Andreas Ernst

“I often see teams that maniacally focus on their metrics around customer acquisition and retention. This usually works well for customer acquisition, but not so well for retention. Why? For many products, metrics often describe the customer acquisition goal in enough detail to provide sufficient management guidance. In contrast, the metrics for customer retention do not provide enough color to be a complete management tool. As a result, many young companies overemphasize retention metrics and do not spend enough time going deep enough on the actual user experience. This generally results in a frantic numbers chase that does not end in a great product.”
― Ben Horowitz, The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers

“When companies fail, or fail to grow, it’s almost always because they don’t invest in the people, the systems, and the processes they need.”
― Howard Schultz, Pour Your Heart Into It: How Starbucks Built a Company One Cup at a Time

“Long hours spent checking off a to-do list and ending the day with a full trash can and a clean desk are not virtuous and have nothing to do with success. Instead of a to-do list, you need a success list—a list that is purposefully created around extraordinary results.

To-do lists tend to be long; success lists are short. One pulls you in all directions; the other aims you in a specific direction. One is a disorganized directory and the other is an organized directive. If a list isn’t built around success, then that’s not where it takes you. If your to-do list contains everything, then it’s probably taking you everywhere but where you really want to go.”
― Gary Keller, The One Thing: The Surprisingly Simple Truth Behind Extraordinary Results

“Incremental change is better than ambitious failure. . . .Success feeds on itself.”
― Tal Ben-Shahar, Happier: Learn the Secrets to Daily Joy and Lasting Fulfillment