Success Quote by Arnold H. Glasow

“Success is simple” is the kind of sentence a businessman can only get away with by immediately adding all the caveats he’s about to pretend aren’t caveats. Glasow’s genius here is rhetorical: he sells clarity while quietly smuggling in complexity. The line reads like a poster, but it’s really a checklist dressed as comfort.

The three “rights” do most of the work. “Do what’s right” signals ethics, but also implies judgment under uncertainty: you have to know which “right” is right, and you have to choose it when shortcuts are available. “The right way” shifts from morality to craft - competence, process, discipline. It’s an anti-hack mentality, a rebuke to the era’s faith in charisma or sheer hustle. Then “at the right time” concedes what businesspeople rarely admit in motivational talk: timing is a form of power, and it isn’t fully controllable. Markets turn, bosses change, technologies mature, luck arrives wearing a spreadsheet.

The subtext is almost Calvinist: salvation comes from proper conduct, proper method, proper season. It reassures strivers that success isn’t magic, but it also warns them that partial virtue won’t cash out. Doing the right thing at the wrong moment can look like naivete; doing it the wrong way can look like incompetence; doing the wrong thing at the right time can still look like success, but it won’t be the kind Glasow is willing to endorse.

Context matters: a 20th-century businessman, steeped in managerial thinking, pitching a moralized version of execution. “Simple” isn’t a description of reality so much as a demand: stop bargaining with your own standards.