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Dan Pallotta

Founder of Pallotta TeamWorks; founder of the Charity Defense Council

Recorded said elsewhere, not written here
This is what happens when we confuse morality with frugality. We've all been taught that the bake sale with five percent overhead is morally superior to the professional fundraising enterprise with 40 percent overhead, but we're missing the most important piece of information, which is: What is the actual size of these pies? Who cares if the bake sale only has five percent overhead if it's tiny?

TED2013, 1 March 2013 source ↗

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Elinor Ostrom Political economist; laureate of the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences, 2009
Yes, but not with a formula. So there are many, many efforts now to decentralize and they create a rigid formula and give people rules from on top and say, 'Now it's yours.' And that isn't worked very well either. … And, you think about the variety. If you look at a countryside, think of the variety out there in terms of the ecological variety. Well, if people are going to manage ecological variety, no single set of rules will work in a semi-arid versus a tropical-wet region. They have to be different.
Recorded Adam Smith, Telephone interview recorded immediately after the prize announcement, Nobel Prize Outreach, 12 October 2009 source ↗
Reid Hoffman Co-founder of LinkedIn; partner at Greylock Partners
Our culture lionizes entrepreneurs who navigate daring switchbacks in their career. Steve Jobs was admired not just for Apple, but also his detour to found Pixar. Elon Musk is revered for helming Tesla AND SpaceX. But don't be distracted by other people's winding paths. I believe you should celebrate your single-mindedness, and stick to your own overarching idea — for as long as it holds your own fascination. In my experience, that could last your entire career.
Recorded Hoffman's own Medium publication, Reid Hoffman on Medium source ↗
Howard Marks Co-founder and co-chairman of Oaktree Capital Management
There are a few things I dismiss and a few I believe in thoroughly. The former include economic forecasts, which I think don't add value, and the list of the latter starts with cycles and the need to prepare for them.
Recorded Oaktree memo, Oaktree Capital Management (client memo), 20 November 2001 source ↗
Tobias Lütke Co-founder and chief executive of Shopify
So, look, I read lots of books, lots of them, you know, especially when I went from programmer to a business, realizing I have to just learn business really quick. I got really dismayed with the quality of business books pretty quickly, because frankly, I think the business books are largely written by the people who have time, who are not the people who actually build companies, frankly.
Recorded David Senra, David Senra's podcast, David Senra (published episode transcript), 2026 source ↗

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Question What does everyone in your world seem to agree on that you think is wrong? Values & belief
Now, this ideology gets policed by this one very dangerous question, which is, "What percentage of my donation goes to the cause versus overhead?" There are a lot of problems with this question. I'm going to just focus on two. First, it makes us think that overhead is a negative, that it is somehow not part of the cause. But it absolutely is, especially if it's being used for growth.
Recorded TED2013, 1 March 2013 source ↗

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