FORD

Posted on September 16, 2011 by Ronald T. Brown, Ph.D.

Henry Ford was a great leader and entrepeneur - but what many people don't know is the Ford Motor Company was not his first company. One of his earlier companies even went bankrupt. Henry, like most successful business leaders, did not just go from one success to another. He learned from both his mistakes and successes.

Here are a few of Henry Ford's words of wisdom:

1. Our customers can have a Model T in any color they like, as long as it's black.
2. Asking "Who ought to be the boss?" is like asking "Who ought to be the tenor in the quartet?" Obviously, the man who can sing tenor.
3. The greatest thing we can produce is character. Everything else can be taken away from us.
4. A business that makes nothing but money is a poor kind of business.
5. Chop your own wood and it will warm you twice.
6. A market is never saturated with a good product, but it is very quickly saturated with a bad one.
7. Competition is the great teacher.
8. The unhappiest man on earth is the one who has nothing to do.
9. If there is any secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person's point of view and see things from that person's angle as well as your own.
10. One of the greatest discoveries a man makes, one of his surprises, is to find he can do what he was afraid he couldn't do.
11. Anyone who stops learning is old, whether at twenty or eighty. Anyone who keeps learning stays young. The greatest thing in life is to keep your mind young.
12. Wealth, like happiness, is never attained when sought after directly. It comes as a by-product of providing a useful service.
13. Quality means doing it right when no one is looking.
14. The air is full of ideas. They are knocking you in the head all the time. You only have to know what you want, then forget it, and go about your business. Suddenly, the solution will come into your mind. It was there all the time.
15. Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.
16. Paying attention to simple little things that most men neglect makes a few men rich.
17. Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right.
18. Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.  

(Adapted from article in EagleZine - Dr. Tom Hill)