Management Quotes

So far, the single most important discovery in happiness research is the idea of hedonic adaptation. Put simply, we take things for granted after a while. Experiences are so much harder to get used to because they are unique events. When you buy a car, for a few months you cherish it, but within a year you’re totally used to it.

The more you can do to slow down that pattern of getting used to things, the better. One of my recommendations is to stop, take note, and give thanks–not necessarily to God but just to reflect on what you’ve achieved and what you’ve got. You need to stop and think, “Actually, I’m damn fortunate.”
— James Montier

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Personality / Behavior

As adults, when we try to solve a problem, we often ask, “What does this mean?” We try to pull the answer from our knowledge bank, just like finding the solution in an encyclopedia. Solve the problem the way it has been solved in the past. This can be useful, but it provides a limited set of possibilities. This is about replication and regurgitation. An alternative (and more insightful) way of looking at problems is to ask, “What is this like?” Be a matchmaker. Make connections. Try and find analogies, metaphors, and associations that fit the problem you are looking to solve. Recombine ideas in new ways. …When you have many dots collected, you have limitless ways of recombining them to create something new. This is not about invention, which is pulling something out of the thin air. This is about innovation which is about reconstituting old ideas in new ways. Don’t always go for the obvious solution. Some of the best ideas come from some of the most unlikely combinations.
— Stephen M. Shapiro

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Innovation and Thought

We spend four months per year on the budget process, but we hardly spend any time talking about our talent, our strengths and how to leverage them, our talent needs and how to build them. Everyone is held accountable for their budget. But no one is held accountable for the strength of their talent pool. Isn’t it the talent we have in each unit that drives our results? Aren’t we missing something?
— Jim Robbins

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Human Resources and Management

It has always been imagined, especially by conservatives, that to associate all, or a large part, of economic activity with the state is to endanger freedom…

The greater danger is in the subordination of belief to the needs of the modern industrial system. As this persuades us on the goods we buy, and as it persuades us on the public policies that are necessary for its planning, so it also accommodates us to its goals and values. These are that technology is always good; that economic growth is always good; that firms must always expand; that consumption of goods is the principal source of happiness; that idleness is wicked; and that nothing should interfere with the priority we accord to technology, growth, and increased consumption.

If we continue to believe that the goals of the modern industrial system and the public policies that serve these goals are coordinate with all of life, then all of our lives will be in the service of these goals. What is consistent with these ends we shall have or be allowed; all else will be off limits. Our wants will be managed in accordance with the needs of the industrial system…
— John Kenneth Galbraith

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Capitalism and Economics

The two questions most asked about an economic system are whether it serves man’s physical needs and whether it is consistent with his liberty and general happiness.
— John Kenneth Galbraith

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Economics

The modern capitalist is a fair-weather sailor. As soon as a storm rises, he abandons the duties of navigation and even sinks the boats which might carry him to safety by his haste to push his neighbor off and himself in.
— John Maynard Keynes

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Capitalism and Economics

Great creativity requires hard facts, wild imagination, and nonlogical jumps forward that are then proved to be right by working backward to known principles. Only the rebellious can do it.
— Lester C. Thurow

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Creativity and Innovation

When societies aren’t organized so that the old vested interests can be brushed aside, entrepreneurs cannot emerge. Social systems have to be built in which entrepreneurs have the freedom to destroy the old. Yet destroying the old can too easily be seen as a step into chaos. Societies that aren’t ready to break with the past aren’t willing to let entrepreneurs come into existence.
— Lester C. Thurow

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Economics and Entrepreneurship

Teams rarely manage to improve their performance wholly outside their active working environment, so short-term workshops, no matter how attractive the setting or how heart-felt and candid the members’ exchanges may be, aren’t likely to change their mode of working. Structured self-discovery and reflection must be combined with decision making and action in the real world; the constant interplay among these elements over time is what creates lasting change.
— Erika Herb, Keith Leslie, and Colin Price

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Teamwork

There’s a latent productivity in people; they’re just waiting for someone to remind them of their capacity.
— Lorraine Monroe

No Comments » Posted by Administrator / Organizational Behavior and Productivity