James Harris Simons

The best way to conduct research on a larger scale is to make sure everyone knows what everyone else is doing... The sooner the better - start talking to other people about what you're doing. Because that's what will stimulate things the fastest.

To ask questions can become the laziest and wobbliest occupation of a mind, but when you must yourself answer the problem that you have posed, you will meditate your question with care and frame it with precision.

When I was planning LearnVest, everyone told me I had to talk to Ann Kaplan, one of the first female partners at Goldman Sachs. Within five minutes of our meeting, she totally got the idea - and by the time I left, she was a seed investor.