Oceans of Pearls

Pay for Performance

joshwillits — Sun, 23 May 2010 23:43:03 +0000

One key to getting onto the fast-track is for you to work for the right company and the right boss. The right company is one that respects its people and practices pay for performance. The right company is dynamic, growing, open to new ideas, and full of opportunities for people with ambition and initiative. [Brian Tracy]

Secret of Business

joshwillits — Mon, 17 May 2010 01:02:36 +0000

The secret of business, especially these days, is to focus relentlessly on your unfair advantage – the thing you do that others don’t. [John Rollwagen]

Three Life Questions

joshwillits — Wed, 05 May 2010 09:32:48 +0000

My career only makes sense in the rear view mirror. I didn’t get here by design. I got here through some basic principles, and I apply them every day.

Find the best people in the world that I can associate with and learn from.
Find the best source of opportunity, long term, what are the richest vein of opportunities that I can find and that will come my way.
Find some thing today, this moment, that engages my passion.

Every door that opens for me, I apply those three questions.

[Randy Komisar]

Market Matters Most

joshwillits — Tue, 04 May 2010 10:25:18 +0000

The #1 company-killer is lack of market.

Andy puts it this way:

When a great team meets a lousy market, market wins.
When a lousy team meets a great market, market wins.
When a great team meets a great market, something special happens.

You can obviously screw up a great market — and that has been done, and not infrequently — but assuming the team is baseline competent and the product is fundamentally acceptable, a great market will tend to equal success and a poor market will tend to equal failure. Market matters most.

[Mark Andreessen]

I took the one less traveled by…

joshwillits — Mon, 03 May 2010 10:24:18 +0000

“One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. “Which road do I take?” she asked. “Where do you want to go?” was his response. “I don’t know,” Alice answered. “Then,” said the cat, “it doesn’t matter.”" [Lewis Carroll]

What Is Work?

joshwillits — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 10:20:30 +0000

“The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor and his leisure, his mind and his body, his information and his recreation, his love and his religion. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence at whatever he does, leaving others to decide whether he is working or playing. To him he is always doing both.” [James Michener]

Ideas and Execution

joshwillits — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 23:06:15 +0000

“It’s so funny when I hear people being so protective of ideas. (People who want me to sign an nda to tell me the simplest idea.)

To me, ideas are worth nothing unless executed. They are just a multiplier. Execution is worth millions.

Explanation:

* Awful idea = -1
* Weak idea = 1
* So-so idea = 5
* Good idea = 10
* Great idea = 15
* Brilliant idea = 20

* No execution = $1
* Weak execution = $1000
* So-so execution = $10,000
* Good execution = $100,000
* Great execution = $1,000,000
* Brilliant execution = $10,000,000

To make a business, you need to multiply the two.

The most brilliant idea, with no execution, is worth $20. The most brilliant idea takes great execution to be worth $20,000,000.

That’s why I don’t want to hear people’s ideas. I’m not interested until I see their execution.” [Derek Sivers]

Success

joshwillits — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 16:37:29 +0000

“Success is waking up in the morning and bounding out of bed because there’s something out there that you love to do, that you believe in, that you’re good at – something that’s bigger than you are, and you can hardly wait to get at it again.” [Whit Hobbs]

Goals

joshwillits — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 14:09:35 +0000

“Your goals should be out of reach, but not out of sight.” [Anita DeFrantz]

Share ideas

joshwillits — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 21:05:55 +0000

“If you have a dollar and I have a dollar and we exchange them, you still only have one dollar and I have a dollar. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we exchange ideas, you and I now each have two ideas. And ideas lead to innovation.” [Harvey Mackay]