Robert G. Allen Quotes

Luck is not a business model.

I may say that this is the greatest factor: the way in which the expedition is equipped, the way in which every difficulty is foreseen, and precautions taken for meeting or avoiding it. Victory awaits him who has everything in order, luck, people call it. Defeat is certain for him who has neglected to take the necessary precautions in time, this is called bad luck.

There's nothing wrong with a plan, but remember Von Moltke's famous dictum that no plan survives first contact with the enemy. The danger is a plan that seduces us into thinking failure is impossible and adaptation is unnecessary - a kind of ‘Titanic' plan, unsinkable (until it hits the iceberg).

Betting on the success of innovative technologies in the marketplace can carry all the uncertainty and risk that betting on the next card in the deck does at a blackjack table in Las Vegas. There is a factor of randomness that must be factored in, but precisely how to do so is anyone's guess.

Luck is not scalable. Luck is not a national strategy.

Fail to prepare, prepare to fail.

Then you realize that the preparation and the planning of this small army of people trying to head to the single aim of creating a work that's going to excite people is very risky. Of course, the odds are that it's not going to work out because there are too many possibilities of it going wrong.

You have to make smart decisions, but you never know what will happen in the future.

You cannot expect victory and plan for defeat.

Fail to plan, plan to fail.

Hope is not a strategy. Luck is not a factor. Fear is not an option.

The seven Ps: Proper Planning and Preparation Prevent Piss-Poor Performance

But to me the bottom line is the more education you can give yourself, and the more preparation you can do, the less chance of failing.

You can measure opportunity with the same yardstick that measures the risk involved. They go together.

It doesn't always happen according to the way you have planned things out but I feel if you have covered most of the aspects, it does help out there in the middle.

Starting a company, your success is going to be very dependent on how you adapt. You're going to make decisions, you're going to make bets; most of them are going to turn out to be wrong.

The game is a game, and things happen, and you can't always execute your plan as perfectly as you'd like to.

The biggest risk is not taking any risk... In a world that changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.

You play. You win. You play. You lose. You play.

We cannot assume that past successes will insure future successes.

Any plan conceived in moderation must fail when the circumstances are set in extremes.

Technology is like the ante in a poker game. It is the price you pay to play the game. But it doesn't mean you are going to win.

Relying on luck … does not constitute a policy.

Human affairs are governed by such a variety of whimsical circumstances, that we should always be prepared to stand the shock of that disappointment which the best concerted measures are constantly subject to.

You can never assume that something is going to do well.