Business Quotes

There's plenty of room for humor in politics, God knows, but it's a serious business. ~ Al Franken

A man in business must put up many affronts if he loves his own quiet. ~ William Penn

Business is merely a form of warfare in which each combatant strives to get the business away from his competitors and at the same time keep them from getting what he already has. ~ David McCullough

Business men are to be pitied who do not recognize the fact that the largest side of their secular business is benevolence ... No man ever manages a legitimate business in this life without doing indirectly far more for other men than he is trying to do for himself. ~ Henry Ward Beecher

The men who have succeeded are men who have chosen one line and stuck to it. ~ Andrew Carnegie

I do believe people ought to be left alone. I don't care who you are or what you do at home or who your friends are or where you hang out, what kind of music you listen to, what you do in your home is your own business. That's always been who I am. I am a leave me alone kind of guy. ~ Rand Paul

There is something about this process, and about the whole 8 x 10 [camera] business, that takes it out of the arena of the snapshot, even though, of course, I'm always desperate for that feeling. I wanted those family pictures to look effortless. I wanted them to look like snapshots. And some of them did. ~ Sally Mann

In the US, there is basically one party - the business party. It has two factions, called Democrats and Republicans, which are somewhat different but carry out variations on the same policies. By and large, I am opposed to those policies. As is most of the population. ~ Noam Chomsky

Today the strategies of many companies in the real estate industry are premised on low interest rates, an assumption that has resulted in the rapid expansion of the real estate securitization business. This trend could be regarded as a risk factor, as it exposes the real estate sector to at least three potential problems: first, interest rate hikes; second, revisions to securitization business accounting standards; and third, overheating in the real estate market. ~ Akira Mori

The people on the business side in the music business are kind of different from the theatre business. I think it's partly because there are different pressures on the industries. ~ Tim Curry

I'm meeting a lot of musicians and people in the music business, and am constantly trying to figure out what I want to do with music. We'll see. I want to do everything. ~ Tyler Posey

I won't close down a business of subnormal profitability merely to add a fraction of a point to our corporate returns. I also feel it inappropriate for even an exceptionally profitable company to fund an operation once it appears to have unending losses in prospect. Adam Smith would disagree with my first proposition and Karl Marx would disagree with my second; the middle ground is the only position that leaves me comfortable. ~ Warren Buffett

Advertising is in essence simply a means of communication through mass media which is available to anyone who can pay for it. It is, in this sense, rather like electricity, which can be used to work a refrigerator or a dentist's drill. ~ John Treasure

Wrigley is a great business, but that doesn't solve the problem. Buying great businesses at advantageous prices is very tough. ~ Charlie Munger

Politics would be a helluva good business if it weren't for the goddamned people. ~ Richard M. Nixon

Some guys are alpha dogs, snarling and snapping. Dex is more like a silverback gorilla, quietly going about his business until something pisses him off and he gives a warning. ~ Kristen Callihan

One man should not be afraid of improving his posessions, lest they be taken away from him, or another deterred by high taxes from starting a new business. Rather, the Prince should be ready to reward men who want to do these things and those who endeavour in any way to increase the prosperity of their city or their state. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

The aeroplane is an invention of the devil and will never play any part in such a serious business as the defence of the nation, my boy! ~ Sam Hughes

My little brother Paul. He owns his own floor sanding business called Silly P Hardwood Floors and hes really good. ~ Amy Sedaris

He was very interested in everything that lay to the North because no one ever went that way and he was never allowed to go there himself. When he was sitting out of doors mending the nets, and all alone, he would often look eagerly to the North. One could see nothing but a grassy slope running up to a level ridge and beyond that the sky with perhaps a few birds in it.

Sometimes if Arsheesh was there Shasta would say, 'O my Father, what is there beyond that hill?' And then if the fisherman was in a bad temper he would box Shasta's ears and tell him to attend to his work. Or if he was in a peaceable mood he would say, "O my son, do not allow your mind to be distracted by idle questions. For one of the poets has said, 'Application to business is the root of prosperity, but those who ask questions that do not concern them are steering the ship of folly towards the rock of indigence'.

