Wisdom in fragments

Emotions are the brain's way of making us pay attention immediately to what is most important so that we can react as quickly as possible. In evolution, that meant 'survival' – the rustle in the bushes may be our next meal or may make us its next meal – something that we have to chase, or run away from – and in either case, we don't want to have to stop and think.

Psychologist who popularized the concept of emotional intelligence

I want Gymshark to be the brand that unites the conditioning community… that brings fitness into the reach of more people… gives people the opportunity to work on themselves physically and mentally. I wasn't very good at school. I got in the gym and then I was good at school because I applied the principles I learned in the gym to my general life. I want more people to have that experience.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

We don't necessarily hire the best CV, we hire the right CV. We try to hire the right people. If someone is 10/10 skills-fit, but doesn't seem interested in our long-term vision? I'd rather have the 8/10 candidate who's passionate about where we're going.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

I wish I could sit here and say that a group of us built a strategy, formula, and tried to work it all out – but it was nothing like that. It was organic. It was reaching out to our heroes on YouTube to see if they liked our kit. They loved our kit, they started wearing it and we started to get to know them – and eventually invited them to our events. It was super organic.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

If I acted 8 years ago how I do today, I wouldn't have lasted 5 minutes in the business. If I acted today how I acted 8 years ago, the business wouldn't be where it is today. Entrepreneurs and founders have to learn to be the most adaptable people in their business- that's really important – otherwise, the business will outgrow the founder, or the founder will cause the business to stagnate or slow.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

I was working on the principle that if you only listen to the voices around you, you'll amalgamate them into something that already exists… My view was that consensus isn't going to build something that will change the game.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

At the beginning I literally started a business out of passion. I loved fitness- it changed my life- it changed my schooling, education and taught me skills that changed my life for the better. I just wanted to be in fitness. When we started the business- whilst the first 6 months were difficult- it started to gain momentum and started to feel like a real opportunity. That's when I had to grab the business by the 'scruff of the neck' and drag it to where I thought it needed to be.

Founder and CEO of Gymshark, fitness apparel company

As an entrepreneur you have to know your market. You shouldn't take too much advice, and you need to believe in your own ability and be ready to tackle problems. You also have to be prepared for the fact that it may not work!

Many people say that if you're the brightest person in the room, you're in the wrong room – that's totally right. You need to bring in people with much more expertise than you to take the business forward. I started out making shoes by hand – I'm a shoemaker, not an intellectual.

As a founder, you're not God. You're a mere piece of the puzzle. To have a company grow, it has to have a lot of people and those people need to feel ownership. You need a winning culture to keep people driving forward. It's not just about loving each other's company, it's about winning together.

I went to collect my prize… it was an American dictionary! Well…when we were looking for a name, I picked up this dictionary and started to flick through. I remember the letter 'R' felt like a good, strong letter and I was flicking through I got to the word R-E-E-B-O-K – a small African gazelle! Well, that felt like us!

Jeff and I tried our best but all our father could say is, 'when I'm gone, the business is yours…' – number 1, we didn't want our Dad to go.. and number 2, it was clear the business would be gone before he was. The business was dying.

I'd never even heard the word 'entrepreneur' growing up – I didn't know what that meant. If I go back to my grandfather – he was the real entrepreneur. He developed things… he made spiked running shoes when he was only 15 (in 1895!). My grandfather died in 1933, I was born in 1935 and my grandmother insisted I brought his name with me – so I became the next Joe Foster.

Wherever there's judgement there's noise, and more than you think. In the criminal justice system, we saw variability between judges in the severity of their sentencing for equivalent crimes. In business, you may have a company where someone in hiring says, 'bring everyone in, I think they're great' and you end up with a company full of people who shouldn't be there.

Legal scholar & behavioral economist; Obama administration official; "Nudge" theory pioneer

We have a lot of phobias around algorithms. Sometimes this is justified, but in the main, it's like being afraid of cockroaches or spiders. Algorithms aren't spiders or cockroaches, they're an instrument and sometimes will outperform human judgement terrifically well – and sometimes won't. If lives are on the line and it turns out an algorithm reduces the noise of the human decision maker and the bias, then the moral case for using the algorithm starts to look really strong.

Legal scholar & behavioral economist; Obama administration official; "Nudge" theory pioneer

You can think of the human mind as a measuring instrument. We're making judgements all the time and studies show that on a day-to-day basis, when presented with the same evidence, our judgements may be different. If you see the mind as a measuring instrument, you start to see it as a scale, a bafflingly variable and noisy scale.

Legal scholar & behavioral economist; Obama administration official; "Nudge" theory pioneer