Perserverence

Ken Iverson and Sam Siegel began turning the Nucor flywheel in 1965. For ten years, no one paid any attention, certainly not the financial press or the other steel companies. If you had asked executives at Bethlehem Steel or U.S. Steel about "The Nucor Threat" in 1970, they would have laughed, if they even recognized the company name at all (which is doubtful). By 1975, the year of its transition point on the stock chart, Nucor had already built its third mini-mill, long established its unique culture of productivity, and was well on its way to becoming the most profitable steel company in America. Yet the first major article in Business Week did not appear until 1978, thirteen years after the start of the transition, and not in Fortune until sixteen years out. From 1965 through 1975, we found only eleven articles on Nucor, none of them significant. Then from 1976 through 1995, we collected ninety-six articles on Nucor, forty of them being major profiles or nationally prominent features."

Jim Collins, Good to Great, Pg. 167