Malcolm Forbes Quotes & Sayings

There is just no way any management with any intelligence and foresight cannot recognize the value of a corporate image. It is the best, single marketable investment that a company can make. — Malcolm Forbes

The more sympathy you give, the less you need. — Malcolm Forbes

Occasionally indulging in a do-nothing day is more than worth the price. — Malcolm Forbes

Hopeless cases: Executives who assert themselves by saying No when they should say Yes. — Malcolm Forbes

Since you have to do the things you have to do, be wise enough to do some of the things you want to do. — Malcolm Forbes

Meaningful truths are never newly discovered; they're just uncovered anew. — Malcolm Forbes

When you catch what you're after, it's gone. — Malcolm Forbes

It's much more profitable to sell investing advice than to follow it. — Malcolm Forbes

Those who enjoy responsibility usually get it; those who merely like exercising authority usually lose it. — Malcolm Forbes

Keeping score of old scores and scars, getting even and one-upping, always makes you less than you are. — Malcolm Forbes

In the long run, a short cut seldom is. — Malcolm Forbes

If you do not know what you're doing stacked on his desk, a dozen colleagues Initially sticks with a large number of papers and pass them. In case of doubt, the way in. — Malcolm Forbes

If you've had a good time playing the game, you're a winner even if you lose. — Malcolm Forbes

The best buy by way of management is brains-at any price. — Malcolm Forbes

All work and no play makes jack. With enough jack, Jack needn't be a dull boy. — Malcolm Forbes

If you want understanding try giving some. — Malcolm Forbes

Security isn't securities. It's knowing that someone cares whether you are or cease to be. — Malcolm Forbes

Crime in the city streets is more than a political issue. It's a too rampant fact ... In Indianapolis they have come up with a most sensible, affordable approach to the problem. Policemen are assigned their police patrol cars for personal use after hours. They are encouraged to use the police car while taking the family shopping, to the movies, and everywhere one takes one's family. As a result, says the Police Chief's assistant, we may have as many as 400 cars on the street instead of 100 or so per shift. [And] the presence of the police car obviously indicates the proximity of policemen. — Malcolm Forbes

Putting pen to paper lights more fire than matches ever will — Malcolm Forbes

There are more fakers in business than in jail. — Malcolm Forbes

The great city of New York wields more of the destinies of this great nation that five times the population of any other portion of the country. — Malcolm Forbes

A bore is someone who persists in holding his own views after we have enlightened him with ours. — Malcolm Forbes

Speaking of birthdays, our firstborn [recently turned 2]. As parents sometimes fondly do, we reminisced a bit about his early days on earth-the excitement, the wonder, the fears when we brought him home. His every squeak or squawk we were sure heralded some terrible crisis; I tested the warmth of formulas from dusk to dawn, it seemed. We were so germ-conscious my wife even sterilized the skin of the oranges before squeezing them. How firstborns ever survive their parents' attentions is beyond me. However, they do, and he did, and, in spite of our efforts, he turned out to be quite a good guy. — Malcolm Forbes

People who stare deserve the looks they get. — Malcolm Forbes

Speculator: One who bought stocks that went down. — Malcolm Forbes

Drinking more often brings out the best in the good than the worst in the bad. — Malcolm Forbes

At the heart of any good business is a chief executive officer with one. — Malcolm Forbes

The key to success is not through achievement, but through enthusiasm. — Malcolm Forbes

When one seeks assurance, there's none from those who respond, Now, don't you worry about a thing. If you weren't worried, you wouldn't have asked. If you are concerned, it's nice to know that those you query are, too. I'll take a worrier any day over a platitudinous reassurer. — Malcolm Forbes

No one ever dies wishing they'd spent more time at the office. — Malcolm Forbes

Diamonds are nothing more than chunks of coal that stuck to their jobs. — Malcolm Forbes

I make more money selling advice than following it — Malcolm Forbes

Accepting blame when it's not really due sometimes makes the point better. — Malcolm Forbes

Age isn't important until you run out of it. — Malcolm Forbes

Most oldsters are fascinated by the Future, while the young love to look back to earlier days, especially their own. — Malcolm Forbes

Everybody has to be somebody to somebody to be anybody. — Malcolm Forbes

It's so much easier to suggest solutions when you don't know too much about the problem. — Malcolm Forbes

