Dose of Motivation: 60 Inspirational Quotes About Success by Influential CEOs

Words of wisdom

1. “It takes 20 years to build a reputation and 5 minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you’ll do things differently.” – Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway
2. “Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.” – Steve Jobs, late CEO of Apple
3. “To me, business isn’t about wearing suits or pleasing stockholders. It’s about being true to yourself, your ideas and focusing on the essentials.” – Sir Richard Branson, Founder of Virgin Group
4. “Every time you make the hard, correct decision, you become a bit more courageous, and every time you make the easy, wrong decision, you become a bit more cowardly. If you are CEO, these choices will lead to a courageous or cowardly company.” – Ben Horowitz, Co-Founder of Andreessen Horowitz and Opsware
5. “I’ve learned that mistakes can often be as good a teacher as success.” – Jack Welch, late CEO and Chairman of General Electric
6. “Success is often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.” – Coco Chanel, late founder of Chanel

7. “Don’t bunt. Aim out of the ballpark. Aim for the company of immortals.” – David Ogilvy, late Founder of Ogilvy & Mather
8. “Chase the vision, not the money; the money will end up following you.” – Tony Hsieh, late CEO of Zappos
9. “I always did something that I was a little not ready to do. I think that is how you grow. When there’s a moment of ‘Wow, I’m not so sure that I can do this,’ and you push through those moments, it’s then that you have a breakthrough. Sometimes that’s a sign that something really great is about to happen. You’re about to grow and learn a lot more about yourself.” – Marissa Mayer, former President and CEO of Yahoo and CEO and founder of Sunshine 
10. “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.” – Drew Houston, Co-Founder and CEO of Dropbox
11. “Any time is a good time to start a company.” – Ron Conway, Founder and Managing Partner of SV Angel

Getting priorities straight

12. “The question I ask myself like almost every day is, ‘Am I doing the most important thing I could be doing?’ … Unless I feel like I’m working on the most important problem that I can help with, then I’m not going to feel good about how I’m spending my time. And that’s what this company is.” – Mark Zuckerberg, Co-founder, Chairman and CEO of Meta Platforms
13. “High expectations are the key to absolutely everything.” – Sam Walton, late Founder of Walmart and Sam’s Club
14. “Life is fragile. We’re not guaranteed a tomorrow, so give it everything you’ve got.” – Tim Cook, CEO of Apple
15. “Balance suggests a perfect equilibrium. There is no such thing. That is a false expectation. … There are going to be priorities and dimensions of your life, how you integrate them is how you find true happiness.” – Denise Morrison, former President and CEO of Campbell Soup Company
16. “Leaders get out in front and stay there by raising the standards by which they judge themselves – and by which they are willing to be judged.” – Frederick W. Smith, Founder and Executive Chairman of FedEx
17. “No man can be successful, unless he first loves his work.” – David Sarnoff, late CEO of RCA
18. “It’s not about having a specific set time; both personal and professional lives are 24/7. It’s simply more about making the right allocation to each one and recognizing that it’s going to be different every single day.” – Ellen Kullman, former CEO of DuPont and current Board Member at Goldman Sachs
19. “You don’t need to be a genius or a visionary, or even a college graduate for that matter, to be successful. You just need framework and a dream.” – Michael Dell, Chairman and CEO of Dell
20. “The heart and soul of a company is creativity and innovation.” – Robert Iger, CEO of The Walt Disney Company
21. “The most important thing is to be able to think big, dream big and know how to translate these dreams into reality.” – Jack Ma, Founder of Alibaba
22. “The most important thing I’ve learned since becoming CEO is context. It’s how your company fits in with the world and how you respond to it.” – Jeffrey Immelt, former Chairman & CEO of General Electric
23. “Disruption occurs when someone listens more carefully to customers, or better anticipates what the customers might want before they even realize it themselves. Most companies are disrupted because they lack the will and courage to disrupt themselves first.” – Walt Bettinger, CEO and current Co-Chairman, Board of Directors of Charles Schwab
24. “If you were filling your own job today, would you rehire yourself? Are you the best person for the role now, rather than when you first got the job? If you’re no longer the best person, what are you going to do about it?” – Katrina Lake, founder and CEO of Stitch Fix
25. “A positive reputation is built by behaving consistently with sound principles, creating real value, achieving compliance excellence and living up to commitments.” – Charles Koch, Co-CEO of Koch Industries

