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Mediocrity results first and foremost from management failure, not technological failure.

James C. Collins

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James C. Collins
Age: 66
Born: 1958
Born: January 25
Author
Businessperson
Journalist
Writer
Boulder
Colorado
Mediocrity
Technological
Management
Failure
Results
Firsts
First
Foremost

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The greatest leaders build organizations that, in the end, don't need them.
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Get keep right people.
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Comparison, a great teacher once told me, is the cardinal sin of modern life. It traps us in a game that we can't win. Once we define ourselves in terms of others, we lose the freedom to shape our own lives.
James C. Collins
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In an ironic twist, I now see Good to Great not as a sequel to Built to Last, but more of a prequel. Good to Great is about how to turn a good organization into one that produces sustained great results. Built to Last is about how you take a company with great results and turn it into an enduring great company of iconic stature.
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The essence of profound insight is simplicity.
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A visionary company doesn't simply balance between idealism and profitability: it seeks to be highly idealistic and highly profitable. A visionary company doesn't simply balance between preserving a tightly held core ideology and stimulating vigorous change and movement it does both to an extreme.
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Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice, and discipline.
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If I'm going really, really fast, I can do a page of finished text a day, on average.
James C. Collins
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First figure out your partners, then figure out what ideas to pursue. The most important thing isn't the market you target, the product you develop or the financing, but the founding team.
James C. Collins
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I see the Baldrige process as a powerful set of mechanisms for disciplined people engaged in disciplined thought and taking disciplined action to create great organizations that produce exceptional results.
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You can't manufacture passion or motivate people to feel passionate. You can only discover what ignites your passion and the passions of those around you.
James C. Collins
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We are not imprisoned by circumstances, setbacks, mistakes or staggering defeats, we are freed by our choices.
James C. Collins
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Genuine confidence is what launches you out of bed in the morning, and through your day with a spring in your step.
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In a world of constant change, the fundamentals are more important than ever.
James C. Collins
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An organization is not truly great, if it cannot be great without you.
James C. Collins
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If you have a charismatic cause you don't need to be a charismatic leader.
James C. Collins
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It occurs to me,Jim,that you spend too much time trying to be interesting. Why don't you invest more time being interested? Collin's advice from John Gardner that he took to heart.
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It is more important to know who you are than where you are going, for where you are going will change as the world around you changes.
James C. Collins
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Profit is like oxygen, food, water, and blood for the body they are not the point of life, but without them, there is no life.
James C. Collins
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Good-to-great companies set their goals and strategies based on understanding comparison companies set their goals and strategies based on bravado.
James C. Collins