The EQ Journal Blog

Some Quotes from Prof Bruce and Fellow Travelers to Help Entrepreneurs Along their Way

1. “No one can really save their way to wealth but you can invest your way there,” Prof Bruce.
2. “Entrepreneurs would rather ask for forgiveness than beg for permission,” Anon.
3. “Fall down seven times, get up eight,” Japanese Proverb and part of the successful Entrepreneur’s Credo.
4. “Whether you believe you can, or whether you believe you can’t, you’re
absolutely right,” Henry Ford.
5. “Dump the losers and keep the winners,” Prof Bruce’s Dad, Professor O. J. Firestone.
6. “People like to buy from people they like and trust,” Prof Bruce.
7. “An entrepreneur is a person who can create $2 of revenue for every $1 that any fool could generate,” Prof Bruce.
8. “Every business has a ‘magic marketing button’—something you do and clients and revenues appear. If you don’t have one, your business will disappear,” Prof Bruce.
9. “If you can’t market your business in a cost effective manner—if it costs too much to acquire a customer, your enterprise is dead anyway,” Prof Bruce.
10. “If you bootstrap your business, you end up owing it instead of the VCs,” Prof Bruce.
11. “The optimal number of partners to have in a business—zero,” Prof Bruce.
12. “There are still two chairs in Heaven waiting for the first two partners to get there and still like each other,” Anon.
13. “It’s OK to trade your way to success as long as you know when to stop, build and hold—in other words, don’t flip until you flop,” Prof Bruce.
14. “The difference between being rich and being wealthy is that Shaq is rich but the man who signs Shaq’s paycheck is wealthy,” Chris Rock.
15. “Negative cost selling is a fancy way of saying: ‘I’ll pay you to hire me,’” Prof Bruce.
16. “ABC, Always be Closing,” Ben Affleck’s character in the Film, Boiler Room.
17. “The VCs Golden Rule: ‘He/she who has the gold, rules.’” Prof Bruce.
18. “Asymmetric information is another way of saying: ‘I know more than you do and so I can profit more than you from this transaction.’” Prof Bruce.
19. “If you’re not an expert in what you do, you’re a dilettante and just food for sharks,” Prof Bruce.
20. “Every successful business looks easier than yours … from the outside,” Prof Bruce.
21. “Guerilla Marketing is just another term for smart marketing,” Prof Bruce.
22. “Selling is telling,” Mark Gencher.
23. “Accretive selling happens when you buy an asset and you have more cash on hand after you buy it than before,” Prof Bruce.
24. “If you focus on getting real clients and customers and building cashflow, you’ll get financed today not the other way round,” Prof Bruce.
25. “Forget about all the studies on why businesses really fail. Have you ever heard of one that failed from having too many sales?” Prof Bruce.
26. “Guerrilla Marketing research happens when you fool people into thinking they are buying the real thing—then you really know if your product or service has any value in the marketplace,” Prof Bruce.
27. “The market is always right, even when it’s wrong,” Prof Bruce.
28. “You are not the market,” Prof Bruce.
29. Upon seeing his very first web page, Lou Gerstner, former CEO of IBM asked: “Where’s the ‘buy’ button?”.
30. “The harder you work, the luckier you get,” Anon.
31. “If you set, visualize, verbalize and monitor your goals, you will achieve them,” Prof Bruce.
32. “Under promise and over deliver,” Anon.
33. “Ideas are cheap, execution counts,” Prof Bruce.
34. “Deal with it,” Sigourney Weaver’s character, Ripley, in the film series, Aliens.
35. “Branding creates trust and trust creates the opportunity to actually make a sale,” Prof Bruce.
36. “If you see someone with a biz card that says: ‘VP of Marketing and Sales’, you’ve just met a person who doesn’t know what he/she is doing,” Prof Bruce.
37. “Buying low and selling high is actually quite hard to do—we are all subject to herd instincts—there is enormous, systemic pressure to sell whenever everyone else is selling and buy when everyone else is buying,” Prof Bruce.
38. “Be more afraid of ‘Fear of Success’ than ‘Fear of Failure’.” Prof Bruce.
39. “Surround yourself with positive people—at home and at work,” Prof Bruce.
40. “Entrepreneurship is an exercise in positivist thinking. If your partner or employees are negative, dump them,” Prof Bruce.
41. “Never tolerate people who make the same mistake over and over again,” Prof Bruce.
42. “… with product innovation, it’s a certainty that your competition is shortly going to copy what you have done. With business-model innovation, though, if you can come up with a unique way of doing things, it’s much tougher to react to,” Sam Palmisano, Chair of IBM.
43. “Success comes from, in part, just showing up. Business people can learn a lot from show biz folks—who know that the show must go on,” Prof Bruce.
44. “Never start a business with the idea that it is OK to lose money because it’s a tax write-off,” Prof Bruce.
45. “Track the amount and direction and velocity of cash—cash doesn’t lie/accounting statements sometimes do,” Prof Bruce.
46. “If you don’t learn to control your costs, you’re sunk. Costs always seek to rise until they exceed revenues,” Prof Bruce.
47. “Don’t forget to reverse sell—people you buy from should also buy from you,” Prof Bruce.
48. “Profit is not a dirty word—you make a profit not just to have a nicer car and a fancier home but also so you can sustain your enterprise, invest in it and in your employees too,” Prof Bruce.
49. “If you ever get into trouble, the first place to look for help is from your existing clients and customers as well as your suppliers—they want you to stick around,” Prof Bruce.
50. “Check, check, check… everything. There are no ‘fire and forget’ missiles in business,” Prof Bruce.
51. “Don’t take ‘no’ for an answer,” Prof Bruce’s Dad, Professor O. J. Firestone.
52. “Turn cost centres into profit centres or sell them,” Prof Bruce.
53. “You make money in real estate when you buy, not when you sell,” Barry Lett.
54. “If you are making a sales presentation and the client is saying ‘Yes’, stop, get the contract signed, thank them and leave. The only things that can happen after you hear a ‘Yes’ if you keep going are bad,” Prof Bruce.
55. “You are never too busy to return a sales call,” Prof Bruce.
56. “Entrepreneurship can be a lonely life. Just knowing that other entrepreneurs are experiencing the same thing, helps,” Prof Bruce.
57. “There should be a 3 am network for entrepreneurs—they are all up writing notes to themselves as ideas bubble up from their subconscious,” Prof Bruce.
58. “Get the business model right so that the harder you work, the more money you make,” Prof Bruce.
59. “Twitter has legs, I think, as long as you are answering the question: ‘What are you thinking?’ rather than ‘What are you doing?’” Prof Bruce.
60. “Gizmos or gadgets almost never underpin a sustainable business,” Prof Bruce.
61. “The best trades you make are often the ones you don’t make,” Glen Sather, former GM of the 1980s Edmonton Oilers.
