Corporate Social Responsibility

There is one and only one social responsibility of business-to use its resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud. - Milton Friedman

  You may choose to be generous, but it is not your responsibility.

Progress Profit

Progress depends on people knowing they'll be able to profit from their ideas. - Deborah Neville


That's why socialist and communist countries make no progress.

Wasted Gifts

Billions are wasted on ineffective philanthropy. Philanthropy is decades behind business in applying rigorous thinking to the use of money. - Michael Porter

Is this because the profit motive is abandoned? I think so; but how come?

Doing Things Differently

If all you're trying to do is essentially the same thing as your rivals, then it's unlikely that you'll be very successful. - Michael Porter

What do your customers need that your competitors don't provide?

Incremental Change

Little changes cost you. Big changes benefit you by changing the game. - Seth Godin

Incremental change will cost you each time.

A Horse Race is Not a Market

The difference between playing the stock market and the horses is that one of the horses must win. - Joey Adams

More correctly put: all but one of the horses must loose. That is the difference between investing and gambling.

Karl's Mom

If Karl, instead of writing a lot about capital, had made a lot of it, it would have been much better. - Karl Marx's Mother

Better, not for just him and his mom, but for millions of people.

Stressful Game

It is how people respond to stress that determines whether they will profit from misfortune or be miserable. - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

You've got to have some stress now and then to stay in shape for the big game.

Remarkable Value

As you sit down to consider ways to be more remarkable, the challenge is to be worth talking about... at the same time you are adding value for the person who's talking about you. - Seth Godin

When your business is both remarkable and valuable you have the winning combination.

Changing Your Model

The best time to change your business model is while you still have momentum. - Seth Godin



The worst time is when you have to.

Complexity Made Simple (or vice versa)

A wonderful discovery - psychoanalysis. Makes quite simple people feel they're complex. - S. N. Behrman

You have a choice; make your service appear so complex only you can perform it; or, make the solution to the seeming complex simple. One way might make you more money but the other might be more rewarding.

The Best is Best

(Selling) average stuff for average people is no way to make a living. - Seth Godin

If you want to increase your profit margin then sell the best to the best.

The Battle for Profit

Too many people think only of their own profit. But business opportunity seldom knocks on the door of self-centered people. No customer ever goes to a store merely to please the storekeeper. - Kazuo Inamori

The desire for profit should walk hand-in-hand with the desire to do something of value, not lead the charge.

Profitable Ideas

Progress depends on people knowing they'll be able to profit from their ideas. - Deborah Neville



If you want your business to progress don't ever fail to reward good ideas. To forget even once can cause your people to doubt whether there will be personal profit from their good work. The same holds true at home.

Profitable Failure

View the knowledge from something that failed as the profit from that effort. - John L Herman



We all know about learning from out mistakes but to view that knowledge as "profit" might make you more adventurous.

Being a Needle

When you are a needle, and you want to get the word out, don't start by jumping into haystacks. – Robert May (posts at businesspundit.com)



This one really got me to thinking about selling (a product or even yourself). When we wrote our book on trail riding we sold a lot more books in feed stores than we did in bookstores. In a bookstore we were a needle in a haystack. In a feed store we were a spear. We all start out as needles. You can jump into a haystack if you want but you had better work to make yourself into a pitchfork.

Stockholders

An excellent monument might be erected to the Unknown Stockholder. It might take the form of a solid stone ark of faith apparently floating on a pool of water. – Felix Riesenberg



If I ever make enough money in the market I will commission the work!

Leadership

When two men ride of a horse, one must ride behind. - Shakespeare

The rider in front steers. The one behind is along for the ride. Choose your place.

I would rather sit on a pumpkin and have it all to myself, than to be crowded on a velvet cushion. – Henry David Thoreau
This may be the refrain of the sole proprietor

The substance of the eminent Socialist gentleman’s speech is that making a profit is a sin, but it is my belief that the real sin is taking a loss. – Winston Churchill

It would have been nice if he had included something like “unless the loss was caused by your adherence to honesty.” Dishonest profit is worse than a sin.