A biography for Max McKeownhasn’t been written yet.
“If there are no new ideas, there is no innovation. And if there is no creativity, there are no new ideas.”
“The psychology of individual creativity is about at least three different things. First, creativity is about thinking differently. Second, creativity is about feeling differently. Third, creativity is about focusing, or committing, differently.”
“The best things happen to those who don't wait.”
“The smart strategist allows strategy to be shaped by events. Good reactions can make great strategy. Strategy involves competition of goals, and the risk is the difference between those goals and the ability of the organization to achieve them. So part of the risk is created by the strategy.”
“Problem-insight precedes solution insight. Someone has to recognise a problem before they start to solve the problem...”
“Strategy and culture should have breakfast together.”
“Pushing your limits is what allows you to grow stronger, so if you find yourself feeling passive, it can make sense to dial it up a little. Get moving. Accomplish something small. Do something you enjoy. Embrace what moves you. And start again.”
“All we've got is Now. Life, composed of a billion moments, from our first to our last thoughts.”
“If you change the rules of the market, you can be more successful than your competitors.”
“You have to learn to see the gold in dirt, which means that you try to spot people with potential as well as ideas that have potential.”
“Embrace the perpetual joy of moving perpetually forward.”
“Innovation is deviance which means that the rebellious personality is a natural resource for practical creativity. As an innovator, you need to reject the old to establish a new, better, status quo. And one of the most powerful sources of newness is the rebel or maverick, mind.”
“You get told to look before you leap. But if you are too careful you may end up just looking.”
“If life is fast, live faster.”
“Strategy is about shaping the future.”
“The founder of Dell found ways of delivering Hewlett Packard's most profitable products for much lower prices but forgot to deliver their quality so within a few years had fallen behind again. Ideas need constant renewal. A great idea will never be perfect and will never work perfectly in all markets and all seasons.”
“Nowists are more likely to experience joy because they embrace the uncertainty of existence. They are switched on by the uncertain stuff of human life and come alive when faced with life at its most uncontrollable.”
“Nowists get off on getting on, so they run when they could walk, jump when they could sit and dance when they could sit at the edge. They regret inaction, so simply act.”
“Change is not overcoming inertia as much as it is redirecting, guiding, tweaking what already is and what has already happened. We must believe that we can make choices and that those choices can alter the future.”
“If you don't start, you're finished.”