Your customers can tell you the things that are broken and how they want to be made happy. Listen to them. Make them happy. But don't rely on them to create the future road map for your product or service. That's your job.
Interpretation
Engage with customers to understand their needs but take responsibility for innovation yourself.
This quote emphasizes the importance of listening to customer feedback to identify issues and improve satisfaction. However, it draws a clear line by stating that while customers can inform you of their desires and problems, the overall vision and strategic direction for a product or service should come from the business itself.
In practice
During a company meeting, to emphasize the importance of customer feedback.
If the pitch starts with a sob story, I'm out. If the pitch talks about personal issues, I'm out. If the pitch starts off with how big the market opportunity is, I'm out. If the pitch tells me what is unique about the product, how it can make a profit, and it's an area where I have expertise, I will read on.
Leaders don't look backwards to condemn what has already been done; they look forward to create a better future.
It doesn't matter how many times you fail. You only have to be right once and then everyone can tell you that you are an overnight success.
I think you’ve got to be very, very careful when you start making blanket statements about what people say and think, as opposed to what they do. It’s a very, very slippery slope.
Creating a close connection to those you do business with has its many risks, rewards and consequences._x000D_ _x000D_ There are few things in business I have encountered that are more difficult than firing someone, particularly if that someone has always been, or has become a friend._x000D_ _x000D_ On the flip side, I have been rewarded with many friends.
I'm always afraid of failing. It's great motivation to work harder.
Companies, in fact, are specifically organized to under-invest in disruptive innovations! This is one reason why we often suggest that companies set up separate teams or groups to commercialize disruptive innovations. When disruptive innovations have to fight with other innovations for resources, they tend to lose out.
The extravagance of any corporate office is directly proportional to management's reluctance to reward the shareholders.
An important priority for me is a business must get their own house in order. Be or become an agent of positive change in your own enterprise and adopt responsible practices to eliminate the risks that often lie at the root of inequality and poverty.
No enterprise can exist for itself alone. It ministers to some great need, it performs some great service, not for itself, but for others; or failing therein, it ceases to be profitable and ceases to exist.
Money goes out first to pay expenses and then comes back as profits later - if at all. The high rate of failure of new businesses makes painfully clear that there is nothing inevitable about the money coming back.
In the vast majority of businesses, there is simply no such thing as “the best.”
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