62. “Successful entrepreneurs know they have to do many things in parallel,” Prof Bruce.
63. “Your priorities should be: 1. take of your business so 2. it takes care of your family and then 3. your family can take care of you,” Peter Patafie.
64. “You want to know the real cause of most divorces in Canada? It’s financial stress,” Peter Patafie.
65. “I’ll tell you a secret about competition in business—I like it,” Prof Bruce.
66. “Maybe the reason no one has ever done this before is that (your new business model) is a bad idea,” Prof Bruce.
67. “Maybe the reason that you don’t have any competition is your idea is a bad one. If it’s a good one, you will have competitors,” Prof Bruce.
68. “Remember that the world is a tough competitive place and entrenched business interests don’t want you to succeed,” Prof Bruce.
69. “Never fire people for making a mistake. Always fire them when they make the same mistake over and over again,” Prof Bruce.
70. “There are no rules in a knife fight,” Butch Cassidy.
71. “If you want your media relations to be successful then you better understand smart truth and spin,” Prof Bruce.
72. “Pricing is an art,” Prof Bruce.
73. “The three most important things in business to remember are: sell sell sell,” Prof Bruce.
74. “The three most important things in business to remember are: check check check everything,” Professor O. J. Firestone.
75. “Entrepreneurs know that they deal with ambiguous situations almost daily… and they can cope with that,” Prof Bruce
76. “Customer Service is not a cost centre,” Prof Bruce.
77. “The easiest, best and least expensive place to look for new clients is old clients,” Prof Bruce
78. “Your AP is a great place to look for new people you can sell to,” Prof Bruce.
79. “If you knew just three things: your Bank balance at the beginning and end of each month, your AP and your AR, you would know practically everything you need to know about your enterprise because you would know your cash position,” Prof Bruce.
80. “I pay everything COD because I hate owing anyone anything… plus when I look at my Bank balance at the end of the month, I know whatever is there is mine,” Jay Curry, owner of the Barley Mow chain of pubs.
81. “Cash is King,” Ken MacMillan, Prof Bruce’s father-in-law.
82. “Litigate only as a last resort and not even then,” Prof Bruce.
83. “When entering into a negotiation, know your BATNA so if the deal falls apart, you are prepared for your next step right away,” NLP. (BATNA: Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement. NLP: Neurolinguistic Programming.)
84. “If things go horribly wrong, I give you three days: one, to feel sorry for yourself, one, to get some exercise and clear your head and one more, to get on with your next startup,” Prof Bruce.
85. “Help your clients sell their products and services—find them customers and they will never forget you,” Prof Bruce.
86. “Turn selling into buying,” Trevor Wilkins.
87. “I am the world’s worst salesman, therefore, I must make it easy for people to buy,” Discount Retailer F. W. Woolworth.
88. “Always volunteer to write up the deal. He/she who holds the pen, wields the power,” Prof Bruce.
89. “Selling isn’t about taking advantage of people, it is about communicating and informing them,” Mark Cuban, Owner, Dallas Mavericks.
90. “Follow the fastest (least effort) route to revenue,” Sir Terence Matthews.
91. “Get close to your customer, early and often,” Sir Terence Matthews.
92. “Focus on your core competencies, outsource all the rest,” Prof Bruce.
93. “Bundle complementary services provided by others (even your competitors, it’s called co-opetition) into your business model: make money for nothing,” Prof Bruce.
94. “If you have a choice between using OPM or your own, I vote for OPM,” Prof Bruce.
95. “Understand that there is bad debt and good debt. Bad is unsecured and good is secured. The latter disappears when the underlying asset disappears, the former lives on long enough to ruin you,” Prof Bruce.
96. “Debt is usually cheaper than equity but bootstrap capital is almost always cheaper than both,” Prof Bruce
97. “The reason you build a brand is to build trust. The reason you want to build trust is to build sales which happens because, as it turns out, people want to buy from people they trust,” Prof Bruce.
98. “You trust your clients to pay you and they trust you to produce on time and on budget,” Prof Bruce.
99. “What’s more important in life: love or trust? It’s trust all the way. Think about it for a minute: what type of relationship would you have if you couldn’t trust your spouse?” Prof Bruce.
100. “Your suppliers trust you to pay them and you trust them to produce on time and on budget,” Prof Bruce.
101. ” The road to success is lined with many tempting parking spaces,” Robin Chahal.
102. “Do the little things right, and the big things will take care of themselves,” Prof Bruce.
103. “Try to do things right the first time and you will be amazed at how your productivity will jump,” Prof Bruce.
104. ” If you TPO (touch paper once), your personal productivity will double. Don’t procrastinate,” Joe Kowalski, Wilderness Tours.
105. “Never become an entrepreneur if the best you think you can do is produce the same value as if you took a JOB. With all the stress involved, stick with the JOB,” Prof Bruce.
106. “Get the Biz Model right so the harder you work, the more money you make,” Prof Bruce.
107. “Even Charities and Non-Profits need a biz model these days: people like to give money to efficient and effective organizations not those that burn up a ton of their money in admin and overhead,” Prof Bruce.
108. “We live in a cynical world and we work in a business of tough competitors,” Jerry Maguire.
109. “If your biz model is a good one, you will have competitors. If it’s a bad one, you won’t but so what, it’s a bad biz model,” Prof Bruce.
110. “Why do you think that petrol stations, hotels, restaurants, outdoor equipment suppliers, dress shops, home builders co-locate? Is it because they hate competition? No, it’s because they understand how to use co-opetition to their advantage and so should you,” Prof Bruce.
111. “Never drink and think,” Prof Bruce.
112. “The moral underpinnings of entrepreneurship and business are based on Adam Smith’s principal that your first duty to society is to ensure that you and your family do not become a burden on your fellow humans,” Prof Bruce.
113. “If your marketing plan says that all you need is a Super Bowl ad to get a launch client, you’re dead on arrival,” Prof Bruce.
114. “Don’t push on a string: there is no substitute for ’shoe leather’, face to face meetings and one-on-one phone calls to get your first launch clients,” Prof Bruce.
115. “Make sure you don’t fear success,” Prof Bruce.
116. “The best decisions you will ever make occur when your head, your heart and your gut all agree,” Prof Bruce.
117. “You cannot let fear stand in the way of realizing your dreams; if you do not believe a business will work for you – do not even bother pursuing it. At the end of the day, it is all about believing that you are the right person to launch the business and keep it running,” Kevin O’Leary.
118. “While there will always be projects and ventures that are best let go, perseverance, even in the face of adversity, tends to distinguish dreamers and managers from true entrepreneurs,” Rich Becker.
119. “Take advice from people who’ve done big things or what you’re hoping to do; don’t take advice from armchair executives or older people who just refer to ‘experience’ in vague terms,” Tim Ferris.
