My Life and Work: Service Before Profit

Henry Ford was a farm boy from Michigan who loved taking watches apart, and he grew up to found the Ford Motor Company.His cheap, strong Model T put millions of ordinary families into cars for the first time.In 1922 he explained his ideas about business in a book called My Life and Work.

“Money comes naturally as the result of service, and it is absolutely necessary to have money.But we must not forget that the purpose of money is not ease but the chance to do more service.Being greedy for money is the surest way not to get it.But when one serves for the satisfaction of doing what one believes is right, then money takes care of itself.

The principles of our service are these.First, an absence of fear of the future and of worship of the past.One who fears the future, who fears failure, limits what he does.Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently; there is no shame in honest failure, but there is shame in fearing to fail.

Second, a disregard of competition: whoever does a thing best ought to be the one to do it.Third, putting service before profit.There is nothing wrong with making a profit, and a well-run business cannot fail to make one, but profit must come as a reward for good service; it must be the result of service, not its basis.Fourth, manufacturing is not buying low and selling high; it is buying materials fairly and turning them into a useful product at the smallest possible extra cost.”