“Stressing output is the key to improving productivity, while looking to increase activity can result in just the opposite.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“The absolute truth is that if you don’t know what you want, you won’t get it”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Remember too that your time is your one finite resource, and when you say yes to one thing you are inevitably saying no to another.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Here I’d like to introduce the concept of leverage, which is the output generated by a specific type of work activity. An activity with high leverage will generate a high level of output; an activity with low leverage, a low level of output.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“I couldn’t afford luxuries like embarrassment.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“If you’re wrong, you will die. But most companies don’t die because they are wrong; most die because they don’t commit themselves. They fritter away their momentum and their valuable resources while attempting to make a decision. The greatest danger is in standing still.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“The sad news is, nobody owes you a career. Your career is literally your business.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Strategic change doesn’t just start at the top. It starts with your calendar.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“In the end self-confidence mostly comes from a gut-level realization that nobody has ever died from making a wrong business decision, or taking inappropriate action, or being overruled. And everyone in your operation should be made to understand this.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Delegation without follow-through is abdication. You can never wash your hands of a task.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Hedging is expensive and dilutes commitment.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“The old saying has it that when we promote our best salesman and make him a manager, we ruin a good salesman and get a bad manager. But if we think about it, we see we have no choice but to promote the good salesman. Should our worst salesman get the job? When we promote our best, we are saying to our subordinates that performance is what counts.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“The person who is the star of a previous era is often the last one to adapt to change.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Remember that by saying yes—to projects, a course of action, or whatever—you are implicitiy saying no to something else. Each time you make a commitment, you forfeit your chance to commit to something else.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“Altogether too often, people substitute opinions for facts and emotions for analysis.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary source“In technology, whatever can be done will be done.”
— Andrew S. Grove Primary sourceBill Gates A.P. Møller Theodore Roosevelt Charlie Munger T. E. Lawrence