60+ Richard Branson Quotes to Give You Boost Up to Succeed in Your Career

Quotes by Richard Branson

• “Do not be embarrassed by your failures, learn from them and start again.” – Richard Branson

• “There are many ways to run a successful company. What works once may never work again. What everyone tells you never to do may just work, once. There are no rules.” – Richard Branson

• “Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” – Richard Branson

• “Good brands reflect the histories of the time and the group of people that made them. They cannot be copied. They cannot be recycled.” – Richard Branson

• “If you spot an opportunity and are really excited by it, throw yourself into it with everything you’ve got.”

•  “You’ve got to take risks if you’re going to succeed. I would much rather ask forgiveness than permission.”

• “If you’re hurt, lick your wound and get up again. If you’ve given it your absolute best, it’s time to move forward.”

•  “Remember it’s OK to be yourself.”

• “And you know, I’ve had great fun turning quite a lot of different industries on their head and making sure those industries will never be the same again, because Virgin went in and took them on.”

• “My mother was determined to make us independent. When I was four years old, she stopped the car a few miles from our house and made me find my own way home across the fields. I got hopelessly lost.”

• “Chance favors the prepared mind. The more you practice, luckier you become.”

• “Life is a hell of a lot more fun if you say yes rather than no.”

• “Education doesn’t just take place in stuffy classrooms and university buildings, it can happen everywhere, every day to every person.”

• “Once a changemaker, always a changemaker but only a few swim against the tide.”

• “Train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough so they don’t want to.”

•  “If you want swashbuckling action in your life, become an entrepreneur and give it a go.”

•  “Clients do not come first. Employees come first. If you take care of your employees, they will take care of the clients.”

•  “It’s rare for a startup to make money immediately, so you need to make sure that you have enough saved or that you have another income stream that can support you.”

Richard Branson Quotes on Employees

• “For a successful entrepreneur it can mean extreme wealth. But with extreme wealth comes extreme responsibility. And the responsibility for me is to invest in creating new businesses, create jobs, employ people, and to put money aside to tackle issues where we can make a difference.”

• “I believe in benevolent dictatorship provided I am the dictator.”

• “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.”

• “Well, I think that there’s a very thin dividing line between success and failure. And I think if you start a business without financial backing, you’re likely to go the wrong side of that dividing line.”

• “Ridiculous yachts and private planes and big limousines won’t make people enjoy life more, and it sends out terrible messages to the people who work for them. It would be so much better if that money was spent in Africa – and it’s about getting a balance.”

• “There’s nothing like the endorphins from being fit, and the incredible endorphin rush that goes with that.”

• “I cannot remember a moment in my life when I have not felt the love of my family. We were a family that would have killed for each other – and we still are.””

• “There’s an inherent danger in letting people think that they have perfected something. When they believe they’ve ‘nailed it,’ most people tend to sit back and rest on their laurels while countless others will be labouring furiously to better their work!”

• ‘The music industry is a strange combination of having real and intangible assets: pop bands are brand names in themselves, and at a given stage in their careers their name alone can practically guarantee hit records.”

• “Right now I’m just delighted to be alive and to have had a nice long bath.”

• “A good leader doesn’t get stuck behind a desk.”

• “An exceptional company is the one that gets all the little details right. And the people out on the front line, they know when things are not going right, and they know when things need to be improved. And if you listen to them, you can soon improve all those niggly things which turns an average company into an exceptional company.”

• “The true cost to the world of a burger is far greater than the money you hand over to buy it.”

• “I was dyslexic, I had no understanding of schoolwork whatsoever. I certainly would have failed IQ tests. And it was one of the reasons I left school when I was 15 years old. And if I’m not interested in something, I don’t grasp it.”

• “So I’ve seen life as one long learning process. And if I see – you know, if I fly on somebody else’s airline and find the experience is not a pleasant one, which it wasn’t in – 21 years ago, then I’d think, well, you know, maybe I can create the kind of airline that I’d like to fly on.”

Richard Branson Leadership Quotes

• “From my very first day as an entrepreneur, I’ve felt the only mission worth pursuing in business is to make people’s lives better.”

• “Great thinkers don’t act solely with their own interest in mind; they drive change to affect society for the better.”

• “If you don’t have time for small things, you won’t have time for the big things.”

• “Don’t become a slave to technology – manage your phone, don’t let it manage you.”

• “Engage your emotions at work. Your instincts and emotions are there to help you.”

• “All you have in business is your reputation – so it’s very important that you keep your word.”

•  “You should not build your customer service system on the premise that your organisation will never question the whims of your clients.”

• “The art of delegation is one of the key skills any entrepreneur must master.”

• “An important priority for me is a business must get their own house in order. Be or become an agent of positive change in your own enterprise and adopt responsible practices to eliminate the risks that often lie at the root of inequality and poverty.”

• “There’s no point in starting a business unless you’re going to make a dramatic difference to other people’s lives. So if you’ve got an idea that’s gonna make a big difference to other people’s lives, then just get on and do it.”

• “Fun is one of the most important – and underrated – ingredients in any successful venture. If you’re not having fun, then it’s probably time to call it quits and try something else.”

• “You never know with these things when you’re trying something new what can happen. This is all experimental.”

• “I always find the time to exercise – kitesurfing, tennis or cycling – and to spend time with my loved ones.”

• “I’m a bit like the Queen in that I don’t carry much cash.”

• “Treat failure as a lesson on how not to approach achieving a goal, and then use that learning to improve your chances of success when you try again. Failure is only the end if you decide to stop.”