Bill Gates Quotes

1003 Bill Gates Quotes

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The software business is very American. The original technological advances were all made here. The largest markets are here. And the atmosphere that allowed it all to happen is here. That’s how our original customers, including IBM, could be so open minded about buying from a 25 year old guy with a small company out in Washington. They may have thought it was crazy at the time, but they said, ‘Hey, if he knows so much about software, maybe he knows even more.’
Bill Gates

[Being on a sailboat called the Doo-Wah, Doo-Wah] I was going off on this vacation and I have to negotiate the salary and I have to negotiate the salary with Steve. So we were on this ship-to-shore radio phone, where I kept saying, ‘Doo-Wah, Doo-Wah! Over!’ I think we started at $40,000. Everybody else on my vacation had been drinking and they kept saying, ‘Pay him whatever it takes! Get somebody to help you out! You look like you’re really stressed out!’ So I agreed to pay $50,000. Which of course, turns out to be 10 to the minus fifth portion of [Ballmer’s] compensation…
Bill Gates

[On Microsoft] If you don’t like to work hard and be intense and do your best, this is not the place to work.
Bill Gates

Microsoft is designed to write great software. We are not designed to be good at other things. We only know how to hire, how to manage, and how to globalize software products. The key was to never view ourselves as a service company.
Bill Gates

Like any company whose chief product is intellectual property, we face a challenge finding and keeping the very best people. Universities and other progressive companies have long understood that one way to attract and keep the best people is to offer sabbaticals periodically so people who are working very hard can take some time off to catch their breath, travel, get involved in community activities or whatever.
Bill Gates

Maintaining focus is a key to success. You should understand your circle of competence, the thing that you’re good at, and spend your time and energy there.
Bill Gates

Today, I work because it’s fun. In that sense, I guess you could say that I approach business as a kind of problem-solving challenge. That doesn’t mean I don’t take business seriously, because I do. But life’s a lot more fun if you treat its challenges in creative ways.
Bill Gates

[On hesitating before he took Microsoft public] The whole process looked like a pain, and an ongoing pain once you’re public. People get confused because the stock price doesn’t reflect your financial performance. And to have a stock trader call up the chief executive and ask him questions is uneconomic – the ball bearings shouldn’t be asking the drive about the grease.
Bill Gates

We’re using ownership as one of the things that ties us all together.
Bill Gates

[In 1998] When we went public back in 1986, I owned about 45 percent of the total shares of Microsoft. That position has gradually declined during the past 12 years to something in the range of 22 percent currently. I sell Microsoft shares regularly to diversify my portfolio of investments, pay taxes, and so forth. Additionally, Microsoft has issued new shares over the years for acquisitions and to fund our employee stock option plans, so the total number of outstanding shares has increased. If I had never sold any shares of Microsoft stock, my holdings today would represent about 33 percent of the total. I intend to keep a sizable stake in the company because I am deeply committed to the future of this company and the exciting opportunities we have to deliver innovative products and solutions to our customers.
Bill Gates



[On board meetings] There is a lot of talk about how to stack the bricks of gold, rather than why is there still gold coming out of this machine.
Bill Gates

[In 1992] Take our 20 best people away and I tell you that Microsoft would become an unimportant company.
Bill Gates

I’m not an educator, but I’m a learner. And one of the things I like best about my job is that I’m surrounded by other people who love to learn.
Bill Gates

[On ‘The Art of Programming by Donald Knuth] If somebody is so brash that they think they know everything, Knuth will help them understand that the world is deep and complicated. It took incredible discipline, and several months, for me to read it. I studied 20 pages, put it away for a week, and came back for another 20 pages.
Bill Gates

[On Microsoft having 20% of their computer programmers being female in 1998] On the bright side, it s a much more balanced industry today than it was 15 years ago. Back then, it was a bunch of guys staying up all night.
Bill Gates

These are all supersmart guys who’ve grown up with the business. This team is an amazing group. None of these people are trying to push, or care that much about their title, or even how they are perceived externally.
Bill Gates

[On Paul Allen in 1997] We still see this stuff the same way, and we debate about it and share ideas quite a bit. The think that’s totally amazing is that looking at the next 20 years, we both believe there’s actually more opportunity to have a broad impact than in the past 20 years.
Bill Gates

