Quotes from Michael Gerber

I've said it for four decades - work 'on' your business, not just 'in' your business!

At some point, you have to declare an idea dead and, if not a failure, then at least not a success.

Strategic Work is all about the big questions: Who? What? When? Where? Why? Tactical Work is all about answers: This is the system we use to do each task. This is how we do it, how we measure it, how we monitor it.

Tactical Work is the work you do every day in your business to generate income, along with all of the operational, financial, and management tasks that entails.

With no clear picture of how you wish your life to be, how on earth are you going to live it?

Your own business growth and success depends on many things, and along that growing path, you are going to have to concede certain responsibilities and activities - whether for your accounting, your production, or day-to-day management.

The deciding factor of why some entrepreneurs are successful and others fail is not limited to your DNA or your education; it is about the actions you take as the leader of your business.

Most people who go into business for themselves and, therefore, believe they are entrepreneurs, are doomed to struggle because they don't have a true Entrepreneurial Perspective. They have a Technician's Perspective.

Most entrepreneurs are merely technicians with an entrepreneurial seizure. Most entrepreneurs fail because you are working IN your business rather than ON your business.

It's fashionable to use terms like 'sales funnels' to describe the sales process for many companies, and it is true that the funnel design is very appropriate for the digital world, but despite all the prose written on sales funnels and the like, my question is still the same - when do you close your sales, and how long does that take?

You cannot build a company or manage a life by chasing others; you have to find your success competing against yourself. There will always be a bigger fish.

Your goal as an entrepreneur is to understand not only what your business does but the clients that it serves. If you really have your pulse on their needs and wants, then your 'absolute' failures are always going to have limits.

A person who willingly goes into business for themselves - and intentionally seeks out 'solopreneurship' - is insane!

Nobody knew they needed a smart phone, an automobile, or even a cheeseburger from a drive through window.

No matter what, once the doors are open for business, the entrepreneur has no choice but to be directing multiple attacks at once - raising money, writing software, prototyping, selling, collecting, training, and marketing.

Here's the problem with phones - they are a ready-made diversion from the considerably harder work of growing a business.

Quit being 'busy' and start actively owning and operating your company, and you'll be able to understand where the money is coming from and how to make more of it.

The only choice that leads small business owners to real success in their endeavors is the one that requires real thought. Understanding and building the systems they need within their company to afford them a framework of organization that can scale the business from a company of one to a company of one thousand.

We all know that Ray Kroc founded the McDonald's franchise back in the 1950s, and it then became the most successful business enterprise in history.

Ray Kroc called his first McDonald's restaurant, which he opened in Illinois, 'a little money machine.' That's why thousands of franchisees bought it.

The Internet is fundamentally free, and when faced with the decision to use something free, we, as humans, always seek to grab all we can.

For over forty years, I've been one of the most passionate believers in entrepreneurs. From day one, I've learned that too many small businesses are predicated on business models that the owner barely understands, and then, those same men and women are baffled when their business dreams are overwhelmed with struggles they never foresaw.

Steve Jobs didn't seek solace among minimum wage workers. He sought it from highly educated men and women who understood and shared his focus on growth, technology, and company-building.

As the owner, you have to look into the mind of the customer and see and feel how their relationship to your product works - not just that the product works.