Shasta thought that beyond the hill there must be some delightful secret which his father wished to hide from him. In reality, however, the fisherman talked like this because he didn't know what lay to the North. Neither did he care. He had a very practical mind. ~ C.S. Lewis

In the end, the humanities can only be defended by stressing how indispensable they are; and this means insisting on their vital role in the whole business of academic learning, rather than protesting that, like some poor relation, they don't cost much to be housed. ~ Terry Eagleton

I decided honestly that comic art is an art form in itself. It reflects the life and times more accurately and actually is more artistic than magazine illustration - since it is entirely creative. An illustrator works with camera and models; a comic artist begins with a white sheet of paper and dreams up his own business - he is playwright, director, editor and artist at once. ~ Alex Raymond

You make history when you do business. ~ Barbara Kruger

What was unique about me being in City Hall during the Giuliani Administration, I was the only one who wasn't an attorney. I may have been the only one who didn't work in a prosecutor's office. So I took a completely different point of view on how the city should be run. Very close to a business, very close on metrics and numbers. ~ Joe Lhota

It's time for our business and political leaders to help redefine morality beyond sex, drugs, and rock and roll to include lying, hypocrisy, and callous indifference to those in need. ~ Arianna Huffington

Free-to-play isn't a business model. Free-to-play is a marketing strategy. It's a way to get people over the hump of trying out your game. It gets rid of the friction that happens when you charge an upfront fee. ~ Mitch Lasky

It is not like studying German, where you mull along, in a groping, uncertain way, for thirty years; and at last, just as you think you've got it, they spring the subjunctive on you, and there you are. No- and I see now plainly enough, that the great pity about the German language is, that you can't fall off it and hurt yourself. There is nothing like that feature to make you attend strictly to business. ~ Mark Twain

The life of every citizen is becoming a business. This, it seems to me, is one of the worst interpretations of the meaning of human life history has ever seen. Man's life is not a business. ~ Saul Bellow

Business needs to push the agenda rather than waiting for it to happen. ~ Jochen Zeitz

I like the music. I love it & live it in fact. But for me the business part of music just plain stinks. ~ Artie Shaw

Our premise is there are going to be a lot of winners. It's not winner take all. Other people do not have to lose for us to win. ~ Jeff Bezos

Like Hansel and Gretel whose trail of breadcrumbs got eaten~ your customer may lose their way once they have left your website and they may never come back.
An email marketing list helps you remind your customers of who you and your business are. ~ Nina Montgomery

My philosophy is: It's none of my business what people say of me and think of me. I am what I am and I do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. And it makes life so much easier. ~ Anthony Hopkins

In this day and age, you need a lot of patience if you are in the movie business. ~ Brett Ratner

People that I have known that have been extremely creative, people in the business, they have always been influenced by their mothers. Their mothers are the ones that created whatever it is - the urge to create. ~ Georgia Holt

In order to become a success, a business doesn't just have to do well, it has to to better than its competitors. Being number one isn't just about bragging rights. Often it means the difference between prospering and merely hanging on. ~ Mitt Romney

It is a formidable list of jobs: the whole of the spinning industry, the whole of the dyeing industry, the whole of the weaving industry. The whole catering industry and - which would not please Lady Astor, perhaps - the whole of the nation's brewing and distilling. All the preserving, pickling and bottling industry, all the bacon-curing. And (since in those days a man was often absent from home for months together on war or business) a very large share in the management of landed estates. Here are the women's jobs - and what has become of them? They are all being handled by men. It is all very well to say that woman's place is the home - but modern civilisation has taken all these pleasant and profitable activities out of the home, where the women looked after them, and handed them over to big industry, to be directed and organised by men at the head of large factories. Even the dairy-maid in her simple bonnet has gone, to be replaced by a male mechanic in charge of a mechanical milking plant. ~ Dorothy L. Sayers

Dan had some questions about Chris-R. We all did. Why the name "Chris-R," for instance? What's with that hyphen? Tommy's explanation: "He is gangster." What about this drug business, which never comes up either before or after Chris-R's only scene in the film? "We have big problem in society with the drugs. ~ Greg Sestero

