A Quote by James C. Collins

Mediocrity results first and foremost from management failure, not technological failure.

James C. Collins

Quote Topics

Failure First Foremost Management Mediocrity Results Technological

Quote Author

James C. Collins
American - Businessman
Born: January 25, 1958

What a shame to be so afraid of failure that you stop living. My wife has a great one-liner about failure: "Never consider yourself a failure-you can always serve as a bad example." She is right. Failure can be a better teacher than success.

Bernie Siegel

I've had many failures in terms of technological... business... and even research failures. I really believe that entrepreneurship is about being able to face failure, manage failure and succeed after failing.

Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw

Cultivate your desire for success to be greater than the fear of failure; Failure is merely a pitstop between where you stand and success. Failure allows you to learn the fastest; Failure inspires winners and defeats losers.

Fran Tarkenton

Mediocrity is my biggest fear. I'm not afraid of total failure because I don't think that will happen. I'm not afraid of success because that beats the hell out of failure. It's being in the middle that scares me.

Robert Downey, Jr.

Honestly, I've learned from results, period. Everything isn't a failure. Sometimes it just doesn't work. That's not a failure. Maybe it just means it wasn't its time.

BJ the Chicago Kid

The Great Depression was not a sign of the failure of monetary policy or a result of the failure of the market system as was widely interpreted. It was instead a consequence of a very serious government failure, in particular a failure in the monetary authorities to do what they'd initially been set up to do.

Milton Friedman

The TV scientist who mutters sadly, "The experiment is a failure; we have failed to achieve what we had hoped for," is suffering mainly from a bad script writer. An experiment is never a failure solely because it fails to achieve predicted results. An experiment is a failure only when it also fails adequately to test the hypothesis in question, when the data it produces don't prove anything one way or another.

Robert M. Pirsig

U.S. failures when it comes to the Gulf of Guinea are many: a failure to address the longstanding concerns of a government watchdog agency, a failure to effectively combat piracy despite an outlay of tens of millions of taxpayer dollars, and a failure to confront corrupt African leaders who enable piracy in the first place.

Nick Turse

I was shocked when I found out who the biggest failure in the Bible actually is...The biggest one in the whole Bible is God...I mean, He lost His top-ranking, most anointed angel; the first man He ever created; the first woman He ever created; the whole earth and all the fullness therein; a third of the angels, at least - that's a big loss, man....Now, the reason you don't think of God as a failure is He never said He's a failure. And you're not a failure till you say you're one.

Kenneth Copeland

Failure's relative. I've always felt, even early on, if I lose the freedom to fail, something's not right about that. It's how you treat failure, too. There's something to learn from it. I've had movies that have failed colossally, so you kind of analyze your failures: What kind of failure was it? A failure because it's misunderstood by others? A failure because you misunderstood it yourself?

Al Pacino

The failure-dichotomy principle: failure is good. Failure is not an option. Balance those in your brain.

Donny Deutsch

Failure doesn't mean you are a failure... it just means you haven't succeeded yet. Failure is a detour, not a dead-end street.

Zig Ziglar

Don't let the fear of failure or failure as a whole stop you from becoming an entrepreneur. Failure doesn't define you or your business unless you allow it to.

Jeet Banerjee

If you can't embrace both failure or the possibility of failure, or the tremendous fear of failure, you can't be wildly successful. It's just an axiomatic truth.

Donny Deutsch

We will all fail in life, but nobody has to be a failure. Failing at a thing doesn't make you a failure. You are only a failure when you quit trying.