120. “Under promise and over deliver to your customers, investors, employees, and yourselves,” Guy Kawasaki.
121. “For startups, SM is now crucial: it has never been cheaper and easier to reach one’s customers. Entrepreneurs should thank God for Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace,” Guy Kawasaki.
122. “Don’t kid yourself. Entrepreneurship is an absolutely brutal lifestyle that will demand everything you think you’ve got to give and more,” Geoff Livingston.
123. “Think about the ultimate propose of your enterprise—at a minimum, don’t you think you should treat your clients at least as well as you would treat yourself?” Glenn Schmelzle.
124. “If your cash conversion cycle is negative (meaning you generate more cash with each sale you make), your enterprise will almost certainly be successful,” Prof Bruce.
125. “Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don’t recognize them,” Anon.
126. “Make a decision! The only thing you get by sitting on the fence is a sore backside,” Pierre Azzi.
127. “Probably the number one thing a good quality mentor can do for someone is to: a) give them confidence in themselves and b) reinforce and confirm for them that they are on the right track,” Prof Bruce.
128. “The right thing to do with dishonest, unreliable or incompetent people is to disassociate yourself from them, the sooner the better,” Prof Bruce.
129. “Once someone has shown you that they can’t be trusted, guess what? They can’t be trusted,” Prof Bruce.
130. “Your first business foray has to work. Otherwise, there won’t be a second,” Prof Bruce.
131. “One of the great things about getting older is that you develop a more accurate picture of the way the world works. It allows you to test your ideas against that model in what Einstein called ‘thought experiments’ which are fast and accurate. It will save you a lot of heartache and you won’t waste your time pursuing a bad idea ,” Prof Bruce.
132. “Make each day count,” Jack Dawson.
133. “When you meet a perfect person, you’ve just met a liar. So learn to forgive yourself when you make errors of omission,” Prof Bruce.
134. “When I was younger, I was told by a senior executive that it was OK if you got 51% right and 49% wrong. Bad advice. As an entrepreneur, you have to get nearly everything right,” Prof Bruce.
135. “There is no easy business, they only look easy,” Prof Bruce.
136. “If you meet someone who has a business card that says ‘VP, Marketing and Sales’, you’ve just met someone who doesn’t understand either marketing or sales,” Prof Bruce.
137. “Marketing builds a brand and a brand builds trust. Trust allows you to make sales through a separate sales process,” Prof Bruce.
138. “New enterprises are so delicately balanced between success and failure that you, as the Founder, have to be right almost all the time,” Prof Bruce.
139. “It isn’t possible to get to six sigma levels of quality (an error or defect rate of 1 – 99.99966%) in service businesses: there’s too much variability in the work flow. But you should try for three instead; basically, aim for one mistake in every 1,000 things you do,” Prof Bruce.
140. “People today crave authenticity in products and people; they can always tell if you’re a phony,” Prof Bruce.
141. “When trying to make a sale, when you hear ‘yes’ stop talking, get it signed and leave. The only things that can happen if you keep chatting are all bad,” Prof Bruce.
142. “Sometimes you don’t have all the answers. If you just shut up for a while, customers will often answer their own questions and you will get the order,” Prof Bruce.
143. “Failure is overrated,” Anon.
144. “In war there is no substitute for victory,” General Douglas MacArthur.
145. “Just win, Baby,” Al Davis.
146. “I never understood the concept of buying a business to lose money so you can take advantage of tax losses. What’s wrong with making a profit?” Prof Bruce.
147. “Be proud to pay your taxes in a great country like Canada,” Professor O.J. Firestone.
148. “Pay your taxes but don’t pay any more than you have to,” Professor O.J. Firestone.
149. “Winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing,” Vince Lombardi.
150. “You want to have a good meeting (just once per year) with your lender? Make a profit,” Prof Bruce.
151. “All people are entrepreneurs, but many don’t have the opportunity to find that out,” Muhammad Yunus.
152. “The greatest job security you can ever have comes from what you have between your ears not your current job description,” Prof Bruce.
153. “Entrepreneur-years are at least 2 for 1, so you, Bruce, are actually 98,” Prof Bruce’s Mom when he was 49.
154. “For the first time since a trading economy first appeared on this planet about 10,000 years ago, humans can create enterprises that, thanks to the Internet, can produce custom products and services from standard inputs,” Professor John Callahan.
155. “The Internet, circa 2010, is about where electrification was 20 years into that new era. Just imagine when the Internet is as old what will be possible,” Prof Bruce.
156. “I wish the Internet was where it is now when I was 20, Prof Bruce.
157. “When asked what was the most important invention during his many years at the largest industrial products company on earth (GE), Jack Welch said: ‘The Internet’,” Prof Bruce.
158. “Everything that can be invented has been invented,” Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.
159. “Not every business idea has to be the equivalent of E = mc**2 or Priceline.com’s novel idea of letting the customer name a price but, to be a successful entrepreneur, you have to at least bring some differentiated value and great execution to the table,” Prof Bruce.
160. “Great management and OK products will always beat great products and lousy management,” Prof Bruce.
161. “I always laugh when I hear that bad unions, crappy employees or lousy financing cause a business to fail. Have you ever heard of a business with mushrooming sales and buoyant revenues going out of business?” Prof Bruce.
162. “Feeling unproductive because you’re hung over, strung out or overweight. You’re never going to be a star if you can’t exert control over yourself: become an impeccable warrior,” Prof Bruce (with contribution from the books of Carlos Castaneda).
163. “Want to know what’s keeping you from success? Look in the mirror,” Prof Bruce.
164. Want to become more creative? Get some exercise, get some sleep, don’t drink or do drugs, eat properly, focus on the problem, let your subconscious work on it as well, be open to opportunity and see the world around you,” Prof Bruce.
165. “What’s the number one thing that helps people survive when lost in the wilderness? A knife? A book of matches? A mirror? A blanket? None of the above: it’s a positive attitude. Same thing in entrepreneurship,” Prof Bruce.
166. “Guerrilla marketing is all about substituting brains for money in the marketing wars,” Prof Bruce.
167. “‘Rules? In a knife fight?’ ‘There aren’t any rules,’” Harvey Logan and Butch Cassidy.
168. “Entrepreneurs would rather ask for forgiveness than beg for permission,” Anon.
169. “You should always tell the truth, the smart truth,” Scott McLean.
170. “If you can visualize it, you can achieve it,” Prof Bruce.
171. “Write a to do list each day; finish that list before you go home,” Prof Bruce.
172. “He/she who loses his/her temper first, loses,” Rod Bryden.
173. “Your IQ drops at least 10 points when you lose your temper,” Matthew Firestone.
174. “Want to be more successful? Learn to resist the Seven Deadly Sins,” Prof Bruce.
