18 Quotes to Live By From Top CEOs

I’ve always said that you should be careful about who you take advice from. For instance, my never-married, perpetual bachelor friend isn’t the guy I am going to go to for relationship advice. I’m also not taking woodworking advice from someone missing more than one finger, or diet tips from someone who is more overweight than I am. I do, however, pay attention when extremely successful give advice on how to be successful. Here are 20 quotes from top CEOs from a variety of companies that are true “words to live by.”

1. “Ideas are commodity. Execution of them is not.”
– Michael Dell, Dell

2. “Trust your instincts.”
– Estée Lauder, Estée Lauder

3. “The way to get started is to quit talking and start doing.”
– Walt Disney, Disney

4. “We’re not going to invest a dollar that doesn’t make sense to invest.”
– Marc Lore, Jet

5. “What do you need to start a business? Three simple things: know your product better than anyone, know your customer, and have a burning desire to succeed.”
– Dave Thomas, Wendy’s

6. “Your people determine your product.”
– Taso Du Val, Toptal

7. “Make your team feel respected, empowered and genuinely excited about the company’s mission.”
– Tim Westergen, Pandora

8. “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.”
– Drew Houston, Dropbox
Read: 22 Amazing Quotes from The Master of Sarcasm: George Carlin

9. “The common question that gets asked in business is, ‘why?’ That’s a good question, but an equally valid question is, ‘why not?’”
– Jeff Bezos, Amazon

10. “Be simple and reliable”
– Jan Koum, WhatsApp

11. “Always deliver more than expected.”
– Larry Page, Google

12. “When something is important enough, you do it even if the odds are not in your favor.”
– Elon Musk, SpaceX

13. “There’s an entrepreneur right now, scared to death, making excuses, saying, ‘It’s not the right time just yet.’ There’s no such thing as a good time.”
– Kevin Plank, Under Armour

14. “I always did something I was a little not ready to do. I think that’s how you grow. When there’s that moment of ‘Wow, I’m not really sure I can do this,’ and you push through those moments, that’s when you have a breakthrough.”
– Marissa Mayer, Yahoo

15. “You don’t learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing and falling over.”
– Richard Branson, Virgin Group

16. “Chase the vision, not the money; the money will end up following you.”
– Tony Hsieh, Zappos
Read: 30 Quotes from Chuck Palahniuk that will Open Your Mind

17. “Capital isn’t scarce. Vision is.”
– Sam Walton, Wal-Mart

18. “Life is too short to do mediocre work and it is definitely too short to build shitty things.”
– Stewart Butterfield, Slack

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