Getting to the heart of the matter

26. “You have to be very nimble and very open-minded. Your success is going to be very dependent on how you adapt.” – Jeremy Stoppelman, CEO of Yelp
27. “It’s not about how to get started; it’s about how to get noticed.” – Steve Case, former CEO of America Online
28. “Your reputation is more important than your paycheck, and your integrity is worth more than your career.” – Ryan Freitas, Co-Founder of About.me and Managing Director and Head of Design at JPMorgan Chase & Co.
29. “Be undeniably good. No marketing effort or social media buzzword can be a substitute for that.” – Anthony Volodkin, Founder of Hype Machine
30. “If you can’t feed a team with two pizzas, it’s too large.” – Jeff Bezos, Founder and Chairman of Amazon
31. “Don’t worry about people stealing your design work. Worry about the day they stop.” – Jeffrey Zeldman, Founder of “A List Apart” magazine and Executive Creative Director at Automattic
32. “The value of an idea lies in the using of it.” – Thomas Edison, late Co-Founder of General Electric
33. “Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details to perfect.” – Jack Dorsey, Co-Founder and former CEO of Twitter (now X)
34. “The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.” – Ingvar Kamprad, late Founder of IKEA
35. “Always look for the fool in the deal. If you don’t find one, it’s you.” – Mark Cuban, Stakeholder and former owner of the Dallas Mavericks and Co-Owner of 2929 Entertainment
36. “There’s nothing wrong with staying small. You can do big things with a small team.” – Jason Fried, Co-Founder and CEO of 37signals
37. “Fail often so you can succeed sooner.” – Tom Kelley, Founder and Chairman of D4V and Partner of Ideo
38. “Nothing works better than just improving your product.” – Joel Spolsky, Co-Founder of Stack Overflow, Trello, HASH and Fog Creek Software (now Glitch)
39. “Get big quietly so you don’t tip off potential competitors.” – Chris Dixon, Co-Founder of Hunch
40. “An entrepreneur is someone who has a vision for something and a want to create.” – David Karp, Founder of Tumblr

Digging down deep

41. “A man must be big enough to admit his mistakes, smart enough to profit from them and strong enough to correct them.” – John C. Maxwell, Founder of Maxwell Leadership
42. “Stay self-funded as long as possible.” – Garrett Camp, Founder of Expa and Uber and co-founder of StumbleUpon
43. “Timing, perseverance and 10 years of trying will eventually make you look like an overnight success.” – Biz Stone, Co-Founder of Twitter (now X)
44. “The only thing worse than starting something and failing … is not starting something.” – Seth Godin, Founder of Squidoo and Yoyodyne
45. “Anything that is measured and watched improves.” – Bob Parsons, Founder of GoDaddy and CEO and Founder of Parsons Xtreme Golf
46. “The secret to successful hiring is this: Look for the people who want to change the world.” – Marc Benioff, Chair, CEO and Founder of Salesforce
47. “Data beats emotions.” – Sean Rad, Co-Founder and Tinder
48. “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.” – Reid Hoffman, Co-Founder of LinkedIn and Microsoft Board Member
49. “When you innovate, you’ve got to be prepared for everyone telling you you’re nuts.” – Larry Ellison, Co-Founder, Chairman and CTO of Oracle

• “Embrace what you don’t know, especially in the beginning, because what you don’t know can become your greatest asset. It ensures that you will absolutely be doing things different from everybody else.” – Sara Blakely, Founder of SPANX
• “Whether you think you can or think you can’t – you’re right.” – Henry Ford, late Founder of Ford Motor Company
• “Fearlessness is like a muscle. I know from my own life that the more I exercise it, the more natural it becomes to not let my fears run me.” – Arianna Huffington, Founder and CEO of Thrive Global and Founder of The Huffington Post 
• “Risk more than others think is safe. Dream more than others think is practical.” – Howard Schultz, Chairman Emeritus of Starbucks
• “Always deliver more than expected.” – Larry Page, Co-Founder of Google
• “Don’t limit yourself. Many people limit themselves to what they think they can do. You can go as far as your mind lets you. What you believe, remember, you can achieve.” – Mary Kay Ash, late Founder of Mary Kay Cosmetics [Check out these 62 inspiring quotes from trailblazing women.]
• “I do not think that there is any other quality so essential to success of any kind as the quality of perseverance. It overcomes almost everything, even nature.” – John D. Rockefeller, late Founder and CEO of Standard Oil Company
• “I never took a day off in my twenties. Not one.” – Bill Gates, Co-Founder of Microsoft Corporation
• “Don’t take too much advice. Most people who have a lot of advice to give with a few exceptions generalize whatever they did. Don’t over-analyze everything. I myself have been guilty of over-thinking problems. Just build things and find out if they work.” – Ben Silbermann, Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Pinterest
• “Work like hell. I mean, you just have to put in 80- to 100-hour weeks every week. [This] improves the odds of success. If other people are putting in 40-hour workweeks and you’re putting in 100-hour workweeks, then even if you’re doing the same thing, you know that you will achieve in four months what it takes them a year to achieve.” – Elon Musk, Co-Founder of SpaceX, Co-Founder and CEO of Tesla Motors and owner of X (formerly Twitter)
• “Fear of failure is a powerful motivator, but it should never paralyze you. Embrace the risk and learn from every setback.” – Lloyd Blankfein, former chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs

Amanda Clark and Sean Peek contributed to this article.