175. “You can close a lot of deals with a bit of humour applied in the right measure and at the right times,” Prof Bruce.
176. “Keep an ‘iron reserve’ so if everything else fails, you won’t starve,” O. J. Firestone.
177. “Develop a PB4L (Personal Business for Life), something you own, has no debt or partners and that you can fall back on if everything else fails,” Prof Bruce.
178. “Being a celebrity counts; being a celebrity with talent, counts for a lot more,” Prof Bruce.
179. “The most important decision you make as an entrepreneur other than the decision to actually start a business is who your first hire is. Hire up,” Prof Bruce.
180. “It’s not assets that produce income for a business, it’s the people,” Prof Bruce.
181. “If I gave an unqualified person the best located, best tenanted office building in Manhattan for free and with no mortgage on it, within seven years, he or she would be bankrupt as unhappy clients leave the premises and they can’t even pay their operating costs,” Prof Bruce.
182. “There is no substitute for talent. And when that person is also a good hearted sort, the type that doesn’t quit when the going gets tough, well, that is unbeatable,” Prof Bruce.
183. “I like to hire people from small towns: they understand what hard work is and are prepared to do it,” Prof Bruce.
184. “It takes at least 10,000 hours to master a craft, any craft,” Malcolm Gladwell.
185. “When 17-year old Alanis Morissette was an ‘overnight success’ with her first album, people forgot that she had been playing since she was six,” Prof Bruce.
186. “If you want to be successful, you have to pursue your goal with the same passion and intensity as you do when asking a girl for a first date,” Prof Bruce.
187. “If you want to be successful, you have to pursue your goal with the same passion and intensity as you do when protecting your baby,” Jennifer Clark.
188. “I am not the Founder of the Ottawa Senators. I’m the mother,” Prof Bruce.
189. “Most people want to be honest but it never hurts to verify,” Greg Graham.
190. “We are all subject to temptation: the little angel and the little devil often dance on our shoulders. But we should not criticize people because they have bad thoughts, only if they act on them,” Prof Bruce.
191. “If you don’t ask, you don’t get,” Mahatma Gandhi.
192. “Don’t be afraid to ask for the deal,” Prof Bruce.
193. “There are three answers you can get to any question: yes/no/maybe. A ‘yes’ is better than a ‘no’ but a ‘no’ is better than a maybe’. I tell my clients when I hear ‘maybe’ that I’ll take that as a ‘no’ and not waste any more of their time. They’ll often say: ‘Wait I didn’t mean to say no.’ Great, so say yes,” Prof Bruce.
194. “In North America, we want out leaders to be perfect but the only perfect people are those without experience and who never do anything, exactly the wrong sort to lead,” Prof Bruce.
195. “When you come to a fork in the road, take it,” Yogi Berra.
196. “Never panic,” Prof Bruce.
197. “Play to the whistle…and a little beyond,” Anon.
198. “An extra day for you is one less for your enemy,” Anon.
199. “The strongest force in finance, almost unstoppable, is compound interest: it can work for you or against,” Matt Nesrallah.
200. “You have one mouth and two ears, use them in that proportion,” Anon.
201. “Once a senior lawyer told me that he had raised our bill by 50% because the result was so good. But he didn’t forget, years later, to reduce another one when the results were poor,” Prof Bruce.
202. “Leave something on the table for the other guy: he’ll just come back and spend it with you later anyway,” Cyril Leeder.
203. “I never understood why people can be so greedy and think they have to take all the value from every deal. If there is no value for the other person, why would anyone, ever make a deal?” Prof Bruce.
204. “Buy more land then we need, put one of our cool projects in the middle, drive up the value of the surrounding land and then harvest that by selling the surplus land,” Cyril Leeder.
205. “Buy more land than we need, put a NHL team and a NHL arena in the middle of it, drive up the value of the surrounding land and then sell the surplus land to pay for the Team,” Prof Bruce.
206. “Collect early, pay late,” Anon.
207. “I always pay COD. That way I know that whatever is left in my account at the end of the month belongs to me,” Jason Curry.
208. “A successful entrepreneur is one who can synthesize conflicting signals and ideas using ‘fuzzy logic’ and isn’t bothered by ambiguity,” Prof Bruce.
209. “Never confuse politeness for weakness,” Prof Bruce.
210. “People who are taller in NA generally make more money because they have the ‘right look’. But don’t underestimate others who don’t,” Prof Bruce.
211. “Everyone has a secret dream. When you can align a person’s inner dream with the organization’s objectives, you have a powerful combination that can achieve great things,” Prof Bruce.
212. “A little self knowledge can take you a long way,” Prof Bruce.
213. “When something special happens, a shift occurs. These are called ‘future shaping days’. Recognize it,” Rod Bryden.
214. “If you build it, they will come,” misquote of Field of Dreams.
215. “The longest journey is the one where you never take the first step,” Prof Bruce.
216. “There are a lot of people who think they are entrepreneurs but when they get to the runway, they decline takeoff,” Prof Bruce.
217. “Entrepreneurs are a funny breed: they have great self confidence and at the same time they are consumed with self doubt,” Prof Bruce.
218. “Give a person a fishing rod not a fish,” Anon.
219. “Play the game,” Nepean High School Knights’ motto.
220. “Defy mediocrity,” Jennifer Clark.
221. “Sometimes you just have to do the cruddy stuff yourself,” Jennifer Clark.
222. “Follow your personal legend,” Paulo Coelho.
223. “The greatest gift you can give others is to show them what they can do for themselves,” Larry Bravar.
224. “You need to be able to recognize it when people who are working in your business ecosystem are turning in little tiny circles and not really getting anything done. It’s even better when you can see that in yourself and fix it,” Prof Bruce.
225. “You should make sure that your business model has links not only to your clients and suppliers but also to your clients’ clients and your suppliers’ suppliers. It’s only when you see your enterprise as part of an entire business ecosystem that you will have the opportunity to create a sustainable business,” Prof Bruce.
226. “Your business model is the engine of your enterprise,” Professor Tony Bailetti.
227. “Nothing is sustainable unless it’s economically sustainable too,” Professor John Callahan.
228. “Always tell the truth; it’s easier to remember than your lies,” Larry Bravar.
229. “Some men see things as they are and say, Why? I dream things that never were and say, Why not?” Bobby Kennedy.
230. “There are no bridges to burn where none have been built,” Sean Murray.
231. “Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction,” Albert Einstein.
232. “An engineer is someone who can do for a dollar what any fool could do for two,” Anon.
233. “An entrepreneur is someone who can create two dollars of revenue where any fool could find one,” Prof Bruce.
234. “The best possible machine has no moving parts,” Anon.
235. “KISS, Keep it simple,” Anon.
