Clayton Christensen Quotes

I know how to make stuff happen, how to create wealth, create jobs, create investment.

Smart companies fail because they do everything right. They cater to high-profit-margin customers and ignore the low end of the market, where disruptive innovations emerge from.

Anybody who can improve the business in the long run is a good buyer.

An adaptable company is one that captures more than its fair share of new opportunities. It's always redefining its 'core business' in ways that open up new avenues for growth.

When I hear people debate the ROI of social media? It makes me remember why so many business fail. Most businesses are not playing the marathon. They're playing the sprint. They're not worried about lifetime value and retention. They're worried about short-term goals.

Our goal is not to produce immediate results. We've been tasked with producing long-term results. That means that there's more risk in any individual thing we take on. But we still aspire to a strong return on investment.

Companies that grow for the sake of growth or that expand into areas outside their core business strategy often stumble. On the other hand, companies that build scale for the benefit of their customers and shareholders more often succeed over time.

I never lost money by turning a profit.

No CEO ever says, 'Damnit, we need to increase research!' I want to encourage them to do that.

We're looking to have the ability to come in and be able to capitalize on the marketing in order to grow the top-line. We basically leverage what has worked with our other successful acquisitions - investment in marketing, retention and student services.

If a rich person invests in a business, either directly or through stock purchases, it means business can grow and hire more people.

The emphasis on innovation and technology in our companies has resulted in a few of them establishing global benchmarks in product design and development, manufacturing practices and human resource capabilities. However, there is no room for complacency.

There are good examples of companies - Coca-Cola is one - that invested before there was a huge market in countries, and I think that ended up playing out to their benefit for decades to come.

I put £150,000 into the stage production of Grease and have got back £1.5 million so far. It has been a fantastic success.

Producers are not gamblers. They want a good return on their investment.

If companies don't think systemically enough - if they try to capture too much of the value - eventually, innovation moves somewhere else.

If GE's strategy of investment in China is wrong, it represents a loss of a billion dollars, perhaps a couple of billion dollars. If it is right, it is the future of this company for the next century.

Making new products is an easy tap for a company in a recession.

Without development there is no profit, without profit no development.

Some entrepreneurs talk of a high burn rate, high advertising rate, and so on, with no outcome, so it doesn't impress me. But an entrepreneur who has that kind of a feeling of responsibility towards his investors is somebody who will have all my support.

Executives need ample flexibility to respond to the market. That means both reducing costs and increasing innovation.

In the commercial world, you have this problem that the amount of research you can do in a company is based on how well your current business is going, whereas there actually should be an inverse relationship: when things are going worse, you should do more research.

Our continued investment in productivity will add to our margins, and you'll see that reflected in the bottom line earnings.

I took a risk and invested in SM Mall of Asia because I wanted to create something that could contribute to Philippine tourism growth.

Ideally, I want my films to work because I want the people who have invested their money to get back their investment and make profits too.