James Dyson Quotes & Sayings

Well, air-conditioning is not a good thing. — James Dyson

I'm afraid I am tidy, and I have to be because the office is open plan and my glass office door is literally always open. — James Dyson

As an engineer I'm constantly spotting problems and plotting how to solve them. — James Dyson

People will make leaps of faith and get excited by your product if you just get it in front of them. — James Dyson

Failure is so much more interesting because you learn from it. That's what we should be teaching children at school, that being successful the first time, there's nothing in it. There's no interest, you learn nothing actually. — James Dyson

China can and will be an invaluable trading partner to both the U.S. and the U.K. — James Dyson

I just think things should work properly — James Dyson

Design and technology should be the subject where mathematical brainboxes and science whizzkids turn their bright ideas into useful products. — James Dyson

You need a stubborn belief in an idea in order to see it realised. — James Dyson

In the past, the U.K. got away with selling things that weren't unusual. Now it's no use trying to export without having something that's unusual and better. — James Dyson

Everybody recognizes that if you can make very efficient electric motors, you can make a quantum leap forward. — James Dyson

Now, we don't teach children in schools to be creative. We don't teach them to experiment. We want them to fill in the right answer, tick the right answer in the box. — James Dyson

Anger is a good motivator. — James Dyson

It's the unlikely juxtaposition of creativity and logic which causes the wooliness and confusion around the term 'innovation'. Everybody wants to be innovative; many companies and ideas are proclaimed to be innovative and no one doubts that innovation is a money spinner. And, thus, we are all looking for the magic formula. Well, here you go: Creativity + Iterative Development = Innovation. — James Dyson

Companies are not ingenious, it's the people in them that are. — James Dyson

Designing aircraft and racing cars is an extremely exciting thing. — James Dyson

The way the world is going, it's technology driven. And it isn't just driven by the old super powers, it's driven by the far east and new emerging economies. — James Dyson

We should have A-levels in vocational subjects. — James Dyson

Insurance companies don't make anything. — James Dyson

Success is made of 99% failure. — James Dyson

The British judiciary needs to support intellectual property. — James Dyson

Children want the challenge of difficult tasks - just look how much better they are than their parents on a computer. — James Dyson

We should learn to live more with our climate and rely less on electricity to alter our climate. — James Dyson

Manufacturing is more than just putting parts together. It's coming up with ideas, testing principles and perfecting the engineering, as well as final assembly. — James Dyson

Anyone developing new products and new technology needs one characteristic above all else: hope. — James Dyson

I want entrepreneurs to be engineers and scientists and designers; they don't necessarily have to be Internet entrepreneurs or retail entrepreneurs. — James Dyson

I'm not into politics but I am committed to a cause: ensuring design technology and engineering stays on the U.K. curriculum, alongside science and maths - grounding abstract theory, merging the practical with the academic. — James Dyson

You don't get inspiration sitting at a drawing board or in front of your computer. — James Dyson

I imported the first Mac into England in 1984; you know, the beige box. I imported what I think were the first four that came into England. I never opened the instruction manual. That was the best thing about it. — James Dyson

Life is a mountain of solvable problems, and I enjoy that. — James Dyson

We're taught to do things the right way. But if you want to discover something that other people haven't, you need to do things the wrong way. Initiate a failure by doing something that's very silly, unthinkable, naughty, dangerous. Watching why that fails can take you on a completely different path. It's exciting, actually. To me, solving problems is a bit like a drug. You're on it, and you can't get off. — James Dyson

Having a good idea is one thing, but persuading other people to buy it is quite another. Good inventors are polymaths: they think with their hands and their brains. They're experts in design, engineering and business. — James Dyson

I own every share of my company, and I don't want to sell any of it. — James Dyson

Some people are academically inclined, some vocationally and we shouldn't penalise the latter. — James Dyson

The key to success is failure ... Success is made of 99 percent failure. — James Dyson

In order to fix it, you need a passionate anger about something that doesn't work well. — James Dyson

Enjoy failure and learn from it. You can never learn from success. — James Dyson

At school, I enjoyed playing the bassoon. I was in the orchestra and played the melody when the other boys sang hymns at prayers time. — James Dyson

I've fought court battles over my inventions before. — James Dyson

I learned that the moment you want to slow down is the moment you should accelerate. — James Dyson

I don't design down to a price. — James Dyson

I think the search engines are the new equivalent of publishing: an enabler of information. — James Dyson

I don't believe in brands. — James Dyson

Apartments are getting smaller on a whole. Houses are getting smaller. People don't need great big vacuums anymore. — James Dyson

Hire inexperience. This year we plan to hire 200 engineers - half of whom are recent grads. Young people are not burdened by years of experience. They haven't learned - or been told - what is right or wrong. With engineering, there is no tried and tested path. You try, and fail, and fix, and fail again. — James Dyson

The computer dictates how you do something, whereas with a pencil you're totally free. — James Dyson

Arbitrary benchmarks cheat kids out of a fulfilling education. — James Dyson

All our engineers are designers and all our designers are engineers. — James Dyson

Nobody wants the expenditure of a lease on a factory which lasts 21 years. You can't plan 21 years ahead. — James Dyson

Cordless vacuums are designed for quick jobs, but you need enough power to do the job; you don't want the power waning over time. — James Dyson