I don't waste too much time philosophizing about wealth, I just recommend it to everyone. — Malcolm Forbes

It's great to arrive, but the trip's most always most of the fun. — Malcolm Forbes

When those with ability at their job get to thinking they can't be done without, they're already on their way out. — Malcolm Forbes

When you cease to dream you cease to live. — Malcolm Forbes

Men who never get carried away should be. — Malcolm Forbes

Where you're from only matters in relation to where you are. — Malcolm Forbes

To seduce most anyone, ask for and listen to his opinion. — Malcolm Forbes

Looking the part helps get the chance to fill it. But if you fill the part, it matters not if you look it. — Malcolm Forbes

He who says he never needs help, most does. — Malcolm Forbes

Few businessmen are capable of being in politics, they don't understand the democratic process, they have neither the tolerance or the depth it takes. Democracy isn't a business. — Malcolm Forbes

It's never a good deal when only one party thinks it is. — Malcolm Forbes

The richest person in the world - in fact, all the riches in the world - couldn't provide you with anything like the endless, incredible loot available in your local library. You can measure the awareness, the breadth and the wisdom of a civilization, a nation, a people by the priority given to preserving these repositories of all that we are, all that we were, or will be. Our libraries are being eroded alarmingly by inflation. It behooves us - all of us - to stop the rot by the application of that prime preserver - money. — Malcolm Forbes

Being right half the time beats being half-right all the time. — Malcolm Forbes

Never hire someone who knows less than you do about what he's hired to do. — Malcolm Forbes

Money isn't everything as long as you have enough. — Malcolm Forbes

Generous gestures yield the most when that isn't their purpose. — Malcolm Forbes

Those carried away by power are soon carried away. — Malcolm Forbes

Once you've given advice to someone, you're obligated. — Malcolm Forbes

The biggest mistake people make in life is not trying to make a living at doing what they most enjoy. — Malcolm Forbes

Nobody can make anybody be someone he or she doesn't want to be. — Malcolm Forbes

You can't fool the mirror-what you see is what you are. — Malcolm Forbes

After the fact, our hearts always go out to the fallen Goliaths. Yet we invariably root for their Davids. Until they're winners. — Malcolm Forbes

SM is an abbreviation of both stock market and sadomasochism
and there are those who think they are one and the same. — Malcolm Forbes

Why, just a couple of economic seasons ago, was idle cash considered an indication of bad management or lazy management? Because it meant that management didn't have this money out at work ... Now look. Presto! A new fashion! Cash is back in! Denigrating liquidity has dropped quicker than hemlines. A management is now saluted if it has some cash, some liquidity, doesn't have to go to the money market at huge interest rates to get the wherewithal to keep going and growing. Along with Ben Franklin, my father and your father would understand and applaud this new economic fashion ... — Malcolm Forbes

How to succeed? Try hard enough. — Malcolm Forbes

Wars almost never end the way starters had in mind. — Malcolm Forbes

To live long and achieve happiness, cultivate the art of radiating happiness. — Malcolm Forbes

A man can't do more than he can - but he can at least do that much. — Malcolm Forbes

Scientists ofttimes have the greatest faith in a higher power. The more they dig into, establish facts and figures, the more they marvel about the mystery of it all. — Malcolm Forbes

Meanness demeans the demeaner far more than the demeaned. — Malcolm Forbes

As you get older there shouldn't be anything you won't try. The payoff is that you open up whole new avenues that are fun. It's a misinterpretation of life to live it only in preparation for the next one. To subordinate the one you've got to an indefinite next round is foolish. It's a waste of this life not to live this life. What's next is anybody's guess. — Malcolm Forbes

None of my other investments give me the joy that autographs do because they make me feel that I am holding a piece of history in my hands. — Malcolm Forbes

If you can read and don't, you're dumb. — Malcolm Forbes

There's one post-Christmas chore I love-writing thank-you letters ... Lots of companies for many reasonable reasons, I guess, have a policy against sending even Christmas cards, never mind things, at Christmastime. But our clan gets a big kick out of opening the Warner-Lambert box containing an assortment of their wares; we argue over which of the boys is to get the Union Oil Co. necktie [and] all the holiday long we play the marvelous Christmas music sent by Goodyear ... None of these things means that Forbes or Forbeses have been had. But all of us like being thought of. — Malcolm Forbes

