Excellent firms don't believe in excellence - only in constant improvement and constant change.

All business success rests on something labeled a sale, which at least momentarily weds company and customer.

If a window of opportunity appears, don't pull down the shade.

The magic formula that successful businesses have discovered is to treat customers like guests and employees like people.

Celebrate what you want to see more of.

Winners must learn to relish change with the same enthusiasm and energy that we have resisted it in the past.

If your company has a clean-desk policy, the company is nuts and you're nuts to stay there.

South Africa has all the tools to compete in the new global village - an eager workforce, ready to take on any challenge.

Almost all quality improvement comes via simplification of design, manufacturing... layout, processes, and procedures.

Design is so critical it should be on the agenda of every meeting in every single department.

Excellent firms don't believe in excellence - only in constant improvement and constant change.

Communication is everyone's panacea for everything.

Give a lot, expect a lot, and if you don't get it, prune.

Leaders don't create followers, they create more leaders.

Test fast, fail fast, adjust fast.

If you're not confused, you're not paying attention.

We found that the most exciting environments, that treated people very well, are also tough as nails. There is no bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo... excellent companies provide two things simultaneously: tough environments and very supportive environments.

'In Search of Excellence' - even the title - is a reminder that business isn't dry, dreary, boring, or by the numbers. Life at work can be cool - and work that's cool isn't confined to Tiger Woods, Yo-Yo Ma, or Tom Hanks. It's available to all of us and any of us.

'In Search of Excellence' was an afterthought, the runt of the McKinsey consulting litter, a hip-pocket project that was never supposed to amount to much.

A passive approach to professional growth will leave you by the wayside.

All white-collar work is project work. The single salient fact that touches all of our lives is that work is being reinvented.

Anybody who is an entrepreneur is a person who essentially has impaired judgment. The odds of success are zilch.

As a consumer, you want to associate with brands whose powerful presence creates a halo effect that rubs off on you.

As far as I'm concerned, the first business leader who was able to establish a cult of personality around his tenure was Lee Iacocca.

Business is about people. It's about passion. It's about bold ideas, bold small ideas or bold large ideas.

Community organizing is all about building grassroots support. It's about identifying the people around you with whom you can create a common, passionate cause. And it's about ignoring the conventional wisdom of company politics and instead playing the game by very different rules.

Everyone has a chance to learn, improve, and build up their skills.

For the blue-collar worker, the driving force behind change was factory automation using programmable machine tools. For the office worker, it's office automation using computer technology: enterprise-resource-planning systems, groupware, intranets, extranets, expert systems, the Web, and e-commerce.

I don't read many business books. I read good fiction. Business is about people, so my favorite business books are anything by Dickens.

I don't want the 35-year-olds in my audience to think of me as as 'pops' giving the kind of advice that only 65-year-olds can understand.

I endorse a lot of people - sometimes people say I endorse too many books. And my response has always been the same: If I can get one case study that can give me one good idea that I can implement for $25, or for these days one-third of that on Kindle, I've gotten a very good deal.

I know it sounds crazy, but you've got to let what you're going to do find you, rather than you pursuing it.

I think it's wonderful to save the world, but you need to be part of the world, too.

If you really want to kill morale, have layoffs every two months for the next two years.

Leaders understand the ultimate power of relationships.

Mastery is great, but even that is not enough. You have to be able to change course without a bead of sweat, or remorse.

Mittelstand companies are incredibly focused and almost always family-run. The young men and women go through the apprenticeship system and learn that the goal is excellence.

My problem is not that I see all 17 sides of any issue, but I'm equally passionate about all 17 sides simultaneously.

One of the biggest problems of 'In Search of Excellence' is that it focused on giant, publicly-traded companies. There are thousands upon thousands of excellent companies. Some of them are two-person accountancies in a community of three thousand people.

One simply cannot pay tribute to Stephen Covey without saying at the outset that he was a lovely human being.

Regardless of age, regardless of position, regardless of the business we happen to be in, all of us need to understand the importance of branding. We are CEOs of our own companies: Me, Inc. To be in business today, our most important job is to be head marketer for the brand called You.

Remember my mantra: distinct... or extinct.

Statistically and emotionally, I believe that the way I can be of help to society is by doing what I know and what I've been good at.

Stop being conned by the old mantra that says, 'Leaders are cool, managers are dweebs.' Instead, follow the Peters Principle: Leaders are cool. Managers are cool too!

The top athletes are consummate pros who work obsessively at their craft. Approach yours the same way.

The whole secret to our success is being able to con ourselves into believing that we're going to change the world because statistically we are unlikely to do it.

The workplace revolution that transformed the lives of blue-collar workers in the 1970s and 1980s is finally reaching the offices and cubicles of the white-collar workers.

Today brands are everything, and all kinds of products and services - from accounting firms to sneaker makers to restaurants - are figuring out how to transcend the narrow boundaries of their categories and become a brand surrounded by a Tommy Hilfiger-like buzz.

Vision is dandy, but sustainable company excellence comes from a huge stable of able managers.