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What business leader do you admire most?

  • 11-07-2007 4:11pm
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,618 ✭✭✭


    Having had to fill this in for a survey it got me thinking and I would probably say Sean Quinn for being able to turn his hand at a variety of ventures. What about you? and why?


Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    I've been saying Sean Quinn for a long time. A local man who hit the big time, well deserved too. Along with Sean Quinn, Bill Cullen would be another person (in a business and personal capacity) I would admire.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 269 ✭✭PRman


    Michael O'Leary - get sh*t done - top man. isn't afraid to stand up to Bertie and his builder mates. Also Denis O'Brien and Michael Smurfit


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,618 ✭✭✭Ideo


    i think O'Leary is a shareholders dream but not a stakeholders dream. he hasnt done a tap to counter the massive increase in carbon his company is emitting and id like to see him be a bit more proactive.

    ive met Bill a couple of times, and think its great what he's acheived. really ahs gone from a nobody to a somebody


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    I agree, if you read his book (penny apples), his transation from being poor to being rich is a worth while read. He didnt havent easy. **** O'Leary, Bill Cullen didn't have the opportunies O'Leary had.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 269 ✭✭PRman


    Sounds like you might have forgot your valid ID at the airport B4 stepbar!! Yeah O'Leary went to a posh school but he still had too work extemely hard to get where he is. I've read penny apples and it's a good read. I have a lot of respect for Cullen. They're both great entrepreneurs


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 60 ✭✭MrSquishSquash


    I Like Richard Branson, tried his hand at a bit of everything!


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    Branson and O'Brien. Quinn and O'Leary are just plain greedy arseholes that belong to that nasty school of business that believes business and ethics are mutually exclusive.

    adam


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,757 ✭✭✭MyPeopleDrankTheSoup


    Warren Buffet, greatest investor ever and he makes it look easy. Seems like a decent man as well, gave nearly all his wealth to charity. Here's a class video where he gives his views on his wealth, http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=9sgCYOeYrnw


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    +1 Buffett


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 356 ✭✭Tchocky


    Bill Cullen does my head in. He reminds me of the Four Yorkshiremen.


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    dahamsta wrote:
    Branson and O'Brien. Quinn and O'Leary are just plain greedy arseholes that belong to that nasty school of business that believes business and ethics are mutually exclusive.

    adam

    Quinn a greedy arsehole :rolleyes: You are going to have to explain that one.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    PRman wrote:
    Sounds like you might have forgot your valid ID at the airport B4 stepbar!! Yeah O'Leary went to a posh school but he still had too work extemely hard to get where he is.

    But it helped being buddies with the Ryan boys. I have far more respect for Cullen than I ever would have for O'Leary. And even I fly Ryanair too ;)


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 362 ✭✭information


    stepbar wrote:
    And even I fly Ryanair too ;)

    Thats what I admire about O Leary he has power, he can be rude
    to passangers, governments and other companies.

    Yet everybody still uses his airline because they are the best
    value, he dosn't have to answer to anybody not even his
    shareholders


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    I don't call what O'Leary did value, I call it cost-cutting at a level that will eventually result in something very bad happening. Yes, he has flipped the market on it's head, and that's a good thing, but it could have been done without the rudeness, without treating many of his customers like cattle, and in many cases like animals; never mind his own employees. O'Leary is an ignorant prick, someday someone's going to punch him in the face very, very hard, and I'll applaud when it happens. The Irish ability to admire a chancer is an embarassment.

    Price is not the only factor involved in a business transaction. There are these things called "principles".

    adam


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    stepbar wrote:
    Quinn a greedy arsehole :rolleyes: You are going to have to explain that one.
    Quinn's insurance company is renowned for going to extraordinary, often frankly disgusting, lengths to avoid paying out on their policies. I call that greed.

    adam


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,228 ✭✭✭Chardee MacDennis


    dahamsta wrote:
    I don't call what O'Leary did value, I call it cost-cutting at a level that will eventually result in something very bad happening. Yes, he has flipped the market on it's head, and that's a good thing, but it could have been done without the rudeness, without treating many of his customers like cattle, and in many cases like animals; never mind his own employees. O'Leary is an ignorant prick, someday someone's going to punch him in the face very, very hard, and I'll applaud when it happens. The Irish ability to admire a chancer is an embarassment.

    Price is not the only factor involved in a business transaction. There are these things called "principles".

    adam

    sure - you sound like the idiot here. i can guarantee that while there is major cost cutting at ryanair it isnt to the detrement of safety. he says what a lot of people are afraid to say. i have a lot of respect for him.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    O'Leary's cost-cutting might not be to the detriment of safety now - and that remains to be seen - however there's a limit to how far you can go in cost-cutting at an airline. Ask someone in the airline safety industry what they think of low fares airlines. Ask them for long-term projections of accident rates.