236. “If you can’t explain your business plan or your value proposition in two minutes or less, you’re not the expert you think you are,” Prof Bruce.
237. “Do you know how naturals get that way? They practice, practice, practice,” Prof Bruce.
238. “When selling don’t be afraid to name big numbers,” Mark McCormack.
239. “Remember that 80% of your business comes from 20% of your clients so don’t be afraid to fire a client,” Prof Bruce.
240. “It takes just as much effort to do a small deal as it does to do a big one, so do more big ones,” Prof Bruce.
241. “Never become an entrepreneur, with all the stress involved and effort required, if the best you can do is create the same value as if you just had a JOB,” Prof Bruce.
242. “Go big or go home,” Anon.
243. “If you’re going to be thinking anything, you might as well think big,” Donald Trump.
244. “Because it’s there,” George Mallory.
245. “We make insanely great products,” Steve Jobs.
246. “Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower,” Steve Jobs.
247. “Why join the navy if you can be a pirate?” Steve Jobs.
248. “Business, that’s easily defined – it’s other people’s money,” Peter Drucker.
249. “Provide WOW service,” Tony Hsieh.
250. “Customer service is a core competency,” Prof Bruce.
251. “Each customer represents more than the value of just one transaction: he or she should be treated as a potential source of a lifetime of revenue and…of referrals,” Prof Bruce.
252. “Obsess over customers,” Jeff Bezos.
253. “Invent on behalf of customers and clients,” Jeff Bezos.
254. “Think long term (in the order of five to seven years: as long as a new initiative benefits customers, it’s OK if the payoff is somewhat down the road for your enterprise),” Jeff Bezos.
255. “Develop a unique corporate culture,” Jeff Bezos.
256. “If something goes catastrophically wrong with your business, I give you three days. The first to feel sorry for yourself; the second is a day off and the third? Get on with the rest of your life,” Prof Bruce.
257. “As an intrapreneur take the initiative: make 90% of the decisions on your own and get input and direction for the other 10%. But be sure to know which questions go into the 10% and which belong in the 90%,” Prof Bruce.
258. “Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things,” Peter Drucker.
259. “If you need heroic efforts to find customers and clients, your business is doomed,” Prof Bruce.
260. “Rank does not confer privilege or give power. It imposes responsibility,” Peter Drucker.
261. “As you enter every negotiation, determine your BATNA (Best Alternative to a Negotiated Agreement). That way, you’ll be OK if no deal happens,” NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming).
262. “Trying to predict the future is like trying to drive down a country road at night with no lights while looking out the back window,” Peter Drucker.
263. “Be sure you put your feet in the right place, then stand firm,” Abraham Lincoln.
264. “Be kind whenever possible. It is always possible,” Dalai Lama.
265. “All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence,” Martin Luther King, Jr.
266. “I like the dreams of the future better than the history of the past,” Thomas Jefferson.
267. “There are no great limits to growth because there are no limits of human intelligence, imagination, and wonder,” Ronald Reagan.
268. “Property is surely a right of mankind as real as liberty,” John Adams.
269. “If you can’t convince a potential client that their either their costs will decrease or their revenues will increase (or some combination of both will happen) when they buy your product or service, you have failed to understand either your customer’s business or, worse, your own and you deserve to fail. Negative cost selling (’I'll pay you to hire me.’) is the most powerful sales technique around today,” Prof Bruce (with input from students).
270. “The number one source of bootstrap capital on this planet is home equity, so buy a home,” Prof Bruce.
271. “Human rights and property rights are connected. If you want to make someone powerless, make them homeless first,” Prof Bruce.
272. “Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future,” John F. Kennedy.
272. “I am extraordinarily patient, provided I get my own way in the end,” Margaret Thatcher.
273. “If you want something done, ask a busy person,” Anon.
274. “There can be no liberty unless there is economic liberty,” Margaret Thatcher.
275. “Politics, economics and media at the highest levels form an identity in practically every nation; you can’t tell the humans from the pigs,” Dawn MacMillan.
276. “There is an economic trough from which big corporations all feed and, guess what? They don’t want to share it with your startup,” Prof Bruce.
277. “Cowards die many times before their actual deaths,” Julius Caesar.
278. “Men in general are quick to believe that which they wish to be true,” Julius Caesar.
279. “You were not born a winner, and you were not born a loser. You are what you make yourself be,” Lou Holtz.
280. “The steeper the mountain the harder the climb the better the view from the finishing line,” Anon.
281. “Before you say anything ask yourself three things: is it an improvement on silence, will it hurt anyone, will it help anyone?” Yoga saying.
282. “If you want to keep a secret, don’t tell anyone anything,” Prof Bruce.
283. “He can talk the talk but can he walk the walk?” Full Metal Jacket.
284. “Many people know the path. Few walk it,” Morpheus From The Matrix.
285. “Be the change you want to see,” Gandhi.
286. “The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging,” Warren Buffett.
287. “If you’re lucky enough to do well, it is your responsibility to send the elevator back down,” Kevin Spacey.
288. “You have to be first, different or great. If you’re one of them, you just might make it,” Loretta Lynn.
289. “Always look on the bright side of life,” Monty Python.
290. “You can’t fail if you don’t give up,” Jennifer Clark.
291. “The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your riches but to reveal to him his own,” Benjamin Disraeli.
292. “Whoso would be a man, would be a non-conformist,” Ralph Waldo Emerson.
293. “No guts, no glory,” or “Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” Anon.
294. “I never perfected an invention that I did not think about in terms of the service it might give others. I find out what the world needs, then I proceed to invent,” Thomas Edison.
295. “The best trades you do are the ones you don’t make,” Glen Sather.
296. “Know when to held ‘em, know when to fold ‘em,” Kenny Rogers.
297. “Experience taught me a few things. One is to listen to your gut, no matter how good something sounds on paper. The second is that you’re generally better off sticking with what you know. And the third is that sometimes your best investments are the ones you don’t make,” Donald Trump.
298. “A professional is a person who gets up to practice the day after the greatest game of their lives,” Steve Nash.
299. “Early to bed, early to rise, work like h__l and advertise,” Ted Turner.
300. “Want to be more successful and have people respect you more? Then raise expectations of yourself first,” Dawn MacMillan.
301. “Be a finisher,” Prof Bruce.
302. “Make sure you bring home the bacon,” Randy Sexton.
303. “Never submit a matter to the courts since reasonable parties can always adjudge matters better for themselves,” Rod Bryden.
304. “Don’t be afraid to name a price first,” Prof Bruce.
305. “I would rather do ten good deals than two perfect ones,” Prof Bruce.
306. “Example is not the main thing in influencing other people; it’s the only thing,” Abraham Lincoln.
307. “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambitions. Small people always do that, but the really great make you feel that you, too, can become great,” Mark Twain.
