Robert Heller Quotes

Robert Heller, also Joseph Heller, was an English magician, mentalist, and musician. The year of his birth is the subject of some speculation; some sources list it as 1829 while others claim 1830.

As the son of a famous concert pianist, Heller began his life as a musician studying at the Royal Academy of Music. After becoming fascinated with magic at age 14, Heller began copying his idol Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin, from whom he adopted his first name. Heller left his scholarship at the academy to become a professional magician.

Heller's magic career began in New York City in 1858. In an attempt to copy the style of Houdin, Heller wore a dark wig and spoke in a French accent when he performed. His act was such a failure that he moved to Washington, D.C. to become a music teacher.

Heller married one of his pupils, the daughter of a wealthy Washington resident and would eventually return to New York. Deciding to try his magic act again, Heller abandoned the accent and image of before and focused on the presentation of his illusions. His tour that spanned from 1869 to 1875 became a success throughout much of the United States, Great Britain, Europe, and Asia. Heller's success prompted fellow magician Harry Kellar to change his name as to avoid the impression that he was copying the greatness of Heller.

Heller retired from magic after his successful tour. He spent the remaining years of his life performing piano in Washington, D.C. In 1878, Heller died suddenly of pneumonia in Philadelphia, United States and was buried in Mount Moriah Cemetery in Yeadon, Pennsylvania.

✵ 10. June 1932 – 28. August 2012

Robert Heller: 21 quotes 0 likes

Famous Robert Heller Quotes

“The difference between management and administration (which is what the bureaucrats used to do exclusively)… is the difference… between choice and rigidity.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller, cited in: Director Vol 35 (1982). p. 88

“Common sense suggests that some factors in a [risk management] process are more important than others — and analysis supports this. In reality, only 20 percent of activities. In reality, only 20 percent of activities may account for up to 80 percent of results. This is known as Pareto's law, the “80/20 rule”…Pareto's law concentrates on the significant 20 percent and gives the less important 80 percent lower priority.”

Robert Heller

as cited in: William G. Ramroth, Jr. (2007) Risk Management for Design Professionals. p. 53
Making Decisions, (1998)

“Never ignore a gut feeling: but never believe that it's enough on its own”

Robert Heller

Source: The supermanagers: Managing for Success, the Movers and the Doers, the Reasons Why (1984), p. 87

“My first book “The Naked Manager”, a big success in 1971, had been followed by many others, and I wanted to write still more. Writing books is very interesting as each new project takes you in a different direction. You learn a lot – especially about what you yourself really think.”

Robert Heller

Interview: Robert Heller (2006)

“Management is a far more homely business than its would be scientists suggest, more closely allied to cookery than any other human activity. Like cooking, it rests on a degree of organisation and on adequate resources. But just as no two chefs run their kitchens the same way, so no two managements are the same.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Naked Manager (1972), p. 12

“Two of my favourite current management writers are Americans – Clayton Christensen and Peter Senge. My all-time favourite gurus are Peter Drucker, who became a greatly admired friend, and W. Edwards Deming. The thing that set these people apart from many other business commentators is that they didn’t propose any all - encompassing theories, they simply told it like it is.
The fact is that life cannot be summarised as a simple set of rules; it’s far too complicated for that and it’s always changing. Unfortunately, all-encompassing panaceas do seem to be popular and certainly sell books, which is why I so value the objectivity of thought that each of these people brought to the debate.”

Robert Heller

Interview: Robert Heller (2006)

Robert Heller Quotes about business

“No decision in business provides greater potential for the creation of wealth (or its destruction, come to think of it) than the choice of which innovation to back.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Decision makers (1989), Ch. 5. The Innovators’

“When I left university I had two objectives; I wanted to write and I wanted to get married. The only way I could afford both was to get a job as a journalist. At that time, the National Union of Journalists was very powerful and would not allow the direct recruitment of journalists from college except under special circumstances. The Financial Times was deemed special and duly recruited a cadre of very bright young people. I joined the FT as part of that now celebrated intake and, as a result, found myself working on a business newspaper.”

Robert Heller

Interview: Robert Heller (2006)

“All businesses operate below their true potential. That is unavoidable, given the fallibility of human beings.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Decision makers (1989), Ch. 10. The Competitors

“Interview: Robert Heller: Alistair Schofield speaks to Robert Heller, journalist, commentator and the author of more than 50 books on management and business strategy.”