    Thanks for calling me an idiot by the way, it was very big of you.

    adam


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,228 ✭✭✭Chardee MacDennis


    you called him an ignorant prick - i replied in kind thought it might make the point clearer!!


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 6,946 ✭✭✭SouperComputer


    Branson for me. Love his attitude, his outlook on life his adventurous lifestyle.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    Call_me_al wrote:
    you called him an ignorant prick - i replied in kind thought it might make the point clearer!!
    Leo Hairy-Camel is well able to defend himself, he doesn't need nosey parker's like yourself speaking for him.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,228 ✭✭✭Chardee MacDennis


    never intended to speak for him - but if someone is going to attack him coz they dont like him i can defend him coz i do like him as a business leader. dont get pedantic just coz you know you are wrong.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    You didn't defend him, you attacked me. Get a clue.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    dahamsta wrote:
    Quinn's insurance company is renowned for going to extraordinary, often frankly disgusting, lengths to avoid paying out on their policies. I call that greed.

    adam

    Really? Have you any evidence of that? Or is it just hearsay?


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    Read the Motors forum on this very site and you'll learn all about Quinn and the way he runs his business.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    O, I see. Make a statement and fail to back it up. Nice. Show me the info. You made the statement, back it up.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    You're the one looking for evidence chum, I've just told you how to find it. I've got better things to do with my time than arse about with the crap search engine on Boards, you obviously don't.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    Ah really? So it's hearsay. Thanks for confirming that.


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 16,659 ✭✭✭✭dahamsta


    Yeah, because Boards.ie is a court of law. What are you, ten?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    Ah, so you can't back up your statement. Thanks for reconfirming that to me.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 32,136 ✭✭✭✭is_that_so


    I know very little about Quinn aside from his success. Cullen would be up there for me and Fergal Quinn. Fergal Quinn was the first one to push good customer service. O'Leary has his own way of doing things. If you admire a bristling take on allcomers who courts publicity at every turn then he is a very good example. Would recommend the Siobhan Creaton book on Ryanair for those who haven't read it.

    He is also never wrong even when he is. Much of that is for the business, which is fine. However a business is also made up of people and customers and Richard Branson is a far better advertisement for good business practice imo.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,123 ✭✭✭stepbar


    dahamsta wrote:
    Branson and O'Brien. Quinn and O'Leary are just plain greedy arseholes

    In your "attempt" to slur Sean Quinn, I just had to laugh (again) at the statement above. At least Quinn & O'Leary pay income tax to the state. God knows where O'Brien pays his. Probably Malta or Portugal or some tax haven like that.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 512 ✭✭✭Macers


    Michael O'Leary and Sean Quinn.

    MOL - the Jose Mourinho of the business world. Arrogant, cocky, will do anything for attention. Love him or hate him - he's a good business man who is oviously very good t what he does.

    Sean Quinn - a self made billionaire. Not afraid to put his money into anything which he can profit off. Always does things with brutal afficiantley. His purchase of Sheffield Wednesday should be done soon... ;)


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 163 ✭✭TEH REAL CDP


    Alan Sugar.

    From nothing to everything all by sheer tenacity and an idea.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 770 ✭✭✭EIREHotspur


    Well as Alan Sugar is the former Chairman of Spurs, I do have to say what a good egg he is don't I?

    I don't know much about Quinn, only what I read in the Business Post a few weeks back.
    The old "I live in the same house and play cards as a past-time" is a strange one.

    Well I know you probably mean living Businessmen but the greatest Businessman I admire is Arthur Carnegie....he made his fortune, ttreated people who worked for him with kindness and respect and set up a foundation to share his wealth with those less well off in later life and after he was gone.

    He knew most of the American Business leaders and Inventors of his time, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison amonst them.

    A Business Genius and old fashioned Gentleman.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 9,228 ✭✭✭Chardee MacDennis


    dahamsta wrote:
    You didn't defend him, you attacked me. Get a clue.

    sure ;)


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 208 ✭✭monkey24


    Kenneth Lay / Jeffrey Skilling ha ha, now they were a good laugh ... lights go off .. SELL .. lights go on .. BUY ..


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 6,151 ✭✭✭Thomas_S_Hunterson


    Warren Buffet as well for me, he's a machine. He's pushing on though now, I hate to think what'll happen to Berkshire Hathaway when he goes.


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