Quotes from Jason Fried

You don't need an MBA, a certificate, a fancy suit, a briefcase, or an above-average tolerance for risk. You just need an idea, a touch of confidence, and a push to get started.

Everyone should be encouraged to start his own business, not just some rare breed that self-identifies as entrepreneurs.

The most important thing is to begin.

If you're solving someone else's problem, you're constantly stabbing in the dark. When you solve your own problem, the light comes on.

People will respect you more if you are open, honest, public, and responsive during a crisis. Don't hide behind spin or try to keep your bad news on the down low. You

We're willing to lose some customers if it means that others love our products intensely. That's our line in the sand.

The longer something takes, the less likely it is that you're going to finish it.

Meaningful work, creative work, thoughtful work, important work—this type of effort takes stretches of uninterrupted time to get into the zone. But in the modern office such long stretches just can't be found. Instead, it's just one interruption after another.

you'd be amazed how much quality collective thought can be captured using two simple tools: a voice connection and a shared screen.

Easy is a word that's used to describe other people's jobs. "That should be easy for you to do, right?" But notice how rarely people describe their own tasks as easy. For you, it's "Let me look into it"—but for others, it's "Get it done.

It's OK if it's not perfect. You might not seem as professional, but you will seem a lot more genuine.

Knowing when to embrace Good Enough is what gives you the opportunity to be truly excellent when you need to be. We're not suggesting you put shit work out there. You need to be able to be proud of it, even if it's only "okay." But attempting to be indiscriminately great at everything is a foolish waste of energy.

If you want to know the truth about what you've built, you have to ship it. You can test, you can brainstorm, you can argue, you can survey, but only shipping will tell you whether you're going to sink or swim.

Most people should miss out on most things most of the time.

Check the cover letter. In a cover letter, you get actual communication instead of a list of skills, verbs, and years of irrelevance.

Ultimately, startups are easy, stayups are hard. Keeping the show running for the long term is a lot harder than walking onstage for the first time.

If the only way you can inspire the troops is by a regimen of exhaustion, it's time to look for some deeper substance. Because what trickles down is less likely to be admiration but dread and fear instead. A leader who sets an example of self-sacrifice can't help but ask self-sacrifice of others.

It's time for companies to stop asking their employees to breathlessly chase ever-higher, ever-more-artificial targets set by ego.

What's our market share? Don't know, don't care. It's irrelevant. Do we have enough customers paying us enough money to cover our costs and generate a profit? Yes. Is that number increasing every year? Yes. That's good enough for us. Doesn't matter if we're 2 percent of the market or 4 percent or 75 percent. What matters is that we have a healthy business with sound economics that work for us. Costs under control, profitable sales.

long commutes make you fat, stressed, and miserable. Even short commutes stab at your happiness.

Starting a business on the side while keeping your day job can provide all the cash flow you need.

Ever try to cancel an account with your cell phone company? It's not an inherently complicated act. But many phone companies make it so difficult to do because they have retention goals to hit. They want to make it hard for you to cancel so it's easier for them to hit their numbers.

no one's upset by what you're saying, you're probably not pushing hard enough. (And you're probably boring, too.)

When you are new at something, you need to start creating.