14 Quotes by John Harvey-Jones

Go for civil engineering, because civil engineering is the branch of engineering which teaches you the most about managing people. Managing people is a skill which is very, very useful and applies almost regardless of what you do.

Planning is an unnatural process; it is much more fun to do something. The nicest thing about not planning is that failure comes as a complete surprise, rather than being preceded by a period of worry and depression.

If you are doing things the same way as two years ago, you are almost certainly doing them wrong.

In order to solve problems, information has to be shared; and not only information, but doubts, fears and questions.

Good business should contain something for both parties.

Problems can only be solved by the people who have them. You have to try and coax them and love them into seeing ways in which they can help themselves.

The task of industry is continuously, year on year, to make more and better things, using less of the world’s resources.

It is the responsibility of leadership and management to give opportunities and put demands on people which enable them to grow as human beings in their work environment.

It horrifies me that ethics is only an optional extra at Harvard Business School.