Top 100 Tips from Successful Business Professionals

 

1. “Enthusiasm is the sparkle in your eyes; the swing in your gait, the grip of your hand. The irresistible surge of will and energy to execute your ideas.” – Henry Ford
    

2. “Nothing comes from lazyness and a lack of passion.”
    

3. “No man can be successful, unless he first loves his work.” – David Sarnoff, CEO, RCA
    

4. “Find your passion, and it’s no longer work.” – L.A. Reid, CEO, Epic Records
    

5. “Never go for the money. You have to match the job and your values so you can bring your whole self.” – Aylwin Lewis, CEO, Potbelly Sandwich Works
    

6. “An important attribute of success is to be yourself. Never hide what makes you, you.” – Indra K Nooyi, CEO, PepsiCo
    

7. “When you find an idea that you just can’t stop thinking about, that’s probably a good one to pursue.” – Josh James, CEO, Omniture
    

8. “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, Founder, Wendy’s
    

9. “The secret of getting ahead is getting started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex overwhelming tasks into smaller manageable tasks, and then starting on the first one.” – Mark Twain, Author
    

10. “Any time is a good time to start a company.” – Ron Conway, Startup Investor, SV Angel
     

11. “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, CEO, Under Armour
     

12. “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 a framework and a dream.” – Michael Dell, CEO, Dell
     

13. “The heart and soul of a company is creativity and innovation.” – Robert Iger, CEO, Walt Disney
     

14. “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, Yelp
     

15. “It’s not about how to get started; it’s about how to get noticed.” – Steve Case, CEO, America Online
     

16. “Business, like life, is about how you make people feel. It’s that simple, and it’s that hard.” – Danny Meyer, CEO, Union Square Hospitality Group
     

17. “You can not kill an idea whose time has come.” Victor Hugo, Author
     

18. “If there’s something you want to build, but the tech isn’t there yet, just find the closest possible way to make it happen.” – Dennis Crowley, Co-Founder, Foursquare
     

19. “Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be a more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks.” – Warren Buffett
     

20. “Be prepared for your luck.” – Ric Campo, CEO, CPT
     

21. "You can do big things with a small dedicated group; so long as you are willing to engage, participate and try something new."
     

22. “Chase the vision, not the money; the money will end up following you.” – Tony Hsieh, CEO, Zappos
     

23. “An entrepreneur is someone who has a vision for something and a want to create.” – David Karp, CEO, Tumblr
     

24. “Life is not always a matter of holding good cards, but sometimes playing a poor hand well.” – Jack London, Author
     

25. “You shouldn’t focus on why you can’t do something, which is what most people do. You should focus on why perhaps you can, and be one of the exceptions.” – Steve Case, AOL Co-Founder and CEO
     

26. “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, CEO, Standard Oil
     

27. “For changes to be of any true value, they’ve got to be lasting and consistent.” – Tony Robbins
     

28. “When you innovate, you must prepare yourself for everybody to tell you that you’re nuts.” – Larry Ellison, CEO, Oracle
     

29. “So often people are working hard at the wrong thing. Working on the right thing is probably more important than working hard.” – Caterina Fake, Co-Founder, Flickr
     

30. “Where do you put the fear when you choose to innovate? The fear is there, but you have to find a place to put it.” – Seth Godin, Author and Entrepreneur
     

31. “Innovation almost always is not successful the first time out. You try something and it doesn’t work and it takes confidence to say we haven’t failed yet… ultimately you become commercially successful.” – Tony Fadell, Founder, Nest
     

32. “The roots of great innovation are never just in the technology itself. They are always in the wider historical context. They require new ways of seeing. As Einstein put it, ‘The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them.’” – David Brooks, Columnist, New York Times
     

33. “I always did something that I was a little not ready to do. I think that, 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.” – Marissa Mayer
     

34. “We are really competing against ourselves, we have no control over how other people perform.” – Pete Cashmore, CEO, Mashable
     