The wonderful thing about Apple technology is just how intuitive it is. — James Dyson

As a modern employer you have to treat people well. — James Dyson

If you want to do something different, you're going to come up against a lot of naysayers. — James Dyson

I like living on the edge. — James Dyson

I don't particularly follow the Bauhaus school of design, where you make everything into a black box - simplify it. — James Dyson

After the idea, there is plenty of time to learn the technology — James Dyson

An inventor's path is chorused with groans, riddled with fist-banging and punctuated by head scratches. — James Dyson

[In my home workshop,] generally I'm mending things, which is interesting because you learn a lot about why they broke. — James Dyson

Today, computers are almost second nature to most of us. — James Dyson

I'm not a businessman. — James Dyson

When I started off, I was working in a shed behind my house. All I had was a drill, an electric drill. That was the only machine I had. — James Dyson

We need to encourage investors to invest in high-technology startups. — James Dyson

When decisions on nuclear power stations and runways are delayed and the government dilly-dallies, people think they aren't important. — James Dyson

Beauty can come in strange forms. — James Dyson

My interest in film is sort of catholic - apart from science fiction and horror movies, I'll watch almost everything. — James Dyson

If robots are to clean our homes, they'll have to do it better than a person. — James Dyson

There is no such thing as a quantum leap. There is only dogged persistence - and in the end you make it look like a quantum leap. — James Dyson

A lot of people give up when the world seems to be against them, but that's the point when you should push a little harder. I use the analogy of running a race. It seems as though you can't carry on, but if you just get through the pain barrier, you'll see the end and be okay. Often, just around the corner is where the solution will happen. — James Dyson

Britain's great strength is its innovative, design and engineering natural ability and we're not using it. — James Dyson

So I think the winners in recession are the people who produce new technology that does things better, which people really want. — James Dyson

If you really want to improve technology, if you want things to work better and be better, you've got to protect the person who spends a lot of effort, money, and time developing that new technology. — James Dyson

What I've learned from running is that the time to push hard is when you're hurting like crazy and you want to give up. Success is often just around the corner. — James Dyson

I think if you have to pay for your education, you worry very seriously about you're going to do when you've got your degree. — James Dyson

Stumbling upon the next great invention in an 'ah-ha!' moment is a myth. — James Dyson

I just want things to work properly. — James Dyson

Don't listen to experts. — James Dyson

Business is constantly changing, constantly evolving. — James Dyson

I think people are realizing that engineering and science are extremely good degrees to get and you'll be very highly paid once you've got them. — James Dyson

Enjoy failure and learn from it. You never learn from success. — James Dyson

The Web is fascinating and transformative, but it's an easy, flashy, get-rich-quick option to the hard graft of proper industry. — James Dyson

Fear is always a good motivator. — James Dyson

Some of the best inventive moments are born out of 'wrong thinking'. Most people start with the right way so they all follow the same path. The wrong way will lead to mistakes from which you can learn and create new discoveries-the kind of original ideas that come to life when we dare to be different, keep an open mind, and have no fear of failure. — James Dyson

The important thing is to learn from mistakes - something graduates are adept at. Our graduate engineers are working on new technology - from uncharted applications for our digital motor, to a new take on the hand dryer. With an unhindered mind, nothing is off limits. — James Dyson

In the digital age of 'overnight' success stories such as Facebook, the hard slog is easily overlooked. — James Dyson

One of the most fun inventions of my lifetime is the Mini. — James Dyson

It is an extreme perversion of capitalism if you can trade in something before you have even paid for it. — James Dyson

When you can't compete on cost, compete on quality. — James Dyson

The media thinks that you have to make science sexy and concentrate on themes such as rivalry and the human issues. — James Dyson

The one size fits all approach of standardized testing is convenient but lazy. — James Dyson

There's nothing wrong with things taking time. — James Dyson

Everyone gets knocked back, no one rises smoothly to the top without hindrance. The ones who succeed are those who say, right, let's give it another go. — James Dyson

Everyone has ideas. They may be too busy or lack the confidence or technical ability to carry them out. But I want to carry them out. It is a matter of getting up and doing it. — James Dyson

Engineering undergraduates should not be charged fees. They should receive grants, not student loans, and the government will get the money back long-term from increased exports. — James Dyson

People buy products if they're better. — James Dyson

I've obviously used fans - I wouldn't say all my life, because we couldn't afford them when I was young, but from my 20s and onwards we've had to use fans. And I've always loathed them. Everything about them. The way you adjust them, getting them at the angle you want. Carrying them. Cleaning them. The danger of putting your finger in them. — James Dyson

What I often do is just think of a completely obtuse thing to do, almost the wrong thing to do. That often works because you start a different approach, something no one has tried. — James Dyson

Goodness, I know nothing about nuclear energy. — James Dyson

Most robotic vacuum cleaners don't see their environment, have little suction, and don't clean properly. They are gimmicks. We've been developing a unique 360 vision system that lets our robot see where it is, where it has been, and where it is yet to clean. Vision, combined with our high speed digital motor and cyclone technology, is the key to achieving a high performing robot vacuum - a genuine labor saving device. — James Dyson

Emerging markets are hugely important. — James Dyson

If you can't be unconventional, be obtuse. Be deliberately obtuse, because there are 5 billion people out there thinking in train tracks, and thinking what they have been taught to think. — James Dyson