Jason Fried Quotes

Do you have a real interest in people who work for you? Most good leaders have that - it's hard to get someone to follow you if they feel like you hate 'em.

If you believe, as I do, that your employees truly are your most valuable asset, you will do whatever you can to help them do their jobs as well as possible.

I can't tell you how many thousands of small moments that I've had with employees in our company that have been nothing more than a one-on-one. I'll see the baggage-services person, he or she is by himself. I'll pull them off to the side and have a 15-minute conversation about their history, their life, that kind of thing.

We would rather have our employees running our business.

Isn't it ironic that pay, perks, and benefits all cost your company at the bottom line, but authentic recognition, especially when it's most unexpected, costs very little and gives the most impressive return on investment?

I'll take fifty percent efficiency to get one hundred percent loyalty.

When leaders throughout an organization take an active, genuine interest in the people they manage, when they invest real time to understand employees at a fundamental level, they create a climate for greater morale, loyalty, and, yes, growth.

We invest very heavily in the employees. We get the return, and the employee gets the return if they stay with us for a while. So, we focus on people that will commit to us for the long run.

We take such good care of our employees. What I do is think about what I would want my employer to be like. We started helping our employees with every facet of their lives, and our HR problems went from A to Z in reverse.

Most CEOs walk around the office like we own the place, without realizing that the place itself isn't worth owning: a business's value comes from the people who walk out the door every night, who have to decide each morning whether to walk back in. One of the simplest things you can do as a leader is honor their choice and appreciate their work.

When you're managing a large number of people, you learn that incentives matter tremendously. You really want people to be rewarded for doing the right thing for the customers and the organization.

Start with good people, lay out the rules, communicate with your employees, motivate them and reward them. If you do all those things effectively, you can't miss.

Taking care of your employees is extremely important and very, very visible.

As a CEO, you get sucked into dealing with all the tasks of being a CEO. There's a big meeting, a big discussion, and you get into all the big issues, which is your job. But what CEOs often lose sight of is that it's all about the people who work for you. For every 1,000 decisions, 999 were being made when I was not in the room.

Understanding your employee's perspective can go a long way towards increasing productivity and happiness.

You can employ men and hire hands to work for you, but you must win their hearts to have them work with you.

Everyone talks about building a relationship with your customer. I think you build one with your employees first.

The supermarket chain Whole Foods has quite a radical employee empowerment program, where employees get to decide whether another employee can work in their team or not. If they think this person's a slacker, doesn't have good ideas, they can vote and say, no, we don't want this person to be working with us on the vegetable aisle.

The employer generally gets the employees he deserves.

Customers are using BetterWorks in a number of creative ways to reward and incentivize employees.

People are definitely a company's greatest asset. It doesn't make any difference whether the product is cars or cosmetics. A company is only as good as the people it keeps.

Employees who believe that management is concerned about them as a whole person - not just an employee - are more productive, more satisfied, more fulfilled. Satisfied employees mean satisfied customers, which leads to profitability.

Take time to appreciate employees and they will reciprocate in a thousand ways.

Internal marketing is probably much more important than external marketing. That's even more true today than it's ever been.

We let folks know we're interested in them and that they're vital to us. cause they are.