Business

The most common mistake is to stop challenging when things are going well. I recognise failure as not having made a business better than when you were first involved.

Terra Firma Capital founder; acquired EMI Records in 2007

To me, a great leader should be empathetic, authentic, entrepreneurial, creative, ethical and lead from the front.

Terra Firma Capital founder; acquired EMI Records in 2007

When you look at companies that survive growth, you are seeing the importance of people- not just ideas. One of the big surprises to young people when they show up in Silicon Valley... is that there are literally thousands of people just like that across Silicon Valley who were top of their class and have incredible ideas. Successful companies that scale stand out because of their people!

CEO of Apple Computer Company during the 1980s and 1990s

I'd only been at Apple a few months and I was sitting in the Macintosh lab with Steve Jobs and Bill Gates listening to them talking about their 'noble cause.' I had never heard about having a 'noble cause' in business- for me, it was about gladiatorial competition... Here was Steve Jobs and Bill Gates talking about empowering knowledge workers with tools for the mind, making them incredibly productive, and helping them to change the way things were done in our world; creating entirely new industries in the process.

CEO of Apple Computer Company during the 1980s and 1990s

To scale? you have the stars aligned- timing is everything. When we created the first personal digital assistant, the Newton... we were probably 15 years too early. Even some of the best computer scientists in the world didn't realise that at the time, we needed Moore's Law to continue doubling processing power every couple of years for at least a decade before it was practical to build products like iPhones.

CEO of Apple Computer Company during the 1980s and 1990s

BE CONSISTENT across your communication – what your values are, what you're trying to do – it's super obvious but without a single clear proposition that you communicate consistently at every contact point, you can't expect to grow an audience that believes in you.

What we're seeing is a global shift towards meaning and WeWork is helping achieve that on a global scale.

Co-founder of WeWork, co-working space company

Our mission is to help people create a life, not just a living. Our product provides the space, community and services that creators need so they can focus on their work.

Co-founder of WeWork, co-working space company

At WeWork, we believe creators are anyone that's pursuing their passions and contributing to a mission. You may be an artist who is working on an innovative new project, a freelance software engineer providing client services or a director of HR at a Fortune 500 company that's trying to build a dynamic work environment for employees – regardless of your company size, title or function, you are working towards creating meaning, intention and purpose within your life.

Co-founder of WeWork, co-working space company

'Brand,' is what journalists and industry-people say… we say culture movement. As artists we say culture! Movement! And analysts say brand. I don't know what a brand is, but I know what a freakin' movement is…

Grammy-winning rapper, producer, and member of The Black Eyed Peas

Having a strong brand identity is essential. With the evolving retail landscape and the impact of technology, the customer is becoming more and more savvy. They want brands they can trust, brands with a sense of integrity and individuality that they associate with quality, craftsmanship and authenticity.

Founder of Luxury Fashion Brand Tory Burch & Philanthropist

Scaling up is incredibly challenging; it's definitely been the hardest part of my own entrepreneurship journey. You might be familiar with The Peter Principle, which states that people are promoted to the level of their incompetence. It's exactly the same in the real world: if you're good at your job, it leads to advancement in your career, and then you don't get to do those things anymore that made you deserve that advancement.

Co-Founder of Slack, Former CEO & Creator of Flickr

Fundamentally, it's really hard to work on intellectual and complex projects collaboratively. Complexity is underestimated, even by the people who are in the thick of it. There's a lot of anxiety or even resentment towards the tools and process of business that manifests in satire with shows like 'The Office', the movie 'Office Space' or the cartoon 'Dilbert'.

Co-Founder of Slack, Former CEO & Creator of Flickr

That's what entrepreneurship is all about–experimenting and finding a way of achieving some goal in the context of business. It's something I've always found fascinating.

Co-Founder of Slack, Former CEO & Creator of Flickr

I came to the conclusion that clubs would be better of promoting strategies that induce home-advantage rather than fighting for higher ticket price because the incremental value of each point lost is higher than the value of those more expensive tickets. If you drive your home advantage, your revenues go up!

Manchester City Captain & Belgian Football Legend

As a player, you are your asset. You have to manage and keep your performance- as an athlete- at the highest standard. This is key…. after all, you can't market something that's not working or performing well.

Manchester City Captain & Belgian Football Legend