Bloomberg by Bloomberg

“Our style then was pretty much the same as today. We took the problem and broke it down into little, manageable, digestible pieces.”

“Think logically and dispassionately about what you'd like to do. Work out all steps of the process-the entire what, when, where, why, and how. Then, sit down after you are absolutely positive you know it cold, and write it out. There's an old saying, "If you can't write it, you don't know it." Try it. The first paragraph invariably stops you short. "Now why did we want this particular thing?" you'll find yourself asking. "Where did we think the resources would come from?" "And what makes us think others-the suppliers, the customers, the potential rivals-are going to cooperate?" On and on, you'll find yourself asking the most basic questions you hadn't focused on before taking pen to paper.”

“If you have to compete based on capital, the giant always wins. If you can compete based on smarts, flexibility, and willingness to give more for less, then small companies like Bloomberg clearly have an advantage.”

“Selling is the only process we run simultaneously with development from the start. That gives us feedback as we build-and makes the customers part of the evolution process (they come to believe it's their product). This strategy may not be without risks, but I've always thought it ridiculous to make the wedding arrangements before agreeing to the marriage.”

“Life, I've found, works the following way: Daily, you're presented with many small and surprising opportunities. Sometimes you seize one that takes you to the top. Most, though, if valuable at all, take you only a little way. To succeed, you must string together many small incremental advances-rather than count on hitting the lottery jackpot once.”

“I've never understood why everybody else doesn't do the same thing-make himself indispensable on the job.”

“Sure we're inflexible, if that means we don't react every time a news article claims a competitor's "to-be-introduced" product will be our downfall. But we change. We do things today we said "never" to years ago-and we no longer do others that were our sine qua non then. Our customers, resources, and opportunities constantly shift. Our policies do too-when and at the speed we want them to, not just because we're being goaded by some outsider who doesn't have to deal with human beings, pay bills, or suffer the consequences of a hastily made wrong decision.”

“While you're reading this, we're thinking about how our competitors are plotting to take the food from our children's mouths. They must be attempting to beat our quality, provide better functionability, undercut our reputation, and mislead us as to their direction. And if they aren't, they should be.”

“we do have to face the issue of someone who just can't do the job. Very seldom do we have the stomach for the process. But that's what management's all about. What are we doing with the bottom 10 percent? Do we as managers have a plan to improve those employees' productivity? Are there better places for them in our company? Have we sat with them and attempted to address their problems, improve their attitudes, provide counseling, discover personal problems we can help with, retrain them? And if nothing works, after all that, while we're doing well and can afford to be generous, no matter how distasteful facing the inevitable may be, have we exercised our responsibility to upgrade our staff? Management's obligation is to all of us in the organization. We sink or swim together, and when someone's not carrying his or her weight, everyone in the company suffers. It's painful, but nature is filled with examples of extinct species that didn't improve the breed. We don't want to be one of them.”

“In most of our new ventures, a similar process takes place. We don't appoint a manager at the beginning. We simply throw everyone interested into the deep end of the pool, as it were, and stand back. It becomes obvious very quickly who the best "swimmers" are. We just watch who people go to for help and advice. And later, when we formalize a management appointment, no one's ever surprised.”

“we don't resist multiple cross-product responsibility. We don't have problems blending short-term performance with long-term growth and development. And so far, we're not obsolete because the difference between those timid, failing companies and Bloomberg is people-from top to bottom.”

“"You do what's right for your project and don't worry about the rest of the relationship," John said. "Each decision has to stand on its own."”

“T. Boone Pickens, Carl Icahn, and Ron Perelman”

“Limited supply and great demand equal high prices.”

“Gustav Levy,”

“"We've got the best people in the world working here. All of them think they walk on water. All of them are workaholics. Once they come, they stay for the rest of their lives because they love it. They've built the better mousetrap. They're doing somethingimportant. Giving the little guy the information he needs to fight. Having fun. Staying ahead."”

