We all have a vast number of areas in which we have no talent or skill and little chance of becoming even mediocre. In those areas a knowledge workers should not take on work, jobs and assignments. It takes far more energy to improve from incompetence to mediocrity than it takes to improve from first-rate performance to excellence.

People who need certainty are unlikely to make good entrepreneurs.

Charisma becomes the undoing of leaders. It makes them inflexible, convinced of their own infallibility, unable to change

Economists talk about profit motive, but nothing motivates modern man more than a chance to avoid taxes!

Most discussions of decision making assume that only senior executives make decisions or that only senior executives' decisions matter. This is a dangerous mistake.

What's measured improves

Leadership is all hype. We've had three great leaders in this century-Hitler, Stalin, and Mao.