35. “I’ve been very lucky, from the beginning. I’ve found that as long as you’re fundamentally good – as long as you’re not being bad to people – people give you a lot of room to be yourself, because being yourself is being honest. And that’s what people want to see.” – Andrew Mason, CEO, Groupon
     

36. “You become the average of the five people you hang out with.” – Drew Houston, CEO, Dropbox
     

37. “Every time you state what you want or believe, you’re the first to hear it. It’s a message to both you and others about what you think is possible. Don’t put a ceiling on yourself.” – Oprah Winfrey, Media Proprietor
     

38. “Pessimists may be right in the end, but an optimist has a much better time getting there.” – Samuel R Allen, CEO Deere
     

39. “Mediocrity is not worth the trip.” – Sergio Marchonne, CEO, Chrysler
     

40. “The importance of gratitude is never forgotten.” – Deborah Lee, CEO, BET
     

41. “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, CEO, Mary Kay Cosmetics
     

42. Launching a business isn’t for the faint of heart, as these industry leaders well know. If you feel your courage wavering, look to their words and remember that each and every one of these success stories was once where you stand today.
     

43. “Ideas are easy. Implementation is hard.” – Guy Kawasaki, CEO, Alltop
     

44. “I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.” – Steve Jobs, Co-Founder and CEO, Apple
     

45. “The best startups generally come from somebody needing to scratch an itch.” – Michael Arrington, Founder, TechCrunch
     

46. “No more romanticizing about how cool it is to be an entrepreneur. It’s a struggle to save your company’s life – and your own skin – every day of the week.” – Spencer Fry, Co-Founder, CarbonMade
     

47. “All humans are entrepreneurs not because they should start companies but because the will to create is encoded in human DNA.” – Reid Hoffman, Co-Founder, LinkedIn
     

48. “The critical ingredient is getting off your butt and doing something. It’s as simple as that. A lot of people have ideas, but there are few who decide to do something about them now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. But today. The true entrepreneur is a doer, not a dreamer.” – Nolan Bushnell, Entrepreneur
     

49. “It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.” – Scott Belsky, Co-Founder, Behance
     

50. “If you’re not a risk taker, you should get the hell out of business.” – Ray Kroc, Founder, McDonald’s
     

51. “I’m convinced that about half of what separates the successful entrepreneurs from the non-successful ones is pure perseverance.” – Steve Jobs
     

52. “Great companies, with the way they work, first start with great leaders.” – Steve Ballmer, CEO, Microsoft
     

53. “Your title makes you a Manager. Your people make you a leader.” – Bill Campbell, former CEO, Intuit
     

54. “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, CEO, Fedex
     

55. “Management is all about managing in the short term, while developing the plans for the long term.” Jack Welch, CEO, General Electric
     

56. “Sometimes, I think my most important job as a CEO is to listen for bad news. If you don’t act on it, your people will eventually stop bringing bad news to your attention and that is the beginning of the end.” – Bill Gates
     

57. “If you see a snake, just kill it. Don’t appoint a committee on snakes.” – Henry Ross Perot, Politician
     

58. “A leader takes people where they want to go. A great leader takes people where they don’t necessarily want to go, but ought to be.” – Rosalynn Carter, Former First Lady
     

59. “Before you are a leader, success is all about growing yourself. When you become a leader, success is all about growing others.” – Jack Welch, CEO, General Electric
     

60. “I’d rather have one percent of the efforts of 100 people than 100 percent of my own efforts.” – J. Paul Getty
     

61. “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, CEO, Dupont
     

62. “If you don’t pay appropriate attention to what has your attention, it will take more of your attention than it deserves.” – David Allen, Author, Getting Things Done
     

63. “For a truly effective social campaign, a brand needs to embrace the first principles of marketing, which involves brand definition and consistent storytelling.” – Simon Mainwaring
     

64. “While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, the other is busy making mistakes and becoming superior” – Henry C. Link
     

65. “Productivity is never an accident. It is always the result of a commitment to excellence, intelligent planning, and focused effort.” – Paul Meyer
     

