Brian O’Kane is managing director of Oak Tree Press, Ireland’s leading business book publisher.
He has written (or co-written) over a dozen books – including the best-selling Starting a Business in Ireland – and edited two of the world’s largest-circulation accounting magazines. He writes and speaks regularly on small business planning and strategy.
He holds a BComm degree from University College Dublin and a Master of Business degree from Waterford IT. He is a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Ireland and a member of the Marketing Institute of Ireland and the Institute of Management Consultants & Advisers.
Never steal more than you actually need, for the possession of surplus money leads to extravagance, foppish attire and frivolous thought.
Dalton Trumbo
Coming together is a beginning;
Keeping together is progress;
Working together is success.
Henry Ford
Winning isn’t everything. It’s the only thing.
Vince Lombardi, coach
Rule No. 1: Never lose money.
Rule No. 2: Never forget Rule No. 1.
Warren Buffett
There are not a lot of client-related problems. There is only one: Some of us don’t take good enough care of our clients.
Thomas J Watson, founder, IBM
Going into business for yourself, becoming an entrepreneur, is the modern day equivalent of pioneering on the old frontier.
Paula Nelson
Ambition, energy, industry and perseverance are indispensable requirements for success in business.
PT Barnum
There is no “Try” - only “Do” and “Do not”.
Yoda, Star Wars
If you’re looking for perfection, look in the mirror.
If you find it there, expect it elsewhere.
Malcolm Forbes
Bankruptcy: A legal proceeding where you put your money in your pants pocket and give your coat to your creditors.
Joey Adams
Most success springs from an obstacle or failure. I became a cartoonist largely because I failed in my goal of becoming a successful executive.
Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert
I’m spending my time trying to understand our competitive position and how we’re serving customers. Out of our competitive strategy will come the right set of financial objectives.
Lou Gerstner, IBM
A smooth sea never made a skilled mariner.
English proverb
Skill and confidence are an unconquered army.
George Herbert
Wealth is the product of man’s capacity to think.
Ayn Rand
Making things requires factories and workers and other expensive inconveniences. You can’t multiply your investment 100 times with that sort of financial burden.
Michael Lewis, Slate magazine
I looked for those sharp, scratchy, harsh, almost unpleasant guys who see and tell you about things as they really are.
Thomas Watson Jr, IBM
Poker is a game of chance – but not the way I play it.
WC Fields
The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.
Linus Pauling
A brand is something that makes people pay more for your product, even though it’s the same as a competitor’s.
Fortune magazine
We’re not in the coffee business, serving people; we’re in the people business, serving coffee.
Howard Schultz, Starbucks
If it’s free, it’s advice; if you pay for it, it’s counselling; if you can use either one, it’s a miracle.
Jack Adams
Small deeds done are better than great deeds planned.
Peter Marshall
There are just two rules for success:
1. Never tell all that you know.
Robert Lincoln
Ideas are a commodity. Execution of them is not.
Michael Dell
Cost, cost, cost.
Service, service, service.
People, people, people.
The business model is understandable by any three-year-old.
Tom Peters, on Southwest Airlines
Customers are the most important part of the production line.
W Edwards Deming
A chief executive’s salary is not a market award for achievement, but frequently in the nature of a warm personal gesture by the individual to himself.
JK Galbraith
Financial rewards follow accomplishment, they don’t precede it.
Harry F Banks
No great marketing decisions have ever been based on quantitative data.
John Sculley, Apple Computer
There’s no such thing as a lack of confidence; either you have it or you don’t.
Rob Andrews
Work is the refuge of people who have nothing better to do.
Oscar Wilde
Success is having 10 honeydew melons and only eating the top half of each one.
Barbra Streisand
Long-range planning does not deal with future decisions, but with the future of present decisions.
Peter F Drucker
Riches: A gift from God, signifying “This is my beloved son, in whom I am well-pleased”.
JD Rockefeller
Complex processes are the work of the devil.
Michael Hammer
Mutiny – such an unpleasant word – think of it more as a management reshuffle.
Alistair Swinerton
Promoters are just guys with two pieces of bread looking for a piece of cheese.
Evel Knievel
Money will come when you’re doing the right thing.
Michael Philips, US economist
A lawyer’s opinion is worth nothing unless paid for.
English proverb
Ambition is an overmastering desire to be vilified by enemies while living and made ridiculous by friends when dead.
Ambrose Bierce
Too few accomplish twice as much as too many.
Malcolm Forbes
Being big does not help you become good in the software business.
Fred Gibbons, Software Publishing
I have never worshipped money and I never worked for money. I worked for pride and accomplishment. Money can become a nuisance. It’s a hell of a lot more fun chasin’ it than gettin’ it. The fun is in the race.
Ray Kroc, McDonalds
Start small; think big; phase in; grow fast.
Baltimore Technologies’ motto
The question is not how to protect copyright on the Internet, but how to use the content to add value to other items that can be sold.
Esther Dyson
Everything is always impossible before it works. That is what entrepreneurs are all about -doing what people have told them is impossible.
Hunt Greene, venture capitalist
MS Larson