Robert Heller

2006
http://www.extensor.co.uk/articles/int_heller/interview_robert_heller.html online
Interview: Robert Heller (2006)

Robert Heller Quotes

“What goes wrong [in long-range planning] is that sensible anticipation gets converted into foolish numbers: and their validity always hinges on large loose assumptions.”

Robert Heller

Cited in: Michael Armstrong, Tina Stephens (2005) A Handbook Of Management And Leadership. p. 71
The Naked Manager (1972)

“Decision tree - The most picturesque of all the allegedly scientific aids to making decisions. The analyst charts all the possible outcomes of different options, and charts all the latters' outcomes, too. This produces a series of stems and branches (hence the tree). Each of the chains of events is given a probability and a monetary value.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Pocket Manager, (1987), p. 73

Decision , Tree

“Although he reputedly hated the label of ‘guru’, Peter Drucker was, by any standards, the greatest management guru the world has yet seen. In 1996, the McKinsey Quarterly journal described him as the ‘the one guru to whom other gurus kowtow’ and Robert Heller described him as ‘the greatest man in the history of management’, praise indeed for a man who described himself as ‘just an old journalist’.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller and Alistair Schofield (2006) " Peter J Drucker (1909~2005) http://www.extensor.co.uk/articles/peter_drucker/peter_drucker.html" on extensor.co.uk

Hate , World , History

“Effective management always means asking the right question.”

Robert Heller

Source: The supermanagers: Managing for Success, the Movers and the Doers, the Reasons Why (1984), p. 304; As cited in: Paul Pryor (2000) Marketing Construction Services. p. 100

Question

“The first myth of management is that it exists. The second myth of management is that success equals skill.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller cited in : Jonathon Green (1984) The Cynic's Lexicon: A Dictionary of Amoral Advice. p. 92

Success

“Never ignore a gut feeling, but never believe that's enough.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller; cited in: Hubert J. M. Hermans (2012) Between Dreaming and Recognition Seeking. p. 107

Feeling

“Letting I dare not wait upon I would is a mug's game, and those who play it usually get mugged.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Decision makers (1989), Ch. 3. The Truth About Decisions

Game , Waiting

“CEO of General Electric for 30 years, Jack Welch was declared the greatest manager of the 20th century. Focusing firmly on results, he revolutionized management to achieve phenomenal growth for his company.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller (2001) Jack Welch Dorling Kindersley Pub.

“Managers are to information as alcoholics are to booze. They consume enormous amounts, constantly crave more, but have great difficulty in digesting their existing intake.”

Robert Heller

Robert Heller (1975) "Research in light of a dark tunnel" Audit AGB research. London, Spring 1973: Cited in Peter M. Chisnall (1977) Effective industrial marketing. p. 91

Alcohol

“Management — The definition that includes all the other definitions in this book and which, because of that, is the most general and least precise. Its concrete, people meaning — the board of directors and all executives with the power to make decisions — is no problem, except for the not-so-little matter of where to draw the line between managers who are part of "the management" and managers who are not.”

Robert Heller

Source: The Pocket Manager, (1987), p. 161

People , Books , Problem , Decision

“Decisions should be pushed down as far as possible, to the level of competence. This allows senior managers more time for making decisions of a more complex nature”

Robert Heller

Source: The Pocket Manager, (1987), p. 72

Nature , Decision , Time

Similar authors

A.A. Milne photo

A.A. Milne 169

British author

Aleister Crowley photo

Aleister Crowley 142

poet, mountaineer, occultist

John Hicks photo

John Hicks 14

British economist

Alfred Hitchcock photo

Alfred Hitchcock 45

British filmmaker

J. J. Thomson photo

J. J. Thomson 8

British physicist

Margaret Thatcher photo

Margaret Thatcher 348

British stateswoman and politician

William Golding photo

William Golding 79

British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Lite…

Doris Lessing photo

Doris Lessing 94

British novelist, poet, playwright, librettist, biographer …

Kazuo Ishiguro photo

Kazuo Ishiguro 76

Japanese-born British author

Audrey Hepburn photo

Audrey Hepburn 21

British actress