If the world is cold, make it your business to build fires. ~ Horace Traubel

Take Canada again: why does Canada have the health-care program it does? Up until the mid-1960s, Canada and the United States had the same capitalist health service: extremely inefficient, tons of bureaucracy, huge administrative costs, millions of people with no insurance coverage―exactly what would be amplified in the United States by Clinton's proposals for "managed competition" [put forward in 1993].21 But in 1962 in Saskatchewan, where the N.D.P. is pretty strong and the unions are pretty strong, they managed to put through a kind of rational health-care program of the sort that every industrialized country in the world has by now, except the United States and South Africa. Well, when Saskatchewan first put through that program, the doctors and the insurance companies and the business community were all screaming―but it worked so well that pretty soon all the other Provinces wanted the same thing too, and within a couple years guaranteed health care had spread over the entire country. And that happened largely because of the New Democratic Party in Canada, which does provide a kind of cover and a framework within which popular organizations like unions, and then later things like the feminist movement, have been able to get together and do things. ~ Noam Chomsky

Such is the brutalization of commercial ethics in this country that no one can feel anything more delicate than the velvet touch of a soft buck. ~ Raymond Chandler

I believe that if we had and would keep our dirty, bloody, dollar-soaked fingers out of the business of these nations so full of depressed, exploited people, they will arrive at a solution of their own ... And if unfortunately their revolution must be of the violent type because the "haves" refuse to share with the "have-nots" by any peaceful method, at least what they get will be their own, and not the American style, which they don't want and above all don't want crammed down their throats by Americans. ~ Michael Parenti

Of the billionaires I have known, money just brings out the basic traits in them. If they were jerks before they had money, they are simply jerks with a billion dollars. ~ Warren Buffett

It is not my business to be petitioning the Governor or the Legislature any more than it is theirs to petition me; and if they should not hear my petition, what should I do then? But in this case the State has provided no way: its very Constitution is the evil. This ~ Henry David Thoreau

You are your own business, so micro manage it as though your life depended on it, because it does. ~ Jevon Scott

It was actually very difficult., especially during the first five years of the start-up stage, when all the odds seemed to be against us - this is probably true for most entrepreneurs. To succeed, you really have to put your heart and soul into it. (p. 71) ~ Injap Sia

There is one other business where the customer is always wrong and that's the media. ~ Rush Limbaugh

Any good business is a hobby. We have an integrated company culture, and I can honestly say that many people who come here to work make Yandex a central part of their lives. ~ Arkady Volozh

I hear Raleigh's new accounting business isn't doing well. Maybe up in New York or somewhere it's a good thing, but in Jackson, Mississippi, people just don't care to do business with a rude, condescending asshole. ~ Kathryn Stockett

After all, your company doesn't define customer experience. Customers do. Customer experience is based on how your customers perceive your organization and how well you meet their needs when they interact with, hear about, and do business with your company. ~ Michael Hinshaw

Everyone loves the idea of "disruption" in business, but no one likes it when it happens to them. ~ Richie Norton

If ethics are poor at the top, that behavior is copied down through the organization. ~ Robert Noyce

We cannot afford to have any large section of the business world in doubt whether they have broken the laws or not, and we cannot let the laws become a dead letter through vagueness. In this view it is clear that an administrative commission can render invaluable service. ~ John Bates Clark

When it first emerged, Twitter was widely derided as a frivolous distraction that was mostly good for telling your friends what you had for breakfast. Now it is being used to organize and share news about the Iranian political protests, to provide customer support for large corporations, to share interesting news items, and a thousand other applications that did not occur to the founders when they dreamed up the service in 2006. This is not just a case of cultural exaptation: people finding a new use for a tool designed to do something else. In Twitter's case, the users have been redesigning the tool itself. The convention of replying to another user with the @ symbol was spontaneously invented by the Twitter user base. Early Twitter users ported over a convention from the IRC messaging platform and began grouping a topic or event by the "hash-tag" as in "#30Rock" or "inauguration." The ability to search a live stream of tweets - which is likely to prove crucial to Twitter's ultimate business model, thanks to its advertising potential - was developed by another start-up altogether. Thanks to these innovations, following a live feed of tweets about an event - political debates or Lost episodes - has become a central part of the Twitter experience. But for the first year of Twitter's existence, that mode of interaction would have been technically impossible using Twitter. It's like inventing a toaster oven and then looking around a year later and discovering that all your custo ~ Steven Johnson

Complex regulation in place of simple-rules capitalism disrupts market processes and corrupts business incentives. ~ Robert L. Bradley, Jr.