“delegated day-today company management to trusted lieutenants so I was free to travel.”

“Woody Allen once said that 80 percent of life is just showing up. I believe that. You can never have complete mastery over your existence. You can't choose the advantages you start out with, and you certainly can't pick your genetic intelligence level. But you can control how hard you work.”

“(Joseph Pulitzer, William Randolph Hearst, Henry Luce, B.C. Forbes, Ted Turner)”

“company-it's the "doers," the lean and hungry ones, those with ambition in their eyes and fire in their bellies and no notions of social caste, who go the furthest and achieve the most.”

“We think those that lasted were the companies with philosophies and management practices that were appropriate for the time, well articulated to employees and clients, and consistently applied. Through both good and bad periods, staying power, we believe, requires team leadership in a constant direction, one that the organization understands and accepts. The winners have this kind of leadership. We hope we do!”

“all people had their livelihoods at stake in the world of commerce. How people earned, saved, and spent their money helped determine prosperity, economic depression, wars, and elections.”

“Young people starting their careers today are too impatient for current compensation, at the expense of continuing their education and giving their jobs a chance. Get back to work. Forget the money today. There's plenty of time for that later. Novices should go to the best firm they can get into-and then shut up and learn those few things they don't happen to know already.”

“"We're out of control!" I would shout, as each software bug surfaced. "We're going to be out of business if this continues!" (I still say the same things today.)”

“Start with a small piece; fulfill one goal at a time, on time. Do it with all things in life. Sit down and learn to read one-syllable words. If you try to read Chaucer in elementary school, you'll never accomplish anything. You can't jumpto the end game right away, in computers, politics, love, or any other aspect of life.”

“As an entrepreneur, I've learned to know what I don't know, get access to the people who do know, and then study hard.”

“The more you try to do, the more life you'll have.”

“Did I want to risk an embarrassing and costly failure? Absolutely. Happiness for me has always been the thrill of the unknown, trying something that everyone says can't be done, feeling that gnawing pit in my stomach that says "Danger ahead."”

“As a practical matter, constantly enhanceyour skills, put in as many hours as possible, and make tactical plans for the next few steps. Then, based on what actually occurs, look one more move ahead and adjust the plan. Take lots of chances, and make lots of individual, spur-of-the-moment decisions.”

“"Sounds like this guy Bloomberg is doing to financial information what American Airlines and United Airlines electronic reservations systems have done to the travel business: become influential by getting everybody hooked onto their data. "”

“"Morgan Stanley type," an (A.G.) "Becker person," a "KL-er" (Kuhn Loeb),”

“Ginny Clark, Bruce Hackett, and James Massey, who all became Wall Street luminaries”

“We had picked just the right project. It was big enough to be useful, small enough to be possible.”

“Every significant advance I or my company has ever made has been evolutionary rather than revolutionary: small earned steps-not big lucky hits.”

“all we ask is that they come up with as many new ideas as they can think of (no matter how "crazy"), and do their best on the projects we assign. If a concept is flawed, the blame and pain rest with me. The credit for whatever's right goes to them.”

“From John D. Rockefeller to Sam Walton (and ultimately to Mike Bloomberg, I hope), great financial success comes from starting businesses with concrete products in the real world, building jobs, creating value, and helping people.”

“They all end the same way, before they start. Either they believe in me, trust me, and are willing to take the riskthat I will deliver success, or they don't. It's that simple. There's no haggling. I don't negotiate.”

“we as a society must find a way to better engage our children in the joys of learning.”

“You don't know exactly what you're going to deliver. You can't predict in what order things will be done. You have no real idea who will purchase it. Why bother gazing into the crystal ball? If you're flexible, you'll do it when it makes sense, not before.”

“The day we turned off the insert's life support, Bill and I made sure everyone worked extra late on the new venture, the subscription version of Bloomberg Personal. More important than any publication is our organization; we didn't want people to feel their jobs were in danger, or that they would be penalized for conceiving of or working on a "failure."”