66. “Surviving a failure allows you more self-confidence. Failing is a great learning tool, but it must be kept to an absolute minimum.” – Jeffrey Immelt, CEO, General Electric
     

67. “Only successful businesses can create and secure jobs.” – Kalus Kleinfeld, CEO, Alcoa
     

68. “I’ve learned to question success a lot more than failure.” – Kat Cole, CEO, Cinnabon
     

69. “If you think good design is expensive, you should look at the cost of bad design.” Dr. Ralf Speth, CEO, Jaguar
     

70. “If you want to succeed, double your failure rate.” – Thomas J Watson, CEO, IBM
     

71. “You should go to work every day a little bit nervous.” – Alexa von Tobel, CEO, LearnVest
     

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

73. “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.” – Drew Houston, CEO, Dropbox
     

74. “Fail often so you can succeed sooner.” – Tom Kelley, Partner, Ideo
     

75. “Content rules. It always has. It just changes form and value.” – Chris Paradysz, Co-CEO Paradysz
     

76. “Business has only two functions – marketing and innovation.” – Milan Kundera, Author
     

77. “I notice increasing reluctance on the part of marketing executives to use judgment; they are coming to rely too much on research, and they use it as a drunkard uses a lamp post for support, rather than for illumination.” – David Ogilvy, Ad Executive
     

78. "Never stop building meaningful relationships with customers and community as those account for sales most of the year."
     

79. “Transforming a brand into a socially responsible leader doesn’t happen overnight by simply writing new marketing and advertising strategies. It takes effort to identify a vision that your customers will find credible and aligned with their values.” – Simon Mainwaring
     

80. “Data beats emotions.” – Sean Rad, Founder, Adly and Tinder
     

81. “In business, what’s dangerous is not to evolve.” Jeff Bezos, CEO, Amazon
     

82. “High expectations are the key to absolutely everything.” – Sam Walton, CEO, Walmart
     

83. “Good brands claim authenticity. Great brands know who they are.” – Chance Carlisle, CEO, LYFE Kitchen
     

84. “Obsess about the next customer, not only the ones you have.” – Jeremy Gutsche, CEO, Trendhuter.com
     

85. “Even if you don’t have the perfect idea to begin with, you can likely adapt.” – Victoria Ransom, Co-Founder, Wildfire Interactive
     

86. “Nothing works better than just improving your product.” – Joel Spolsky, Co-Founder, Stack Overflow
     

87. “Timing, perseverance, and ten years of trying will eventually make you look like an overnight success.” – Biz Stone, Co-Founder, Twitter
     

88. “The secret to successful hiring is this: look for the people who want to change the world.” – Marc Benioff, Salesforce, CEO
     

89. “I choose a lazy person to do a hard job. Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.” – Bill Gates
     

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

91. “Always treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers.” – Stephen R. Covey, Author
     

92. “There’s nothing wrong with staying small. You can do big things with a small team.” – Jason Fried, Founder, 37signals
     

93. “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.” – Steve Jobs
     

94. “Lots of companies don’t succeed over time. What do they fundamentally do wrong? They usually miss the future.” – Larry Page
     

95. “In the long arc of time, you are only relevant if customers love you.” – Tim Cook, CEO, Apple
     

96. “In a hyper-connected world where business and technology models are changing so rapidly, leaders/companies must learn to innovate, prioritize, and execute rapidly to survive.” – John Chambers, CEO, Cisco
     

97. “When I’m old and dying, I plan to look back on my life and say ‘wow, that was an adventure,’ not ‘wow, I sure felt safe.’ ” – Tom Preston-Werner, Co-Founder, Github
     

98. “The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow.” – Rupert Murdoch, CEO, 21st Century Fox
     

99. “There’s lots of bad reasons to start a company. But there’s only one good, legitimate reason, and I think you know what it is: it’s to change the world.” – Phil Libin, CEO, Evernote
     

100. “Never forget that only dead fish swim with the current.” – David Sable, CEO, Y&R

 

Majority of these tips are taken from the list by Business 2 Community found at: http://ow.ly/pDiR30girhg