Never let anyone (or any situation) scramble your mind, your heart or your money. You are no good to anyone (especially yourself) if you are insane, miserable and broke. ~ Carlos Wallace

It is solely bigness in business which makes it possible to supply the masses with all those products the present-day American common man does not want to do without. Luxury goods for the few can be produced in small shops. Luxury goods for the many require big business. ~ Ludwig Von Mises

The transition to a low-carbon economy will be one of the defining issues of the 21st century. This plan sets out a route-map for the UK's transition from here to 2020 ... every business, every community will need to be involved. Together we can create a more secure, more prosperous low carbon Britain and a world which is sustainable for future generations. ~ Ed Miliband

I knew Quintessentially was a success when my father, who does a lot of business in Beirut, introduced himself to somebody and they said, 'Oh, do you know Ben Elliot? I'd really like to meet him.' I remember him ringing me up, really annoyed. ~ Ben Elliot

We had all opted to take City's financial reporting course work, which, in theory, meant we wanted to write about stock prices and corporate takeovers. That, of course, was a joke. No one still in their twenties, and broke, goes into journalism to write about money - a subject in which they still have zero practical experience. ~ Chris Ayres

I'm coming out with a wine ... I'm actually a restaurateur. I have Famous Famiglia Pizzeria that has opened up in the Sacramento airport. I'm also working with my business partner on opening up the Linnethia Lounge. ~ NeNe Leakes

I'm in the movie business; it's meant to be very cutthroat. But you won't find anybody that ever says I cheated them or manipulated them. ~ Jack Nicholson

As one of the first creators on YouTube, I've been fortunate to sit in the front row, witnessing the remarkable evolution of digital media. The experiences and knowledge I've been afforded are invaluable, and I'm excited to take that skill set, together with Endemol Beyond, to build a reliable, reputable business. ~ Michelle Phan

When you are designing your plan, think not in terms of what you need to do, think in term of what you need to achieve. ~ T. Jay Taylor

What goes on between a man and his missus is nobody's business; especially where desert toppin's involved. ~ Tanya Huff

Business should never be allowed to justify mean, thug ugly deals for any reason. ~ Ralph Steadman

To think that the new economy is over is like somebody in London in 1830 saying the entire industrial revolution is over because some textile manufacturers in Manchester went broke. ~ Alvin Toffler

Obvious prospects for physical growth in a business do not translate into obvious profits for investors. ~ Benjamin Graham

When looking at trends I always ask myself basic and timeless questions about business, and the one I seem to always come back to is, 'How is this different than anything else in the marketplace?' ~ Daymond John

When the United States cannibalize dollars from the defensive business of the NSA, securing our communications, protecting our systems, patching zero-day vulnerabilities, and instead we're giving those dollars to be used for creating new vulnerabilities in our systems so that they can surveil us and other people abroad who use the same systems. ~ Edward Snowden

My father died and left me his blessing and his business. His blessing brought no money into my pocket, and as to his business, it soon deserted me, for I was busy writing poetry, and could not attend to law, and my clients, though they had great respect for my talents, had no faith in a poetical attorney. ~ Washington Irving

The love, support, and respect the members of the theater community have for one another is unparalleled. Say what you want about us wacky drama-types, but one thing that makes our business special is our loyalty, our fierce commitment to one another, and our mutual respect. ~ Monica Raymund

The mobile phone acts as a cursor to connect the digital and physical. ~ Marissa Meyer

The best advice I ever got was from Lee Iacocca ... It was get into a business where you can be a big fish, not the little fish. Get into a business where you can be a change agent, where you can make a difference. ~ Marcus Lemonis

Maybe I'm tired," he said. "Maybe I'm tired of picking up life in bits and fistfuls and little drawstring bags. When you get to be as old as I am, there's an appeal in the idea of seeing some business through from start to finish. ~ Michael Chabon

Thus, experience has ever shown, that education, as well as religion, aristocracy, as well as democracy and monarchy, are, singly, totally inadequate to the business of restraining the passions of men, of preserving a steady government, and protecting the lives, liberties, and properties of the people ... Religion, superstition, oaths, education, laws, all give way before passions, interest, and power, which can be resisted only by passions, interest, and power. ~ John Adams

Except for politics, no business is scrutinized more exhaustively than journalism. ~ Russell Baker

Celebrities are the fodder of much of the media business, so they're always interested in making you seem provocative when you're not, or trying to bring you some sort of embarrassment by revealing something you'd rather not have revealed. That's the downside of celebrity. ~ Todd Rundgren

You check to see the facts are correct where business is concerned but if I read everything that was written about me, I'd end up feeling totally insecure about myself. ~ Elle Macpherson

