Ben Horowitz on Excellence Quotes

"You must be willing to kill your darlings to achieve excellence."

"Management is the process of making people better through the work they do."

"If you want to be a great leader, you have to be a great listener."

"The only thing that matters is the result."

"There are no shortcuts to knowledge, especially knowledge gained from personal experience."

"If you don't treat the people who leave well, the people who stay will never trust you."

"The difference between a good product and a great product is the attention to detail."

"The pursuit of excellence is a lifelong journey, not a destination."

"You can’t just tell people what to do; you have to tell them why it matters."

"You have to be able to see the world as it is, not as you want it to be."

"The most difficult part of management is managing your own psychology."

"The best way to predict the future is to build it."

"Excellence is not a destination; it is a way of being."

"The hard thing isn’t setting a big, hairy, audacious goal. The hard thing is laying people off when you miss the big goal."

"The only way to do great work is to love what you do."

"The most important thing for a leader is to be authentic."

"Culture is the way that employees make decisions when the CEO is not in the room."

"The first rule of entrepreneurial leverage is: if you can’t trust someone, you can’t give them any responsibility."

"The most important skill for a CEO is the ability to communicate effectively."

"In times of peace, the CEO must be a cheerleader. In times of war, the CEO must be a general."

"A great culture is the result of thousands of small decisions that align with a core set of values."

"Focus on where you are going, not on what you are afraid of."

"If you want to build a great company, you have to be willing to do the things that don't scale first."

"Hire for strength, not lack of weakness."

"The best leaders are those who are constantly learning and evolving."

"Excellence is the result of high intentions, sincere effort, and intelligent execution."

"What you do is who you are."

"If you don't have a culture of excellence, you will have a culture of mediocrity by default."

"A culture of excellence is built on a foundation of trust and accountability."

"Take care of the people, the products, and the profits—in that order."

"Every time you make the hard, correct decision you become a bit more courageous and every time you make the easy, wrong decision you become a bit more cowardly."

"The hardest thing is not the technical challenge; it’s the human challenge."

"If you are going to be excellent, you have to be willing to be misunderstood for long periods of time."