308. “Let 99 deals go as they cross your path but when the right one appears, strike,” Professor OJ Firestone.
309. “Humans can not live without hope,” Prof Bruce.
310. “Set very high goals, and then be willing to take unexpected pathways to get there,” Mark Pincus.
311. “Chase the vision, not the money,” Tony Hsieh.
312. “A lot of the best stuff that we’ve done is tried not to take all the advice from other people,” Mark Zuckerberg.
313. “The function of entrepreneurs is to reform or revolutionize the pattern of production… by exploiting an invention or, more generally, an untried technological possibility for producing a new commodity or producing an old one in a new way, by opening up a new source of supply of materials or a new outlet for products, by reorganizing an industry…” Joseph Schumpeter.
314. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work,” Thomas Edison.
315. “The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary,” Vidal Sassoon.
316. “Once you say you’re going to settle for second, that’s what happens to you in life,” John F. Kennedy.
317. “Never say: ‘I’ll try.’ That is the language of losers,” Prof Bruce.
318. “Set goals but don’t over plan. Remember that the moment you come into contact with your market, everything changes,” Prof Bruce.
319. “Work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion,” Cyril Northcote Parkinson (Parkinson’s Law).
320. “Impose deadlines on everyone, including yourself,” Prof Bruce.
321. “In a hierarchy, every employee tends to rise to their level of incompetence,” Laurence J. Peter and Raymond Hull (Peter Principle).
322. “The hurrier I go, the behinder I get,” Lewis Carroll.
323. “One of the greatest compliments you could ever be paid would be to have it said about you that you are like Atticus Finch, ‘the same person in the privacy of your own home as you are in the street,’” Prof Bruce.
324. “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind,” Dr. Seuss.
325. “There is nothing we are sure is infinite, not even the Universe, except ideas,” Prof Bruce.
326. “Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent,” Eleanor Roosevelt.
327. “Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, but expecting different results,” Rita Mae Brown.
328. “You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough,” Mae West.
329. “Let Death be your advisor,” Carlos Castaneda.
330. “If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything,” Mark Twain.
331. “Be yourself; everyone else is already taken,” Oscar Wilde.
332. “Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans,” John Lennon.
333. “If you don’t stand for something you will fall for anything,” Malcolm X.
334. “Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect,” Mark Twain.
335. “That which does not kill us makes us stronger,” Friedrich Nietzsche.
336. “If it is important, remember it,” Prof Bruce.
337. “To do great things, you need peace at home,” Prof Bruce.
338. “Close your eyes and imagine Mars, the Red Planet. There, you just proved that some things are faster than light,” Prof Bruce.
339. “There should be a 3 am network for entrepreneurs. They are all up anyway furiously scribbling notes from their subconscious,” Prof Bruce.
340. “Entrepreneurship by its very nature is a lonely life,” Prof Bruce.
341. “Successful people are held to a higher standard of behaviour; get used to it,” Prof Bruce.
342. “The question isn’t who is going to let me; it’s who is going to stop me,” Ayn Rand.
343. “When something great happens to a friend, rejoice as if it happened to you,” Prof Bruce.
344. “Never do anything to harm your own interests,” Prof Bruce.
345. “You can not right a wrong by committing a ‘crime’ yourself,” Prof Bruce.
346. “The first million words are the toughest,” Max Neutze, PhD Supervisor.
347. “A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty,” Winston Churchill.
348. “Do one thing everyday that scares you,” Eleanor Roosevelt.
349. “Great invention is obvious…after the fact,” Prof Bruce.
350. “Patents are worth what you are willing to pay to defend them,” Patent Lawyer.
351. “The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity,” Dorothy Parker.
352. “How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world,” Anne Frank.
353. “Never be afraid to admit you don’t know the answer or to ask for it,” Prof Bruce.
354. “You can never be overdressed or overeducated,” Oscar Wilde.
355. “It’s actions, not words, that matter,” Nicholas Sparks.
356. “And, when you want something, all the universe conspires in helping you to achieve it,” Paulo Coelho.
357. “Have you ever noticed that when you learn a word for the first time, you hear it everywhere in the next few weeks? Same thing with new ideas,” Prof Bruce.
358. “The first time someone shows you who they are, believe them,” Maya Angelou.
359. “It never hurts to be charming but hard work and smarts help too,” Prof Bruce.
360. “The more you look, the more it isn’t there,” Winnie the Pooh.
361. “In the Internet age, more pie for me does not mean less for you,” Prof Bruce.
362. “And I think to myself, what a wonderful world,” Louis Armstrong.
363. “There are the Three Laws of Thermodynamics, Newton’s Laws of Motion, Faraday’s Law of Induction but there is no Law of Fairness,” Prof Bruce.
364. “We’re looking for people with vision, decisiveness, attention to detail, refusal to accept defeat and situational awareness,” Robert Thirsk.
365. “I’d rather die from an unavoidable accident than from my failure to properly perform my duties,” Robert Thirsk.
366. “The best way to predict the future is to invent it,” Alan Kay.
367. “You trust me to pay you and I trust you to work,” Prof Bruce.
368. “If you knew how hard it was going to be to start your business, how long it was going to take to become successful and how much it was going to cost in cash and personal hardship, no one would ever begin,” Prof Bruce.
369. “Sir Terence Matthews once told me it takes 7 to 12 years to build a great business. If it takes Terry that long, it’s probably going to take you and me longer,” Prof Bruce.
370. “It’s OK to bankrupt a company if you are left with no other choice but never accept personal bankruptcy,” Prof Bruce.
371. “Protect your credit score as if it were one of your prized assets. Turns out, it is,” Prof Bruce.
372. “Litigation to collect your receivables is your last choice and, even then, don’t,” Prof Bruce.
373. “Whenever a Tenant got into trouble, rather than sue them or distrain, we worked with them. We saved about half,” Prof Bruce.
374. “Litigation is a soul destroying, value destroying, negative holocaust that can eat your life. Just ask Tom Wolfe,” Prof Bruce.
375. “Politicians don’t really understand the purpose of bankruptcy laws: it’s to give entrepreneurs a chance to start again not to punish them. What if the punishment for failure wasn’t bankruptcy, but hanging instead? Wouldn’t have many startups, would we?” Prof Bruce.
376. “If you ain’t first, you’re last,” Ricky Bobby.
377. “Creditor proofing is not about hiding money in off shore accounts. It’s about doing some prudent things like putting the matrimonial home in the name of the spouse with the lower risk profile so that your family won’t be homeless if the business fails,” Prof Bruce.
378. “I think that business modeling just might be the Rosetta Stone which leads to unraveling the DNA of what actually makes a business successful,” Prof Bruce
379. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” Jesus of Nazareth.
380. “The day you decide to delegate the crucial aspects of your business like marketing, sales and collecting receivables is the day you should retire and let someone else take over,” Prof Bruce.