All that Lenin learned about business from the tales of his comrades who occasionally sat in business offices was that it required a lot of scribbling, recording, and ciphering. Thus, he declares that accounting and control are the chief things necessary for the organizing and correct functioning of society ... Here we have the philosophy of the filing clerk in its full glory. ~ Ludwig Von Mises

Many people fail in their career, business and relationship, and others get stuck because of their inability to make quality decisions. ~ Nkem Paul

So Merrill Lynch has launched its first campaign in years to advertise the accomplishments of its investment banking business. The ads feature things like Merrill's recapitalization of Sierra Pacific. I guess including "helping Enron achieve its earnings goals in 1999" might be a little awkward given that Merrill Lynch bankers are currently on trial in Houston for that "accomplishment." ~ Bethany McLean

There's just something fascinating to me about watching a business interaction unfold, and the negotiation. And how everything is negotiable in life. ~ Kether Donohue

We need to become good citizens in the global village, instead of competing. What are we competing for - to drive more cars, eat more steaks? That will destroy the world. ~ Yuan T. Lee

Taxes are what we pay for civilized society, for modernity, and for prosperity. The wealthy pay more because they have benefitted more. Taxes, well laid and well spent, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, and promote the general welfare. Taxes protect property and the environment; taxes make business possible. Taxes pay for roads and schools and bridges and police and teachers. Taxes pay for doctors and nursing homes and medicine. During an emergency, like an earthquake or a hurricane, taxes pay for rescue workers, shelters, and services. For people whose lives are devastated by other kinds of disaster, like the disaster of poverty, taxes pay, even, for food. ~ Jill Lepore

It is a mistake always to contemplate the good and ignore the evil, because by making people neglectful it lets in disaster.
There is a dangerous optimism of ignorance and indifference. ~ Helen Keller

A tree 'fires' its leaves every autumn, and a mother bird 'fires' its babies from the nest in spring, right? Be alert to the need to call an end to a relationship within your business, and if it's your turn to fire, do it swiftly. ~ Andrea J. Lee

I know that I personally have felt quite happy because I've done what I wanted to do. I pursued my interests and have thus managed to combine my business with lots of fun. I guess my only advice is to do what you enjoy, and try to do your best with it. ~ Jim Henson

MEDIOCRITY IS A CHOICE... PROCRASTINATION IS A VIRUS THE FIRST ERROR IS INDECISION ~ Marsha Wright

The business of thinking ... undoes every morning what it had finished the night before. ~ Hannah Arendt

Art is fast, but with art you're tied down. That's too negative. What I mean is, you have a business and a place that you go every day. I guess some artists do move around. ~ Cory Arcangel

We may not be able to stop satan from doing his business, but we can scheme to make his business to yield a loss! All things ... I mean "all", "all things", "everything" is working for our good! ~ Israelmore Ayivor

She needs you, Dad," Julia says. "She has unfinished business in this world."
"What is the matter with you?" Charlie asks his daughter. "Any sane person would have told me to go to the doctor. I'm seeing a headless apparition every day. Maybe my medications are conflicting. You should see the list of side effects on this stuff. ~ Joey Comeau

Sometimes the nastiest shit happens behind the prettiest doors, while everyone laughs and smiles and pretends everything's okay. Here's the thing about my world. We're fucked up. We own it. We take care of business and move on. ~ Joanna Wylde

business is neither a burden to bear nor a battle to win, but a chance to outgrow fear by helping others outgrow theirs. This ~ Devdutt Pattanaik

I have always believed that personal relationships are vital in business and that people should be directly accountable for their actions. ~ Richard Branson

Bob Smith from Brooklyn is a guy who sometimes gets hung with problems and fears. Wolfman Jack is a happy-go-lucky guy who knows how to party. The challenge of my life has been letting more and more of Bob Smith go, becoming the Wolfman on an almost full-time basis, while still taking care of business. ~ Wolfman Jack

In Jason Fried's book Rework, he writes that one of the smartest investments a business can make is in hiring great writers, and I completely agree. No ~ Sophia Amoruso

Couture has copied my things for years, in addition to countless other costume designers, claiming theirs were the original ideas. It's all part of the business, unfortunately. ~ Edith Head

We are really competing against ourselves, we have no control over how other people perform. ~ Pete Cashmore