Conductors do not know how the oboe does its work, but they know what the oboe should contribute.

One has to make a decision when a condition is likely to degenerate if nothing is done.

Tomorrow always arrives. It is always different. And even the mightiest company is in trouble if it has not worked on the future. Being surprised by what happens is a risk that even the largest and richest company cannot afford, and even the smallest business need not run.

Management means, in the last analysis, the substitution of thought for brawn and muscle, of knowledge for folkways and superstition, and of cooperation for force. It means the substitution of responsibility for obedience to rank, and of authority of performance for the authority of rank.

The entrepreneur always searches for change, responds to it, and exploits it as an opportunity.

Never ask who's right. Start out by asking what is right. And you find that out by listening to dissenting, disagreeing opinions.

The leaders who work most effectively, it seems to me, never say "I." And that's not because they have trained themselves not to say "I." They don't think "I." They think "we"; they think "team." They understand their job to be to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don't sidestep it, but "we" gets the credit. This is what creates trust, what enables you to get the task done.