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There is an old Rolex ad featuring the explorer Sir Edmund Hillary. The tagline was powerful. “People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.” You are nothing more, and nothing less, than the choices you’ve made in your life. Warren Buffett is Warren Buffett because he chose to start a business…
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who…
There is a story told by Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick that is a perfect lesson for happiness and success in life: On the slope of Long’s Peak in Colorado lies the rum of a gigantic tree. Naturalists tell us that it stood for some four hundred years. It was a seedling when Columbus landed at…
Everyone thinks life is one upward, smooth trajectory. They think of Cinderella in her big castle and forget that she spent decades scrubbing floors, being beaten, and locked in a cold room. Between “Once upon a time” and “Happily ever after” a lot happens. Not all of it is good. – Joshua Kennon
In 2005, Steve Jobs gave a commencement speech at Stanford University after surviving his first fight with pancreatic cancer. There were four lessons that really spoke to me in his message. These are: Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to make the big choices in life because…
As you can probably tell from my recent posts, I’ve been working my way through a compendium of Chinese proverbs. This type of reading has always been among my favorite – to take an observation and think about it for days, weeks, sometimes even longer, extracting every lesson I can from it. Here are some of my favorites.
There is a traditional Chinese proverb that goes something along the lines of, “Do not take the seeds and throw away the melon”. Though there are many ways you can approach this, and multiple lessons that can be extracted from reflecting on it, it can be particularly sage when it comes to running a business and allocating the cash flow from that business. One of my favorite examples comes from The Coca-Cola Company.
When you are managing your business, your life, or money, the true test of your ability and talent will come during the bad times. Have you managed your liquidity well enough so that even the worst depression won’t wipe you out? Have you conducted yourself with restraint so you don’t find yourself buried under interest expense on credit cards and store accounts?
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