The Best Strategy Quotes

"Your No. 1 goal is to reduce the risk of failure and uncertainty."

"You pick a general direction and implement like hell."

"Competition is a way of separating the lazy from the industrious."

"Anyone who has visions should see a doctor."

"When you're on the field, it's not about whether you like it or not. All that matters is playing at a high level and doing everything you can to help your team win."

"If you have the intention to renew yourself, do it every day."

"We have to lay the railroad tracks first before we can make the trains run on time."

"What is not possible for one, many can accomplish."

"Implementation is everything. (...) There are so many people who work so hard and yet achieve so little."

"Embrace chance! Affirm chaos!"

"The starting point of any strategy is a great situation analysis. (...) Intelligence precedes operations."

"The result of our incomplete knowledge of the world, or about the connection between our present actions and their future outcomes. (...) There are things we do not know, and things we do not know that we do not know. And sometimes things we do know that are just not so."

"The reason why it is so difficult for existing firms to capitalize on disruptive innovations is that their process and their business model that make them good at the existing business actually make them bad at competing for the disruption."

"The key steps in dealing with a strategic challenge are a diagnosis of the situation - a comprehension of 'what's going on here,' finding the crux, and then creating reasonable action responses."

"The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do."

"The central issue is never strategy, structure, culture, or systems. The core of the matter is always about changing the behavior of people."

"Strategy is a big word. Often oversized. When it comes up in a meeting, everyone freezes to a pillar of salt, and everyone hopes for the Messiah to show the way. But you have to realize that strategy is often just the tried and true remedy for the weak. Strategy is important (...) for those who can't make it with sheer performance."

"Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, (...). There is no other route to success."

"Once you understand business models you can then start prototyping business models just like you prototype products."

"Openness makes us more crisis-proof as a company, but also as a country. That's why German SMEs in particular need to think about how to move from hidden to open champion."

"Only those who know where they want to sail set their sails correctly."

"Only what the customer perceives contributes to success."

"Nothing is more helpful than a challenge to bring out the best in a person."

"After the game is before the game!"

"Market share is a meaningless number unless a company defines the market in terms of the boundaries separating it from its rivals."

"Some people have a keen eye for other people's weaknesses and a poor eye for their own."

"The more planned people are, the more effectively chance strikes them."

"It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change."

"I love it when a plan works".

"I never think about the future. It comes soon enough."

"However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results."

"Don't be afraid to give up the good to achieve the great."

"Good artists copy - great artists steal."

"Experimentation can be defined as an iterative process of learning what does and does not work. The goal of a business experiment is actually not a product or solution; it is learning - the kind of learning about customers, markets, and possible options that will lead you to the right solution."

"Execution is everything."

"It's not our job to predict the future, but to be well prepared for it."

"A goal without a plan is just a wish."

"Dual Transformation is the greatest challenge a leadership team will ever face. It is also the greatest opportunity a leadership team will encounter."

"You have to do exactly what you think: You can't do that."

"Dreams without goals are just dreams. And ultimately, they fuel disappointment. On the road you must apply discipline, but more importantly, consistency. Because without commitment you'll never start, but without consistency, you'll never finish."

"The one who hunts two rabbits at the same time will not catch any of them."

"The strategy process is learning and formulation work."

"Life belongs to the living, and those who live must be prepared for change."

"Creating a new business from scratch is hard, but executives of incumbents have the dual challenge of creating new businesses while simultaneously staving off never-ending attacks on existing operations, which provide vital cash flow and capabilities to invest in growth."

"Competitive strategy is about being different. It means deliberately choosing a different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value."

"A good field hockey player plays where the puck is. A great field hockey player plays where the puck is going to be."

"... strategy is the determination of the basic long-term goals and objectives of an enterprise, and the adoption of courses of action and the allocation of resources necessary for carrying out these goals".

"The strategy is an economy of forces".

Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory, tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat."