Top 90 Michael E. Gerber Quotes (2025 Update)
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51. “It is – first, last, and always – about how you act.”

— Michael E. Gerber

52. “They see the pattern, understand the order, experience the vision. Peter Drucker.”

— Michael E. Gerber

53. “Most salespeople think that selling is “closing.” It isn’t. Selling is opening.”

— Michael E. Gerber

54. “Contrary to popular belief, my experience has shown me that the people who are exceptionally good in business aren’t so because of what they know but because of their insatiable need to know more.”

— Michael E. Gerber

55. “The system isn’t something you bring to the business. It’s something you derive from the process of building the business.”

— Michael E. Gerber

56. “Delegating your accountabilities is abdication.”

— Michael E. Gerber

57. “And as the world becomes more and more complex, and the commodities more varied, the feelings we want become more urgent, less rational, more unconscious.”

— Michael E. Gerber

58. “Documentation says, “This is how we do it here.”

— Michael E. Gerber

59. “The truth is, nobody’s interested in the commodity. People buy feelings.”

— Michael E. Gerber

60. “If you were to write a script for the tape to be played for the mourners at your funeral, how would you like it to read? That’s your Primary Aim. And once you’ve created the script, all you need to do is make it come true. All.”

— Michael E. Gerber

61. “It’s time for me to challenge my imagination and to begin the process of shaping an entirely new life. And the best way to do that anywhere in this whole wide opportunity-filled world is to create an exciting new business.”

— Michael E. Gerber

62. “And what makes people work is an idea worth working for, along with a clear understanding of what needs to be done.”

— Michael E. Gerber

63. “The Entrepreneurial Perspective adopts a wider, more expansive scale. It views the business as a network of seamlessly integrated components, each contributing to some larger pattern that comes together in such a way as to produce a specifically planned result, a systematic way of doing business.”

— Michael E. Gerber

64. “It’s up to you to dictate your business’s rate of growth as best you can by understanding the key processes that need to be performed, the key objectives that need to be achieved, the key position you are aiming your business to hold in the marketplace.”

— Michael E. Gerber

65. “Thus, the Entrepreneurial Model does not start with a picture of the business to be created but of the customer for whom the business is to be created.”

— Michael E. Gerber

66. “I believe it’s true that the difference between great people and everyone else is that great people create their lives actively, while everyone else is created by their lives, passively waiting to see where life takes them next. The difference between the two is the difference between living fully and just existing. The difference between the two is living intentionally and living by accident.”

— Michael E. Gerber

67. “The question you need to keep asking yourself is: How can I give my customer the results he wants systematically rather than personally? Put another way: How can I create a business whose results are systems-dependent rather than people-dependent? Systems-dependent rather than expert-dependent.”

— Michael E. Gerber

68. “A business that looks orderly says to your customer that your people know what they’re doing.”

— Michael E. Gerber

69. “Your arrows do not carry,’ observed the Master, ‘because they do not reach far enough spiritually.’ Eugen Herrigel Zen and the Art of Archery.”

— Michael E. Gerber

70. “Freedom does not come automatically; it is achieved. And it is not gained in a single bound; it must be achieved each day. Rollo May.”

— Michael E. Gerber

71. “What most people need, then, is a place of community that has purpose, order, and meaning.”

— Michael E. Gerber

72. “In short, businesses that ‘get small again’ die.”

— Michael E. Gerber

73. “The commodity is the thing your customer actually walks out with in his hand. The product is what your customer feels as he walks out of your business.”

— Michael E. Gerber

74. “5. The Model Will Provide a Uniformly Predictable Service to the Customer.”

— Michael E. Gerber

75. “To The Entrepreneur, the business is the product.”

— Michael E. Gerber

76. “Your Strategic Objective is a very clear statement of what your business has to ultimately do for you to achieve your Primary Aim.”

— Michael E. Gerber

77. “1. Your Primary Aim 2. Your Strategic Objective 3. Your Organizational Strategy 4. Your Management Strategy 5. Your People Strategy 6. Your Marketing Strategy 7. Your Systems Strategy.”

— Michael E. Gerber

78. “The Entrepreneurial Perspective asks the question: “How must the business work?” The Technician’s Perspective asks: “What work has to be done?”

— Michael E. Gerber

79. “So in the development of your Marketing Strategy, it is absolutely imperative that you forget about your dreams, forget about your visions, forget about your interests, forget about what you want – forget about everything but your customer!”

— Michael E. Gerber

80. “Because, the moment you chose to start a small business, Sarah, you unwittingly chose to play a significantly larger game than any game you had ever played before.”

— Michael E. Gerber

81. “What would best serve our customer here? How could I most easily give the customer what he wants while also maximizing profits for the company?”

— Michael E. Gerber

82. “We can only change our lives and create a world of our own if we first understand how such a world is constructed, how it works, and the rules of the game.”

— Michael E. Gerber

83. “The game has to be real. You have to mean it. The game is a measure of you.”

— Michael E. Gerber

84. “To be a great Technician is simply insufficient to the task of building a great small business. Being consumed by the tactical work of the business, as every Technician suffering from an Entrepreneurial Seizure is, leads to only one thing: a complicated, frustrating, and, eventually, demeaning job!”

— Michael E. Gerber

85. “How does one come to the point in his or her life when he or she is not only ready but eager and willing – however terrifying the prospect might be – to self-execute such a leap of faith without any guarantees that it will do any good?”

— Michael E. Gerber

86. “Thus, the Entrepreneurial Model does not start with a picture of the business to be created but of the customer for whom the business is to be created. It understands that without a clear picture of that customer, no business can succeed.”

— Michael E. Gerber

87. “What is standing in the way of my customer getting what he wants from my business?”

— Michael E. Gerber

88. “Little things that are meaningless from a practical point of view may have great emotional meaning through their symbolism. Images and colors are often great motivating forces.”

— Michael E. Gerber

89. “I would suggest that value is what people perceive it to be, and nothing more.”

— Michael E. Gerber

90. “You might say that, while going to work on the business, people begin to realize that it is a powerful metaphor for going to work on their lives.”

— Michael E. Gerber