Jim Collins

Born 1958 · American business researcher & author

James C. “Jim” Collins was born in Aurora, Colorado, in 1958, studied at Stanford, and joined the faculty of Stanford’s Graduate School of Business in 1988. He co-wrote Built to Last (1994) with Jerry I. Porras, then wrote Good to Great (2001), which introduced the “First Who, Then What” idea behind this line. Later books include How the Mighty Fall (2009) and Great by Choice (2011, with Morten T. Hansen).

Traced to source

6 quotes we’ve traced to Jim Collins

“A culture of discipline is not a principle of business, it is a principle of greatness”

Verified

“For no matter what we achieve, if we don't spend the vast majority of our time with people we love and respect, we cannot possibly have a great life”

Verified

“Good is the enemy of great”

Verified

“There is a direct relationship between the absence of celebrity and the presence of good-to-great results”

Verified

“Those who built the visionary companies wisely understood that it is better to understand who you are than where you are going, for where you are going will almost certainly change”

Verified

“It is better to first get the right people on the bus, the wrong people off the bus, and the right people in the right seats, and then figure out where to drive”

Disputed

Not actually Jim Collins

Often misattributed to Jim Collins

Famous lines widely pinned on Jim Collins that we’ve traced to someone else.

“The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing”

actually Archilochus

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