You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage—pleasantly, smilingly, nonapologetically, to say “no” to other things. And the way you do that is by having a bigger “yes” burning inside. The enemy of the “best” is often the “good.

If two people have the same opinion, one is unnecessary. ... I don't want to talk, to communicate, with someone who agrees with me; I want to communicate with you because you see it differently. I value that difference.

Win-win is a belief in the Third Alternative. It's not your way or my way; it's a better way, a higher way.

Every time I see high-trust cultures, I see a lessening of adversarialism.

Most learning is social, or what I call the cultural DNA. Everyone knows that word of mouth advertising is the best advertising. That's social learning.

To listen with empathy is the most important human skill.

During the first few minutes in lift-off, the astronauts were strictly controlled and were powerfully buffeted by the forces of nature struggling to keep them on earth. This is somewhat comparable to the pull of the flesh when our alarm goes off early in the morning. Unless we put "mind over mattress" and carry out the resolves made the night before, we will experience our first defeat that day. Not sufficient to finish. Mission aborted.