling people what to do and inciting a movement."

"There is an individual who can walk into chaos and create order, someone who can invent, connect, create, and make things happen. Every worthwhile institution has indispensable people who make differences like these."

"There?s a huge difference between the shallow pleasure of instant applause and the long-lasting impact of true connection."

"There's a myth that all you need to do is outline your vision and prove it's right?then, quite suddenly, people will line up and support you. In fact, the opposite is true. Remarkable visions and genuine insight are always met with resistance. And when you start to make progress, your efforts are met with even more resistance. Products, services, career paths... whatever it is, the forces for mediocrity will align to stop you, forgiving no errors and never backing down until it's over. If it were any other way, it would be easy. And if it were any other way, everyone would do it and your work would ultimately be devalued. The yin and yang are clear: without people pushing against your quest to do something worth talking about, it's unlikely it would be worth the journey. Persist."

"There?s no correlation between how good your idea is and how likely your organization will be to embrace it."

"There?s always a gift intent on the part of the artist."

"They don't work for losing weight, they don't work for making sales quota and they don't work for getting and keeping a job."

"They insists on making a difference, on leading, on connecting with others and doing something I call art. The is the indispensable one, the one the company can?t live without. This is about humanity, not compliance."

"They don?t understand that Excellence isn?t about working extra hard to do what you?re told. It?s about taking the initiative to do work you decide is worth doing."

"They told you to get your r‚sum‚ in order, to punch your ticket, to fit in, and to follow instructions. They told you to swallow your pride, not to follow your dream. They promised trinkets and prizes and possibly riches if you would just suck it up and be part of the system, if you would merely do what you were told and conform. They sold you debt and self-storage and reality TV shows. They sold your daughters and sons, too. All in exchange for what would happen later, when it was your turn. It?s your turn."

"This is an addictive pastime. You take no real risk, touch the world, and it responds. Repeat."

"This is like the Six Sigma approach to quality. Six Sigma refers to the quest for continuous improvement, ultimately leading to 3.4 defects per million units. The problem is that once you?re heading down this road, there?s no room left for amazing improvements and remarkable innovations. Either you rolled ten strikes or you didn?t. Organizations that earn dramatic success always do it in markets where asymptotes don?t exist, or where they can be shattered. If you could figure out how to bowl 320, that would be amazing. Until that happens, pick a different sport if you want to be a linchpin."

"They understand that there is no map, no step-by-step plan, and no way to avoid blame now and then."

"Things that are remarkable never make spec, because that would make them standardized, not worth talking about."

"This is marketing done right. Marketing where the marketer changes the product, not the ads."

"This is not a book for the wild-haired crazies your company keeps in a corner. It is a book for you, your boss, and your employees, because the best future available to us is a future where you contriubute your true self and your best work. Are you up for that?"

"This notion that it is up to each person to innovate in some way flies in the face of the industrial age, but you know what, the industrial age is over."

"Three things have happened, pretty much at the same time. All three points to the same (temporarily uncomfortable, but ultimately marvelous) outcome:"

"Three for one: I don?t care how many friends you have on Facebook or how many followers you have on Twitter. Those are not actual friends or truly followers. I care about how many people will miss you if you?re not back here again tomorrow. | The opportunity is not in being momentarily popular with the anonymous masses. It?s in being missed when you?re gone, in doing work that matters to the tribe you choose. | The rest of the world isn?t nearly as important as the few who are here."

"To be a superstar, you must do something exceptional. Not just survive the Dip, but use the Dip as an opportunity to create something so extraordinary that people can?t help but talk about it, recommend it, and, yes, choose it."

"To efficiently run a school, amplify fear (and destroy passion)."

"Traditional corporations, particularly large-scale service and manufacturing businesses are organized for efficiency. Or consistency. But not joy. Joy comes from surprise and connection and humanity and transparency and new...If you fear special requests, if you staff with cogs, if you have to put it all in a manual, then the chances of amazing someone are really quite low. These organizations have people who will try to patch problems over after the fact, instead of motivated people eager to delight on the spot. The alternative, it seems, is to organize for joy. These are the companies that give their people the freedom (and the expectation) that they will create, connect and surprise. These are the organizations that embrace someone who make a difference, as opposed to searching the employee handbook for a rule that was violated."

"Today?s new marketing is a bigger opportunity than any revolution that came along before (Factory, Industrial revolution) because people only need access to ideas, not access to large amounts of capital."

"Too many organizations are willing to make a half-assed effort to try a new tactic, but require a writ from the Pope to quit a tactic. This not only dilutes their ability to execute?witness a9.com?but it also leads to an impotent organization that rarely breaks through, even when they?re on to something. This means that the Dip isn?t pain; nor is it something to be avoided. The Dip is actually an ally. Because when the Dip shows up, you?re know you?re close to a breakthrough, to getting to the other side, to mastery, and to being the best in the world."

"To be willing to do new things you don?t think you?ll like requires you to prefer the unknown. Not just to tolerate it, but to prefer it."

"Today, most marketers don?t notice, track, or interact with people until they are customers."

"Today, not starting is far, far worse than being wrong. If you start, you've got a shot at evolving and adjusting to turn your wrong into a right. But if you don't start, you never get a chance."

"Traditional ways of interrupting consumers (TV ads, trade show booths, junk mail) are losing their cost-effectiveness."

"Transferring your passion to your job is far easier than finding a job that happens to match your passion."

"Traditional sales and marketing involves increasing market shares, which means selling as much of your product as you can to as many customers as possible. One-to-one marketing involves driving for a share of customer, which means ensuring that each individual customer who buys your product buys more product, buys only your brand, and is happy using your product instead of another to solve his problem. The true, current value of any one customer is a function of the customer's future purchases, across all the product lines, brands, and services offered by you."

"Transparency in the traditional school might destroy it."

"Treasure what it means to do a day's work. It's our one and only chance to do something productive today, and it's certainly not available to someone merely because he is the high bidder. A day's work is your chance to do art, to create a gift, to do something that matters. As your work gets better and your art becomes more important, competition for your gifts will increase and you'll discover that you can be choosier about whom you give them to."

"Tribes makes our lives better, and leading a tribe is the best life of all."

"Treat different customers differently."

"Tribes need leadership. Sometimes one person leads, sometimes more. People want connection and growth and something new. They want change... You can't have a tribe without a leader - and you can't be a leader without a tribe."