381. “If as CEO the best strategy you can come up with is to sell the company or buy back your company’s stock from shareholders, it’s time to retire and let someone with more imagination take over,” Prof Bruce.
382. “Sometimes help comes at the best possible time from the least expected source,” Prof Bruce.
383. “The media used to follow the principle that they would not publish anything without confirmation by two independent sources. Now they follow: comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable,” Prof Bruce.
384. “There is no news anymore; it’s all infotainment,” Prof Bruce.
385. “The best media profile to have is…none,” Prof Bruce.
386. “The more important you are, the smaller the sign on your front door,” Prof Bruce.
387. “First the media build you up followed by an inevitable tearing down,” Prof Bruce.
388. “You can never be a hero…in your own home town,” Prof Bruce.
389. “Never name a company after yourself; you might as well paint a bullseye on your back,” Prof Bruce.
390. “If everything is urgent, nothing is,” Anon.
391. “When someone tells you something in confidence, keep it,” Prof Bruce.
392. “Our continuing mission…to boldly go where no one has before,” Jean Luc Picard.
393. “You don’t think you have any enemies? Think again,” Prof Bruce.
394. “If you think you can con a con artist, you’re the greater fool,” Prof Bruce.
395. “If you are an asset flipper, you are going to flip til you flop,” Prof Bruce.
396. “It’s hard to capture lightning in a bottle twice. So build and hold,” Prof Bruce.
397. “You benefit financially from owning your own business by paying yourself wages, receiving dividends, having a company car, what have you. But owners often forget who actually owns the retained earnings in their business? Why they do,” Prof Bruce.
398. “You start out life with a certain storehouse of luck but you use it up over time so you need to be more careful later on,” Prof Bruce.
399. “When you’re 20, your personal discount rate is about 22% p.a. and when you’re 60 it’s about 4.5%. If it isn’t, you have mucked up your financial life,” Prof Bruce.
400. “It’s OK to be an asset flipper early in your professional life: how else are you going to get your grub stake?” Prof Bruce.
401. “I have to laugh when an entrepreneur asks his or her Bank for a loan. The Banker inevitably asks for collateral. ‘Well, I have my student loan.’” Prof Bruce.
402. “Every entrepreneur needs a PBS, Personal Balance Sheet, to keep track of things. And they inevitably forget to add the value of their new startup even if it is only a notional amount,” Prof Bruce.
403. “A better way to manage business affairs than a LLC has yet to be found; they don’t die, their governance is well understood, double entry bookkeeping works, ownership rules are straightforward and, today, you can self-incorporate for about $250,” Prof Bruce.
404. “There is always one fool who’ll buy your product, maybe two but probably not three. So aim for at least three launch clients,” Prof Bruce.
405. “The top dozen sources of capital for self-capitalized businesses are: 1. home equity loans, 2. trade credit (supplier credit), 3. future customers and clients, 4. soft loans from friends and family, 5. partners, 6. consulting, 7. seller financing, 8. trading (asset flipping and speculating), 9. credit cards, 10. sponsors, 11. savings and 12. sweat equity,” Prof Bruce.
406. “Most Canadians if you offered them a JOB making $60k, paid every two weeks versus a JOB that would pay them $90k or more but the pay was contingent on performance, would take the $60k,” Prof Bruce.
407. “When I left a job where I was making minimum wage for one where I could make three times as much in half the hours, my Mom and my Grandmother tried to talk me out of it because the new job was a commission position,” Matthew Firestone.
408. “Female headed businesses tend to have higher survival rates. Why? Because they pay more attention to detail, are not afraid to get in the trenches and actually do some work and have more realistic goals. The guys all want to be the next Google. There is only one Google,” Prof Bruce.
409. “I think being on-call 100% of the time is a drag. Most of us are not paramedics or firefighters so how about some time off?” Prof Bruce.
410. “The most valuable commodity you own is your reputation, so protect it,” Kent Plumley.
411. “Scratch the surface and most people are motivated by two primal emotions: greed and fear,” Prof Bruce.
412. “Jane Jacobs said that all human progress came from the formation of villages, towns and cities. Why? Because people living in close proximity can learn from each other and trade based on Ricardo’s law of comparative advantage,” Prof Bruce.
413. “Design can contribute as much as 94% of the value of a product. So how come so many artists are poor?” Prof Bruce.
414. “Artists, designers, architects, novelists, poets, musicians and other creative people should learn more about business so death isn’t a career move for them,” Prof Bruce.
415. “Entrepreneurs often feel that if their competition is offering the product at $10 they have to offer it for $1. What’s wrong with $9.95?” Prof Bruce.
416. “Sometimes when you put your prices up, volume goes up not down. That’s because higher prices are associated with higher quality,” Prof Bruce.
417. “A kid came up to me and asked me if I could get him a bike. Sure, I said, I have one for $100. Naw, I was looking for one that’s around $200. Hmm, I said, I have one of those too,” Young Entrepreneur.
418. “Don’t fool yourself, tough zoning codes aren’t there just to protect your property values. They are the greatest single boon to the bottom line of large, established developers who know how to get around those Byzantine rules and bureaucracy and they keep out entrepreneurs who might otherwise change the game,” Prof Bruce.
419. “Politicians love money and power and, come to think of it, the two are interchangeable,” Prof Bruce.
420. “Want to get your municipal project approved? Then remember local councillors can count. If more heads in Council Chambers are nodding ‘yes’, you win and vice versa,” Prof Bruce.
421. “A hotel I know kept cutting prices during the last recession but bookings went down. They cut some more and bookings went down some more. Turns out, their pricing was sending a signal that the hotel was a scary, unsafe place to stay. Then they raised prices and, sure enough, volume went up,” Prof Bruce.
422. “Canadian values of peace, order and good government are a prerequisite to building any sort of private value; you can’t develop any type of sustainable enterprise in their absence,” Prof Bruce.
423. “Who do you think creates better business models: undergrads from Engineering & Commerce or grad students from there? Hands down, it’s the undergrads, don’t ask me why?” Prof Bruce.
424. “What does Toronto have that Ottawa doesn’t?” Prof Bruce to himself on what to do next (before founding the Ottawa Senators).
425. “Now, John, you give those boys from Ottawa a chance,” Frank Finnegan to John Ziegler then President of the NHL.
426. “You will never, ever get a (NHL) franchise for Ottawa,” NHL Board of Governor Member to Prof Bruce the night before one is awarded.
427. “A park is not an environmental issue: there is no wildlife there,” Prof Bruce.
428. “Natural systems work a lot better than mechanical ones. Your heart will beat > 2.3 billion times. Try that with a water pump,” Prof Bruce.