A hug's a happy thing while a shrug's so often destructive. — Malcolm Forbes

Nothing is sometimes the right thing to say. — Malcolm Forbes

Pay your people the least possible and you'll get from them the same. — Malcolm Forbes

If you have a job without aggravations, you don't have a job. — Malcolm Forbes

Things there are no solution to: Inflation, bureaucracy & dandruff. — Malcolm Forbes

It doesn't take much of a rule to measure a mean man. — Malcolm Forbes

At today's prices for medicines, doctors and hospitals-if the latter are available at any price-only millionaires can afford to be hurt or sick and pay for it. Very few people want socialized medicine in the U.S. But pressure for it is going to appear with the same hurricane force as the demand for pollution control if the medicine men and hospital operators don't take soon some Draconian measures ... At the present rate of doctor fees and hospital costs under Medicare and Medicaid plans [taxpayers] are shovelling in billions with nothing but escalation in sight. — Malcolm Forbes

The top people of the biggest companies are, surprisingly, often the nicest ones in their company I'm not sure, though, if they got there because they were good guys or that they're now good guys because they can afford to be. — Malcolm Forbes

Authority's for sharing only when the sharer is sure of his (or hers). — Malcolm Forbes

A Tax Loophole: A deduction that the other guy gets. — Malcolm Forbes

A little reciprocity goes a long way. — Malcolm Forbes

One thing that previous practice doesn't always make perfect: Marriage. — Malcolm Forbes

We'd all like to be taken for what we'd like to be. — Malcolm Forbes

All too often we say of a man doing a good job that he is indispensable. A flattering canard, as so many disillusioned and retired and fired have discovered when the world seems to keep on turning without them. In business, a man can come nearest to indispensability by being dispensable in his current job. How can a man move up to new responsibilities if he is the only one able to handle his present tasks? It matters not how small or large the job you now have, if you have trained no one to do it as well, you're not available; you've made your promotion difficult if not impossible. — Malcolm Forbes

I think the foremost quality - there's no success without it - is really loving what you do. If you love it, you do it well, and there's no success if you don't do well what you're working at. — Malcolm Forbes

One cannot walk into an April day in a negative way. With spring, each man's plans and hopes result in new efforts, fresh actions. All of which has a mighty important bearing on the economy. There are those of us who think that the psychology of man, each and together, has more impact on markets, business, services and building and all the fabric of an economy than all the more measurable statistical indices. — Malcolm Forbes

People who say that money isn't the most important thing in the world are usually broke. — Malcolm Forbes

Anyone who says businessmen deal in facts, not fiction, has never read old five-year projections. — Malcolm Forbes

It's the less bright students who make teachers teach better. — Malcolm Forbes

For corporations to be bedfellows with the arts is good business for both. The architecture that houses a company is a more visible statement than the president's in the annual report. Ditto interiors, particularly of offices and sometimes, dramatically, in plants. For solvent businesses, support of community cultural undertakings in music, drama, dance creates great goodwill. Also, the existence of such activities is often important to the executives and their families that companies want to keep or attract to keep. — Malcolm Forbes

It is unfortunate we can't buy many business executives for what they are worth and sell them for what they think they are worth. — Malcolm Forbes

What's an expert? I read somewhere, that the more a man knows, the more he knows, he doesn't know. So I suppose one definition of an expert would be someone who doesn't admit out loud that he knows enough about a subject to know he doesn't really know how much. — Malcolm Forbes

Venture nothing, and life is less than it should be. — Malcolm Forbes

How to fail: Try too hard. — Malcolm Forbes

There's no way to move without making waves. — Malcolm Forbes

As you get older, don't slow down. Speed up. There's less time left! — Malcolm Forbes

When things are bad, we take comfort in the thought that they could always get worse. And when they are, we find hope in the thought that things are so bad they have to get better. — Malcolm Forbes

Trying to impress others does - usually in quite the opposite way. — Malcolm Forbes

There are a handful of companies who understand all successful business operations come down to three basic principles; People
Product
Profit. Without top people, you cannot do much with the other two. — Malcolm Forbes