"Accept business only at a price permitting thoroughness. Then do a thorough job, regardless of cost to us"
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Nielsen is selling something more bracing than “quality”: he’s selling a boundary. “Accept business only at a price permitting thoroughness” flips the usual client-service script. The client doesn’t get to set the terms and then demand excellence; excellence has preconditions, and one of them is money. It’s a line aimed as much at eager, undercapitalized firms as it is at bargain-hunting customers who treat rigor like an optional upgrade.
The second sentence tightens the screw: “Then do a thorough job, regardless of cost to us.” Once you’ve named your price for integrity, you don’t get to backfill with excuses. That “regardless” is a moral clause disguised as operations advice. It anticipates the most common failure mode in professional services: agreeing to a scope that requires craft, charging for it, then quietly cutting corners when the work becomes inconvenient. Nielsen is arguing that reputation is an asset you either protect with pain or you don’t have.
The context matters: Nielsen built an empire on measurement and trust. In market research, “thoroughness” isn’t a vibe; it’s sampling, method, controls, and the unglamorous discipline of saying “no” to data that flatters. His subtext is that credibility is expensive by design. Underprice the work and you don’t just lose margin, you invite methodological compromise, then spend years paying for it in skepticism. This is capitalism with a spine: charge enough to be honest, then be honest even when it hurts.
The second sentence tightens the screw: “Then do a thorough job, regardless of cost to us.” Once you’ve named your price for integrity, you don’t get to backfill with excuses. That “regardless” is a moral clause disguised as operations advice. It anticipates the most common failure mode in professional services: agreeing to a scope that requires craft, charging for it, then quietly cutting corners when the work becomes inconvenient. Nielsen is arguing that reputation is an asset you either protect with pain or you don’t have.
The context matters: Nielsen built an empire on measurement and trust. In market research, “thoroughness” isn’t a vibe; it’s sampling, method, controls, and the unglamorous discipline of saying “no” to data that flatters. His subtext is that credibility is expensive by design. Underprice the work and you don’t just lose margin, you invite methodological compromise, then spend years paying for it in skepticism. This is capitalism with a spine: charge enough to be honest, then be honest even when it hurts.
Quote Details
| Topic | Work Ethic |
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