429. “If we really wanted to solve environmental issues on this planet, within 450 years, we could return earth population to 1.2 billion (about what it was in 1850) plus make 85% of the land mass and 95% of the oceans completely off limits to humans,” Prof Bruce.
430. “Nimby’ites are wrong. Adding density and mixed uses to an existing urban area will increase property values, in the absence of an increase in street crime, otherwise Ottawa would have the same rents as Manhattan and Tokyo,” Prof Bruce.
431. “Did you notice how Tom Hank’s character in Castaway started to make better decisions after he had a trusted advisor to verbalize his thoughts to even if it was a volleyball named ‘Wilson’,” Prof Bruce.
432. “Modern society treats young people as if they were children way too long. How would you like to be 17 and still need a Hall Pass to go to the washroom?” Prof Bruce.
433. “For many adults, the best time of their lives was High School or College. After that, it’s all downhill. How sad. But why is that? It’s because they want to long to belong to something greater than themselves,” Prof Bruce.
434. “Architects have left the field of urban planning to urban planners and the result is that the built form of our cities is worse, much worse than what we were capable of building circa 1930,” Prof Bruce.
435. “Repeat after me, ‘the Internet changes everything’,” Prof Bruce.
436. “Newspapers, in the Age of the Internet, forgot a hoary old chestnut: ‘If you can’t beat ‘em, join’em,’ and they’re finished as a result,” Prof Bruce.
437. “I tried to convince the home building industry in the year 2000 to reverse out the work of ‘building’ homes online to their customers: let them pick their lot, their model, their finishes, everything and to see prices for all of it. No one would do it because that info was ‘proprietary’ and they didn’t want their competitors to know it. Guess what, they already do. Ever hear of secret shoppers?” Prof Bruce.
438. “If you build something that is so complex that no one person, no one controlling mind can run it, you are courting a catastrophe,” Prof Bruce.
439. “If they could get a washing machine to fly, my Jimmy could land it,” Jim Lovell’s Mom, Blanche.
440. “Failure is not an option,” Gene Kranz.
441. “Let’s not make things worse by guessing,” Gene Kranz.
442. “I don’t care about what anything was DESIGNED to do, I care about what it CAN do,” Gene Kranz.
443. “When we were trying to bring back the Ottawa Senators, we did some market research that suggested we could sell 100,000 season tickets when the actual number turned out to be more like 10,000. That’s because a market starved for NHL hockey will say they will pay ‘anything’ for it, as long as the question is hypothetical,” Prof Bruce.
444. “The only way to do market research is to do guerrilla market research: where people think they are actually making a real buying decision,” Prof Bruce.
445. “Guerrilla marketing and guerrilla marketing research almost always take you into a grey area where your ethics are tested. Make sure you come out with your reputation in tact, otherwise you’ll find out what reverse marketing is,” Prof Bruce.
446. “Reverse marketing happens when an organization’s planned marketing campaign results in negative consequences for their brand. The reason a brand is important is, in part, that it creates trust in that organization, which, in a for-profit business, results in higher sales. Reverse marketing works in the opposite direction,” Prof Bruce.
447. “A client when buying your product or service can experience a negative cost if the benefits from using your product or service are greater than its cost. A negative cost can also result from a reduction in their costs from the use of your product or service that is greater than the cost of buying the product or service from you or it may result from some combination of higher benefits and lower costs,” Prof Bruce.
448. “There is truth and smart truth. In a media-saturated world where each word is parsed by many looking for scandal, it is more important than ever to tell the smart truth. Lawyers, especially criminal law lawyers, understand the difference,” Prof Bruce.
449. “CEOs triangulate on employees and other sources of information to be sure that they are getting accurate information which is mission critical to any enterprise’s longevity and sustainability. CEOs know that direct reports often tell them what they think the CEO wants to hear instead of the unvarnished truth. That is a reason why many CEOs like to speak directly to customers and suppliers—they disintermediate everyone else,” Prof Bruce.
450. “Bootstrap capital, also known as self-capitalization, is how most start-ups actually capitalize themselves. It allows the Founders to keep control of their own enterprises and not lose it to VCs and other debt or equity holders,” Prof Bruce.
451. “VCs should put capital into more mature businesses leaving startups to fend for themselves. New businesses that have real customers and real cashflow are hardier, more sustainable enterprises and, if and when they do accept VC funding, it’s a much more even playing field,” Prof Bruce.
452. “You know the song ‘money for nothing’? Well that’s what happens when you bundle in other people’s products and services into your own offering with a markup,” Prof Bruce.
453. “If you can not acquire customers and clients in a cost-effective manner, your company is doomed so spend enough time developing effective sales and distribution channels,” Prof Bruce.
454. “When you can’t take it anymore and you feel that it’s time to delegate crucial tasks like sales and finance, it’s actually time to resign and let someone else take over,” Prof Bruce.
455. “Three rules of work: out of clutter find simplicity; from discord find harmony; in the middle of difficulty lies opportunity,” Albert Einstein.
456. “A lifestyle business is an enterprise that provides its Founders/Owners with an adequate personal lifestyle but that is all. In other words, it does not represent a game changing, large-scale opportunity that others such as Venture Capital funds can or would participate in—there just isn’t a large enough market, growth is too low or their market share is too small,” Prof Bruce.
457. “A prime consideration for every enterprise, even not-for-profits and charities, is what their sales or distribution channels are or will be. These are channels that you sell into and can take years to develop,” Prof Bruce.
458. “If all economists were laid end to end, they would not reach a conclusion,” George Bernard Shaw.
459. “Economists have accurately predicted nine out of the past five recessions,” paraphrasing a quip by Nobel economist Paul Samuelson about the stock market.
460. “If you are feeling frustrated by a lack of precision from economists, you can curse the profession by exclaiming: ‘Frigonomics’,” Prof Bruce.
461. “…how can man control his own affairs when he is not only incapable of compiling a plan for some laughably short term, such as, say, a thousand years, but cannot even predict what will happen to him tomorrow?” the Devil.
462. “If you help enough people get what they want, you can everything you want,” Zig Ziglar.
463. “Don’t waste your time doing deals where you trade four quarters for a buck,” Anon.
464. “Put me anywhere on God’s Green Earth, and I’ll triple my worth,” Sean Carter.
465. “Where there is hope, there’s a way,” Prof Bruce.
466. “There are always alternatives,” Mr. Spock.

366. “All that we are is the result of what we have thought,” Buddha.
367. “Do or do not… there is no try,” Yoda.
368. “You can stand me up at the gates of hell but I won’t back down. No I won’t back down,” Tom Petty.
369. “Once you become an entrepreneur, it’s almost impossible to become an employee again—it’s a one-way journey,” Prof Bruce.
370. “Almost everything humans do is ultimately an act of faith despite all the analysis and debate,” Prof Bruce.

Hope this was helpful,

Prof Bruce