Margaret heffernan quotes

When we care about people, we care less about money, and when we care about money, we care less about people.

Instead, we have found ourselves gasping for air in a sea of corruption, dysfunction, environmental degradation, waste, disenchantment and inequality—and the harder we compete, the more unequal we become.

British innovation in design, in the creative arts, in engineering and manufacturing is world class.

I regularly take my entrepreneurship students out walking because I want to get them in the habit of noticing and thinking about what they notice. They have to leave their phones behind to learn the basic lesson: Be where you are.

A thinking partner who isn't an echo chamber... How many of us dare to have such collaborators?

Those in powerless positions aren't about to complain about bullying bosses, abusive supervisors or corrupt co-workers. There is no safe way to do so and no process that promises redress.

Most executives I know are so action-oriented, or action-addicted, that time for reflection is the first casualty of their success.

Companies don't have ideas; only people do. And what motivates people are the bonds and loyalty and trust they develop between each other. What matters is the mortar, not just the bricks.

If we aren't going to be afraid of conflict, we have to see it as thinking.

Most people have their best ideas when they take their minds away from problems they're trying to solve.

The best remote companies I've seen do almost everything online, via email and telephone. But they also get together face to face on a regular basis.

As long as they are well-intentioned, mistakes are not a matter for shame but for learning

Huge open source organizations like Red Hat and Mozilla manage the collaboration of hundreds of people who don't know one another and have spent no time hanging around the water cooler.

Certainty is no guarantor of correctness.

What do you want your business to do? Make money, of course. To pay for people and supplies, to be able to grow.

Many CEOs and leaders think that silence is indeed golden, that consensus is bliss. It is - sometimes. But more often what it signifies is that there are no respected processes for surfacing concerns and dissent.

All businesses and jobs depend on a vast number of people, often unnoticed and unthanked, without which nothing really gets done. They are all human and deserve respect and gratitude.

The healthiest companies are always characterized by organic talent development.

Any fool can buy talent; only real leaders develop it.

As a mother, I work hard every day and I expect that work to be recognized and appreciated. Because I work for and with human beings, sometimes they're grateful and sometimes they aren't.

There is no more powerful weapon for change than honesty.

I hate people walking down the street listening to the soundtrack of their lives which responds to them but not their setting. I hate the overspill of sound which metro and subway riders are oblivious to because they notice no one and nothing around them.

As long as it (an issue) remains invisible, it is guaranteed to remain insoluble.

Bosses and leaders everywhere should cherish the people who bring them bad news, disappointing data or hard problems.

Making those around you feel invisible is the opposite of leadership.

Words are how people think. When you misuse words, you diminish your ability to think clearly and truthfully.

A fantastic model of collaboration: thinking partners who aren't echo chambers.

The truth won't set us free until we develop the skills and the habit and the talent and the moral courage to use it.

If you have never failed at anything, then you haven't been trying hard enough, aren't very imaginative, or have had such extraordinarily good luck that you have come to believe you are invincible.

We treasure what we can measure.

In business, staying focused requires that you turn most opportunities down.

On overnight flights, I have trained myself to get to sleep almost instantly after takeoff. I always listen to the same audiobook on my iPod so my brain knows, regardless of time zone, that that voice means it's time for bed.

Customers who have to come back and spend, or customers who just don't want the hassle of leaving - those are the ones who are most worth attracting.

The biggest catastrophes that we've witnessed rarely come from information that is secret or hidden. It comes from information that is freely available and out there, but that we are willfully blind to.

Silence is the language of inertia.

I don't think you ever know anyone until you see them in action.

It is nobody's right to be waited on and nobody's fate to do the waiting.

We know - intellectually - that confronting an issue is the only way to resolve it. But any resolution will disrupt the status quo. Given the choice between conflict and change on the one hand, and inertia on the other, the ostrich position can seem very attractive.

In our house, mother’s day is every day. Father’s day, too. In our house, parents count. They do important work and that work matters. One day just doesn’t cut for us.

money appears to motivate only our interest in ourselves, making us selfish and self-centered...Money makes people feel self-sufficient, which also means they don't need or care about others; it's each man for himself

One of the sad truths about leadership is that, the higher up the ladder you travel, the less you know.

If the company depends entirely on you - your creativity, ingenuity, inspiration, salesmanship or charisma - nobody will want to buy it. The risk and the dependency are too great.

Once you have power, you are inevitably surrounded by people who have their own agendas and will tell you whatever advances them.

Companies don't have ideas. Only people do. And what motivates people are the bonds of loyalty and trust they develop around each other.

Big data will never give you big ideas... Big data doesn't facilitate big leaps of the imagination. It will never conjure up a PC revolution or any kind of paradigm shift. And while it might tell you what to aim for, it can't tell you how to get there

[For constructive conflict,] we have to resist the neurobiological drive which means that we really prefer people mostly like ourselves.

I don't think a true company - one that builds sustainable value - can ever only exist online or remotely.

Building businesses takes tremendous stamina, and success isn't achieved without it.

Business is not a science; it is not susceptible to experiments that can be controlled and replicated. Everything in business is too unpredictable for that - every business, employee, product, market is different and keeps changing.

Phones and soundtracks and Muzak and fountains replace genuine and unpredictable human contact with a seamless soundtrack from a bad movie and a cliche that makes us believe we must all be happy.

Everyone I know feels harassed by email which has invaded their waking and sleeping hours.

Britain is famous for being great at inventing and poor at commercializing.

When we confront facts and fears, we achieve real power and unleash our capacity for change.

You cannot fix a problem that you refuse to acknowledge.

The cell phone has become the adult's transitional object, replacing the toddler's teddy bear for comfort and a sense of belonging.

For good ideas and true innovation, you need human interaction, conflict, argument, debate.

Making a company fit to sell may be the only way to ensure you never need a buyer.

Every organization has issues and concerns which are known about by many people who choose to remain silent.

Openness isn't the end. It's the beginning.

I'm all for ambition and stretch goals. I set them for myself. But leadership isn't the same as cheerleading. Believing in something is a necessary but absolutely insufficient condition for making it come true.

We have to see conflict as thinking and then get really good at it.

Noise is a buffer, more effective than cubicles or booth walls.