[On Steve Ballmer] No one should doubt that he’s number two in the company. Steve is my best friend.
Bill Gates

[On Nathan Myhrvold] He’s a lot like I am. The same thinking he brings to a technology problem, he applies to business strategy.
Bill Gates

[On bailing out Kay Nishi] Because Kay was Kay. What did I want, my best guy ever to go to jail for bad debts?
Bill Gates



[On Kay Nishi in 1986] The guy’s life is a mess. He’s worth negative half a million and I’m worth X million – that’s certainly seeds for bitterness.
Bill Gates

If being a nerd means you’re somebody who can enjoy exploring a computer for hours and hours late into the night, then the description fits me, and I don’t think there’s anything pejorative about it. But here’s the real test: I have never used a pocket protector, so I can’t really be a nerd, can I?
Bill Gates

One of the lessons from the Darwinian world is that the excellence of an organism’s nervous system helps determine its ability to sense change and quickly respond, thereby surviving or even thriving.
Bill Gates

Our company is unusual in that most of the employees who are important to us are owners of the company and tend to have made a lot of money through our stock option plans. They tend to have the financial freedom not to work.
Bill Gates

[In 1994 on not believing a business degree is necessary] Let me put it this way. Say you added two years to my life and let me go to business school. I don’t think I would have done a better job at Microsoft. Let’s look around these shelves and see if there are any business books. Oops. We didn’t need any.
Bill Gates

The dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.
Bill Gates

The world is full of superlative events. I reach new extremes. It’s incredible. There’s some kind of attention for past events, so I’m constantly running into the most stupid thing I’ve every heard. Makes life fun! I know that my climaxes are ahead of me, not just behind me.
Bill Gates

[On Andy Groves] We definitely had different views.
Bill Gates

To a certain extent, a little blindness is necessary when you undertake a risk. You have to have a little suspension of disbelief where you say, ‘Hey, we’re going to do this unproven product. Let’s do our best.’ But every once in a while, some part of your organization needs to evaluate whether or not there really is a market for what’s been undertaken. It’s hard to do. Would you want to be the one to call the meeting to say that the whole thing’s a dead end?
Bill Gates

We never waste a lot of time talking about what we’re doing well. It just isn’t our culture. Every meeting is about ‘Sure, we won in seven of the categories, but what about that eighth category?
Bill Gates



I’m biased against conferences in exotic surroundings. It seems that the more attractive the location, the less work gets done.
Bill Gates

[On traveling economy when on commercial airlines but not billing Microsoft when he has to use his personal airplane.] It sets a good example. It costs less money.
Bill Gates

[In 1992 when an assistant said she was swamped and asked for more help.] Who am I? The Queen?
Bill Gates

When I go to a meeting, I keep specific objectives in mind. There isn’t much small talk, especially if I’m with colleagues I know well. We discuss accounts we lost or where overhead is too high, and then we’re done. Bang! There’s always more challenges than there are hours, so why be wasteful?
Bill Gates

[On not explaining everything twice] Because there aren’t enough hours in the day, it’s tempting to try to do two things at once. Right now I’m perfecting reading a newspaper and riding an exercise bike at the same time – a very practical form of multitasking.
Bill Gates

I envy people who thrive on three or four hours of sleep a night. They have so much more time to work, learn and play.
Bill Gates

All my electronic mail comes directly to me, and I answer it myself. I type all of my own memos and letters. In fact, I type a lot more words than the administrative assistant who sits outside my office.
Bill Gates

The entrepreneurial mind-set continues to thrive at Microsoft because one of our major goals is to reinvent ourselves – we have to make sure that we are the ones replacing our products instead of someone else.
Bill Gates

Software development still involves smart engineers thinking through algorithms and typing them out. Success still involves getting people to work together, and bringing expertise to testing. There have been many quantitative changes. But the character of building software, and the kinds of people who are good at it, haven’t changed at all.
Bill Gates

Software is a great combination between artistry and engineering. When you finally get done and get to appreciate it what you have, it is like a part of yourself that you’ve put together.
Bill Gates



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