Business

Having attention as an entrepreneur is the ultimate business development tool, and business development is the backbone of any great business- it's important.

Serial Entrepreneur, Author & Digital Marketing Strategist

Good attention is very valuable. In 2017 unlike 2007 when I was yelling about this stuff, people now understand that personal brands are leverage. When you have people's attention, and especially if they think you have value, you can do amazing things.

Serial Entrepreneur, Author & Digital Marketing Strategist

You will never find opportunities in your comfort zone, you have to push yourself. You have to be hungry and willing to go into the unknown. The unknown is where you will always find opportunity.

Icelandic billionaire businessman and former chess player

One of the best ways to make money is not to lose it. If you can learn not to lose money, you're making money. When you lose your own money, it hurts, it makes you careful, but you cannot let it take the mojo… the hunger out of you.

Icelandic billionaire businessman and former chess player

I would not have believed anyone if they had told me that within eighteen months I would have lost 99 per cent of my $4 billion fortune and would be pursued almost to the brink of bankruptcy by seven major banks… I would have found it impossible to contemplate that I would be treated like a pariah in my home country, saddled with $1 billion in debts and hated as a man who had supposedly almost single-handedly brought down an economy. But that is exactly what happened…

Icelandic billionaire businessman and former chess player

Are you the guy who wants to know what he gets at the end of the month? Or are you the guy who says I'll take my chances and will do very well or very badly. If you can make that distinction in your own mind, the rest is up to you. That's where entrepreneurship comes from; it means you can live with risk.

Icelandic billionaire businessman and former chess player

Short-term vision does not allow one to build better businesses and create value. If we keep a long-term perspective in mind, we will go through the good cycles and the bad cycles and reach the other side.

Terra Firma Capital founder; acquired EMI Records in 2007

While most people are uncomfortable with change we have a business built on analysing it. Our business takes advantage of challenges and the opportunities they provide.

Terra Firma Capital founder; acquired EMI Records in 2007

Simply put, a great business will understand its customers, have a clear, sound strategy and a business plan that can deliver against it.

Terra Firma Capital founder; acquired EMI Records in 2007

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

Kodak had been living in linear-time, something which is intuitive to most of us, where we think in days, weeks, months, years… The world had already started to shift when people like Steve Jobs started to take-advantage of the fact that you could connect the dots.

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

To scale? you have the stars aligned- timing is everything.

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

Our mission is to help people create a life, not just a living. By freeing them from thinking about the tasks related to space, they can dedicate more of their time and energy on their work and passions.

Co-founder of WeWork, co-working space company

Without the existence of Europe, smaller countries like mine [Estonia] would have a difficult time to survive economically or even from a defence perspective. The internal European market is absolutely vital for the functioning of the very different economies of the continent.

Former President of Estonia & Cybersecurity Pioneer

I completely appreciate that people think social media is a waste of my time, but spending all day being obsessed with our customer, interacting with them in every way that I can, answering every question, trying to understand everything that I can about them, matches everything that we do and everything that we produce.

Founder of Deliciously Ella, plant-based food blogger and author

The word engage is the most important thing when it comes to creating a strong brand. From day one, any time someone would comment I would comment back to them- and I started to understand our audience really quickly. I probably spent 3 or 4 hours a day on our social media channel replying to people.

Founder of Deliciously Ella, plant-based food blogger and author