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Tom Peters Quotes

Tom Peters

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'In Search of Excellence' was an afterthought, the runt of the McKinsey consulting litter, a hip-pocket project that was never supposed to amount to much.
- Tom Peters
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Mittelstand companies are incredibly focused and almost always family-run. The young men and women go through the apprenticeship system and learn that the goal is excellence.
- Tom Peters
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My problem is not that I see all 17 sides of any issue, but I'm equally passionate about all 17 sides simultaneously.
- Tom Peters
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I think economics is about passion. Economic progress, whether it is a two-person coffee shop or whether it is Netscape, is about people with brave ideas. Because it is brave to mortgage the house, when you've got two kids, to start a coffee shop.
- Tom Peters
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Anybody who is an entrepreneur is a person who essentially has impaired judgment. The odds of success are zilch.
- Tom Peters
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Hire for attitude. Train for skill... More
- Tom Peters
Collection: Attitude
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The greatest difficulty in the world is not for people to accept new ideas, but to make them forget old ideas.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Ideas
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Excellence is not an aspiration. Excellence is what you do in the next five minutes.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Excellence
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You will be remembered, in the long haul, for the quality of your work, not the quantity of your work. No one evaluates Picasso based on the number of paintings he churned out.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Motivation
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Listen to Everyone. Ideas come from everywhere
- Tom Peters
Collection: Ideas
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Excellence comes from human beings doing things of value that customers find memorable.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Memorable
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What gets measured gets done.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Done
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The thing that keeps a business ahead of the competition is excellence in execution.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Business
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Divas do it, golfers do it, pilots do it, violists do it, sprinters do it, soldiers do it, surgeons do it, astronauts do it...only business people think it isn't necessary to train.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Teamwork
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Formula for success: under promise and over deliver.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Inspirational
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There are few things that will take you further in life, than your ability to make a good presentation.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Ability
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I imagine a school system that recognizes learning is natural, that a love of learning is normal, and that real learning is passionate learning. A school curriculum that values questions above answers...creativity above fact regurgitation...individuality above conformity.. and excellence above standardized performance..... And we must reject all notions of 'reform' that serve up more of the same: more testing, more 'standards', more uniformity, more conformity, more bureaucracy.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Real
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How do you achieve excellence?...Stop doing non-excellent stuff!
- Tom Peters
Collection: Excellence
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Change is not so much about being the first one to embrace a new idea, but being the first to forget an old one
- Tom Peters
Collection: Ideas
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Don't 'tolerate' mistakes. Embrace them!
- Tom Peters
Collection: Business
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One percent improvement in 1,000 things is better than 1,000% improvement in one thing.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Improvement
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Smile if it kills you. The physiology of smiling diffuses a lot of anger and angst. It makes your body and soul feel better.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Feel Better
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I urge you to set a tough, quantitative target for adding "differentiators" as I call them, to every service you provide.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Target
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Inspiring visions rarely (I'm tempted to say never) include numbers.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Numbers
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Creating in all employees the awareness that their best efforts are essential and that they will share in the rewards of the company's success.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Best Effort
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A while back, I came across a line attributed to IBM founder Thomas Watson. If you want to achieve excellence, he said, you can get there today. As of this second, quit doing less-than-excellent work.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Excellent Work
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Success requires a persistent misreading of the odds.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Odds
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I don't want an epitaph on my gravestone that says, 'He would have pursued some big dreams in his life, but other people wouldn't let him.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Inspirational
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Execution Excellence! (Show up on time! Leave last!)
- Tom Peters
Collection: Entrepreneur
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I used to be skeptical when educators and technologists predicted that we may be entering a new era of oral culture, in which audible information will be at least as important as visible information. Now that I have adopted into my own daily life a device that makes music and spoken-word files easy to access from anywhere, I have tempered my skepticism.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Important
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If future competitiveness depends on treating people as an important part of the institution, the least respectful thing I can imagine doing to a human being is asking him to urinate in a cup.
- Tom Peters
Collection: People
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Even a poor, out-of-datecollection reflects in its own way the values of the people who created it and the community it serves.
- Tom Peters
Collection: People
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Companies have got to learn to eat change for breakfast.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Change
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A career is a portfolio of projects that teach you new skills, gain you new expertise, develop new capabilities, grow your colleague set, and constantly reinvent you as a brand.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Skills
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We are all Michaelangelos.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Creative
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Winston Churchill said that appetite was the most important thing about education. Leadership guru Warren Bennis says he wants to be remembered as 'curious to the end.' David Ogilvy contends that the greatest ad copywriters are marked by an insatiable curiosity 'about every subject under the sun.'
- Tom Peters
Collection: Leadership
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Nothing good or great can be done in the absence of enthusiasm.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Done
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Don't settle for less than is possible.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Settling
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Obviously, despite hard work and heroic efforts, many dreams don't come true. But if we don't dare to dream and then throw muscle, heart, and soul into making the dream come true, then WoW Projects-and all of the emotional, intellectual, spiritual, and financial riches that they bring will surely NOT be our lot in life!
- Tom Peters
Collection: Dream
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Do it, fix it, try it.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Excellence
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You can't think your way out of a box; you've got to act.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Thinking
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Swipe from the best, then adapt.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Innovation
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Cost does not equal value... and low cost parts decrease brand equity for a very long time.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Long
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Have you thanked a front-line employee for carrying around a great attitude ... today?
- Tom Peters
Collection: Attitude
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Take someone NEW AND WEIRD to lunch today
- Tom Peters
Collection: Lunch
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If timing ain't everything, it's damn close
- Tom Peters
Collection: Timing
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Oh Lord, there it is again. The question;" What kind of business should I start?" Incidentially, it has a twin that also sets me off: "What should I specialize in during the second year of my MBA studies?" Sorry, but those are two of the most profoundly upsetting questions anyone can ask - upsetting because the answer should be obvious: Do what turns you on, not what the statistics say is best.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Sorry
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I find digital content much easier and more rewarding to interact with on screen than printed on paper.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Paper
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A little (or more) boat burning would do many enterprises a world of good.
- Tom Peters
Collection: Burning

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