B. C. Forbes

B. C. Forbes
Bertie Charles Forbeswas a Scottish-born American financial journalist and author who founded Forbes magazine...
NationalityScottish
ProfessionJournalist
Date of Birth14 May 1880
journey men return
The man who is cocksure that he has arrived is ready for the return journey.
art kindness atmosphere
What one thing does the world need most today-apart, that is, from the all-inclusive thing we call righteousness? Aren't you inclined to agree that what this old world needs is just the art of being kind? Every time I visit a factory or any other large business concern, I find myself trying to diagnose whether the atmosphere is one of kindliness or the reverse. And somehow, if there is palpably lacking that spirit of kindness, the owners ... have fallen short of achieving 24-carat success no matter how imposing the financial balance sheet may be.
friendship loyalty true-friend
The way to make a true friend is to be one. Friendship implies loyalty, esteem, cordiality, sympathy, affection, readiness to aid, to help, to stick, to fight for, if need be. ... Radiate friendship and it will return sevenfold.
littles able kind
Are you doing the kind of work you were built for, so that you can expect to be able to do very large amounts of that kind and thrive under it? Or are you doing a kind of which you can do comparatively little.
confidence men organization
Search and you will find that at the base and birth of every great business organization was an enthusiast, man consumed with earnestness of purpose, with confidence in his powers, with faith in the worthwhileness of his endeavors.
happiness suicidal selfishness
We must learn that to enjoy happiness we must conscientiously and continuously seek to spread happiness. Selfishness is suicidal to happiness.
sports adventure destiny
...the incontestable truth is that America has been built up by optimists, not by pessimists, but by men possessing courage, confidence in the nation's destiny, by men willing to adventure, to shoulder risks terrifying to the timid.
hands europe feet
It is not a case of whether we want to wash our hands of Europe or want to help her to regain her feet. The troubles of Europe have been laid on our doorstep, so to speak, and will plague us, if we do nothing to cure them, whether we like it or not.
yield satisfaction bargaining
The bargain that yields mutual satisfaction is the only one that is apt to be repeated.
encouragement real people
I have never seen people who could do real work except under the stimulus of encouragement and enthusiasm and the approval of the people for whom they are working.
running animal long
That which is useless dies. Animals that fail to serve some useful purpose in the scheme of things slowly but surely become extinct. Let any part of the human body cease to perform its ordained function, and it withers-as when an arm is kept long in a sling. This same decree, that nothing useless is permitted to survive, runs through the mind of the industrial world.
ideas machines raw-materials
An idea, like a machine, must have power applied to it before it can accomplish anything.
attitude sight interesting
Whenever possible, I like to have the supreme head of a company show me over the works. It is extremely illuminating to note the attitude of workers towards their boss, and equally interesting to note the attitude towards the workers. It is tragic to notice how many chief executives of large concerns are absolutely unknown, even by sight, to the rank and file of their workers.
country new-york mistake
It is a great mistake for presidents and other leading executives of organizations having branches throughout the country to chain themselves to their desks at headquarters and send out rigid instructions to those in charge of distant branches and offices. Because a man sits in a palatial office in New York or Chicago or Philadelphia or Detroit and draws a big salary, it does not necessarily follow that he knows better than the man on the spot what ought to be done.... Paul, Caesar, Napoleon did not merely sit at home and issue long-range instructions.