* "If you examine a butterfly according to the laws of aerodynamics, it should not be able to fly. But the butterfly doesn't know that, so it flies." At Starbucks, we likewise do things we don't know we're not supposeed to be able to do so - Howard Schultz, Chairman & CEO, Starbucks

* Security is mostly superstitution. It does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing - Helen Keller

* Nothing truely great can ever be ahieved without taking risks. For a brand dependent company, it's virtually important to champion & elevate the brand, but you can't let that worthy goal prevent you from breaking new ground. When problems crop up, serious setbacks that might seem to threaten the image you have lovingly cultivated, you have to withhold judgement on the success of the venture until you have thrown all your resources into attempts to solve those difficulties - Howard Schultz, Chairman & CEO, Starbucks

* The fundamental task is to achieve smallness within large organisation E.F. Schumacher

* Whatever you do, don't play it safe. Don't do things the way they have always been done. Don't try to fit the system. If you do what's expected of you, you will never accomplish more than others expect Howard Schultz, Chairman & CEO, Starbucks

All the above quotes are very enthusing & inspirational... chiefly because they come from remarkably successful people who are perhaps inherently predisposed to tom-tom about their achievements without encountering a murmur of dissent...
There are some people I know who were brilliant, dynamic & willing to think & act out of the box & yet never made it big in life...
As a teenager, I looked up to a particular gentleman  who was a nerd par excellence, so much so, that I was over-awed by his immense depth of knowledge (related to finance & stock market) & would have blindly followed him to the very edge... I also got to witness his catastrophic debacle (aftermath of Harshad Mehta's scam) whereby he was financially ruined & had to sell his ancestral property & leave Delhi  & shift to his wife's hometown for good...

Before people banish me as blasphemous, lemme give another example that would be easier to assimilate:
The merger of Time Warner & the online service AOL... till then, the biggest corporate merger in the history of U S of A
It was the brain-child of Gerald Levin (The guy hailed as the visionary CEO who foresaw the future of Cable T.V and helped invent HBO, transforming Time Warner from just a combo of magazines, movies and music into a broadcasting powerhouse)
The merger nearly destroyed Time Warner (its stock plummeted 80%)
While Levin lost his job, a big chunk of his net worth & all of his reputation, thousand of employees lost the bulk of their retirement savings!

Sadly, there's a very thin line differentiating an 'enterprising idiot' from a 'genius'.

-biks




Edited by biks - 26/Jan/2010 at 9:01pm

I am done with all the quotes underlined in POUR YOUR HEART INTO IT", How STARBUCKS Built a Company Once Cup at a Time.

I would be continuing with the quotes from another book HOW STARBUCKS SAVED MY LIFE, The Riches-to-Rags Story of a Man Who Had It All, and Found It Again by Michael Gill

"The Humble Improve"

a quote from Wynton Marsalis, jazz musician, published on the side of a cup of a Starbucks Double Tall Skim Latte.