Execution is the ability to mesh strategy with reality, align people with goals, and achieve the promised results.

Complexity has nothing to do with intelligence, simplicity does.

I am convinced that nothing we do is more important than hiring and developing people. At the end of the day you bet on people, not on strategies.

I saw that leaders placed too much emphasis on what some call high level strategy, on intellectualizing and philosophizing, and not enough on implementation. People would agree on a project or initiative, and then nothing would come of it.

If you can't describe your strategy in twenty minutes, simply and in plain language, you haven't got a plan. 'But,' people may say, 'I've got a complex strategy. It can't be reduced to a page.' That's nonsense. That's not a complex strategy. It's a complex thought about the strategy.

People tend to look at their businesses from the inside out - that is, they get so focused on making and selling their products that they lose awareness of the needs and buying behaviors of their customers.

Execution is a systematic process of rigorously discussing hows and whats, tenaciously following through, and ensuring accountability.