Every few hundred years in Western history there occurs a sharp transformation. Within a few short decades, society - its worldview, its basic values, its social and political structures, its art, its key institutions - rearranges itself. We are currently living through such a time.

The single most important thing to remember about any enterprise is that there are no results inside its walls. The result of a business is a satisfied customer.

Any time I have seen someone accomplishing something magnificent, they have been a monomaniac with a mission. A single-minded individual with a passion.

Business purpose and business mission are so rarely given adequate thought is perhaps the most important cause of business frustration and failure.

Innovation opportunities do not come with the tempest but with the rustling of the breeze.

The knowledge we now consider knowledge proves itself in action. What we now mean by knowledge is information effective in action, information focused on results. Results are outside the person, in society and economy, or in the advancement of knowledge itself. To accomplish anything this knowledge has to be highly specialized.

The correct assumption is that what individuals have learned by age twenty-one will begin to become obsolete five to ten years later and will have to be replaced-or at least refurbished-by new learning, new skills, new knowledge.