40 Business Growth Quotes to Inspire Your Team | 6sense (2024)

Even with the best possible growth marketing strategy, businesses rarely follow a straight path of progress. Through every round of testing and learning, observing and iterating, achievements and setbacks, it’s important to stay on track.

But how can business leaders keep teams motivated for the long haul?

We curated this list of 40 business growth quotes to help inspire your team through the ups and downs that every company experiences.

Maintain Forward Momentum

1. “No company can afford not to move forward. It may be at the top of the heap today but at the bottom of the heap tomorrow, if it doesn’t.”

—James Cash Penney, Founder of JCPenney

2. “Even if you are on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.”

—Will Rogers, actor and humorist

3. “If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. And, if you can’t walk, then crawl. But whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.”

—Martin Luther King Jr., minister, activist, civil rights leader

4. “Growth, in some curious way, I suspect, depends on being always in motion just a little bit, one way or another.”

—Norman Mailer, writer, activist, and actor

5. “The most dangerous poison is the feeling of achievement. The antidote is to every evening think what can be done better tomorrow.”

—Ingvar Kamprad, founder of IKEA

Pay Attention to the Present

6.“Forget past mistakes. Forget failures. Forget everything except what you’re going to do now and do it.”

—William Durant, co-founder of General Motors

7. “I don’t focus on what I’m up against. I focus on my goals and I try to ignore the rest.”

—Venus Williams, professional tennis player

8. “Everyone wants to live on top of the mountain, but all the happiness and growth occurs while you’re climbing it.”

—Andy Rooney, radio and television journalist

9. “See things in the present, even if they are in the future.”

—Larry Ellison, co-founder & Executive Chairman of Oracle

10. “Money is like gasoline during a road trip. You don’t want to run out of gas on your trip, but you’re not doing a tour of gas stations.”

—Tim O’Reilly, CEO and founder of O’Reilly Media

Fail More, Fail Better

11. “It doesn’t matter how many times you fail. It doesn’t matter how many times you almost get it right. No one is going to know or care about your failures, and neither should you. All you have to do is learn from them and those around you because all that matters in business is that you get it right once. Then everyone can tell you how lucky you are.”

—Mark Cuban, entrepreneur, owner of the Dallas Mavericks, co-owner of 2929 Entertainment, and chairman of AXS TV

12. “Don’t worry about failure; you only have to be right once.”

—Drew Houston, founder and CEO of Dropbox

13. “The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. It’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.”

—Barack Obama, 44th President of the United States

14. “The only way you are going to have success is to have lots of failures first.”

—Sergey Brin, co-founder of Google

15. “It’s important to be willing to make mistakes. The worst thing that can happen is you become memorable.”

—Sara Blakely, founder of Spanx

16. “It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.”

—Bill Gates, co-founder of Microsoft

17. “Do not be embarrassed by your failures. Learn from them and start again.”

—Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group

18. “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.”

—Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company

19. “Success is most often achieved by those who don’t know that failure is inevitable.”

—Coco Chanel, fashion designer and founder of the Chanel brand

20. “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”

—Michael Jordan, former professional athlete dubbed the greatest basketball player of all time by the NBA

Take Risks Without Fear

21. “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, President of The Huffington Post Media Group

22. “If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you’ve launched too late.”

—Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn

23. “Don’t be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.”

—John D. Rockefeller, business magnate and philanthropist

24. “Risk more than others think is safe. Dream more than others think is practical.”

—Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks

25. “If you can push through that feeling of being scared, that feeling of taking a risk, really amazing things can happen.”

—Marissa Mayer, co-founder, Sunshine; former President & CEO of Yahoo!

26. “Play by the rules, but be ferocious.”

—Phil Knight, founder of Nik

Nothing Beats Hard Work

27. “I never dreamed about success. I worked for it.”

—Estée Lauder, co-founder of the Estée Lauder cosmetics company

28. “The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.”

—Vidal Sassoon, world-renowned hair stylist and founder of the Vidal Sassoon hair care line

29. “The big secret in life is that there is no big secret. Whatever your goal, you can get there if you’re willing to work.”

—Oprah Winfrey, talk show host, producer, actress, and philanthropist, recognized as one of the most influential women in the world

30. “Some people dream of success, while other people get up every morning and make it happen.”

—Wayne Huizenga, entrepreneur and past owner of Blockbuster Video and various professional sports teams

31. “In the end, a vision without the ability to execute it is probably a hallucination.”

—Steve Case, co-founder of AOL

32. “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.”

—Thomas Edison, entrepreneur who has been described as America’s greatest inventor

33. “The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.”

—Harry Golden, writer and newspaper publisher

34. “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 of Flickr

Just Don’t Quit

35. “It always seems impossible until it’s done.”

—Nelson Mandela, President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999 and globally recognized revolutionary and political leader

36. “Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts.”

—Winston Churchill, Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War II

37. “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go.”

—William Feather, publisher and author

38. “If you really look closely, most overnight successes took a long time.”

—Steve Jobs, co-founder, Chairman, and CEO of Apple

39. “Success seems to be connected with action. Successful people keep moving. They make mistakes, but they don’t quit.”

—Conrad Hilton, Founder of Hilton Hotels

40. “It’s hard to beat a person who never gives up.”

—Babe Ruth, baseball Hall of Famer

Conclusion

Growth marketing can be daunting, but with the right mindset and the right tools it’s a powerful way for business leaders to realize expansive success.

With 6sense as your account engagement partner, you can maximize efficiency, optimize your sales funnels, and manage your pipeline to achieve your growth goals. Get in touch with us to learn more.