The great mystery isn't that people do things badly but that they occasionally do a few things well. The only thing that is universal is incompetence. Strength is always specific! Nobody ever commented, for example, that the great violinist Jascha Heifetz probably couldn't play the trumpet very well.

The enterprise, by definition, must be capable of producing more or better than all the resources that comprise it.

The only real difference between one organization and another is the performance of its people.

If something fails despite being carefully planned, carefully designed, and conscientiously executed, that failure often bespeaks underlying change and, with it, opportunity.

If a business is to be considered a continuous process, instead of a series of disjointed stop-and-go events, then the economic universe in which a business operates-and all the major events within it-must have rhyme, rhythm, or reason.

What you have to do and the way you have to do it is incredibly simple. Whether you are willing to do it is another matter.

The most important contribution management needs to make in the 21st century is ... to increase the productivity of knowledge work and the knowledge worker