knowing which ones to keep

Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep.

- Scott Adams, creator of Dilbert

via a Hannah facebook post

strategic plan

We have a strategic plan, it’s called doing things.

- Herb Kelleher, Southwest Airlines

via a Rich Goade tweet

no matter how hard it is, you better get good at those things

To be built to transform requires the courage to focus on delivering value for the customer first. Identifying value begins by thinking of an important unserved or underserved job that customers want done and then coming up with a well-defined value proposition to address that job, however foreign to your current offerings that may be. "If you want to continuously revitalize the service that you offer to your customers, you cannot stop at what you are good at," says CEO Jeff Bezos. "You have to ask what your customers need and want, and then, no matter how hard it is, you better get good at those things." With a well-defined customer value proposition serving a focused, well-articulated job, business leaders and project teams can work together to design the appropriate profit formulas, key resources, and key processes the company needs to thrive.

Mark W. Johnson, "Amazon's Smart Innovation Strategy," BusinessWeek, 12 April 2010, www.businessweek.com/innovate/content/apr2010/id20100412_520351.htm.

it's the things that are not there that we are most proud of

I put to designer Ive the matter of all the features that are missing from the iPad. "In many ways, it's the things that are not there that we are most proud of," he tells me. "For us, it is all about refining and refining until it seems like there's nothing between the user and the content they are interacting with.

Stephen Fry, "The iPad Launch: Can Steve Jobs Do It Again?" Time.com, 1 Apr 2010, www.time.com/time/business/article/0,8599,1976935-3,00.html