Most companies don't have the luxury of focusing exclusively on innovation. They have to innovate while stamping out zillions of widgets or processing billions of transactions.

Obviously, you don't have to be religious to be moral, and beastly people are sometimes religious.

I live a half mile from the San Andreas fault - a fact that bubbles up into my consciousness every time some other part of the world experiences an earthquake. I sometimes wonder whether this subterranean sense of impending disaster is at least partly responsible for Silicon Valley's feverish, get-it-done-yesterday work norms.

Somewhere out there is a bullet with your company's name on it. Somewhere out there is a competitor, unborn and unknown, that will render your strategy obsolete. You can't dodge the bullet – you're going to have to shoot first. You're going to have to out-innovate the innovators.

Truth be told, there are lots of companies that provide exemplary phone support. DirecTV, Virgin America and Apple are a few that regularly exceed my expectations.

It's important to remember that innovators in business don't always get a platform.

Trust is not simply a matter of truthfulness, or even constancy. It is also a matter of amity and goodwill. We trust those who have our best interests at heart, and mistrust those who seem deaf to our concerns.