5 Powerful Quotes from 5 Powerful People

1. “Cooler heads prevail.” - Scott Minerd, the CIO of Guggenheim Partners and Special Advisor to the Federal Reserve.
During the 1993 European exchange rate crisis, Minerd orchestrated the restructuring of Italy’s Eurobond debt. By employing the largest debt exchange offer ever executed by a G7 country, Italy was able to reestablish itself as a credible capital markets borrower. In any business, it is important to always keep calm, even in a crisis situation. In doing so you maintain clear focus, limit the possible damage and increase the chance of success. How did YOU react during your last business crisis?

2. “If you are not failing 30% of the time you are not trying.” - William Lupien, General Partner of Kudu Partners and legendary commodities expert.
In 1969, Lupien executed the first-ever electronic stock trade in history on the PSE SCOREX system, whose design he pioneered. Lesson: Don’t fear failure — face it and learn from it. Great companies and leaders embrace this mentality, and if your company or management doesn’t, you are simply letting the clock run out on being a true leader in your industry. Have you failed lately?

3. “Success in any field, but especially in business is about working with people, not against them.” - Keith Ferrazzi, author, one of the world’s most connected people and CEO of Ferrazzi Greenlight.
Ferrazzi launched his career as the youngest Chief Marketing Officer in the Fortune 500 at Deloitte Consulting, and was also CMO at Starwood Hotels HOT +1.47% and CEO at YaYa Media. To win at anything it takes a team. Are you building a team or are you building a personal silo?

4. “… To make a persuasive pitch, you need to be passionate about the topic, act as a storyteller, limit the PowerPoint slides and ingest no more than one cup of caffeine.” - Porter Gale, speaker, author and Former CMO of Virgin America.
Advice worth heeding coming from Porter, who was awarded the “Changing The Game Award” by The Advertising Women of New York (AWNY), was on AdAge’s Digital Hotlist, iMedia Top 25-Digital Marketers and named a Digital Passionista by The Huffington Post. In your business, you will inevitably have to ‘sell’ something, a product, a vision, the reason why you deserve a raise. When that selling moment comes, will you be convincing enough?

5. “There can be no success without failure.” - Gavin Newsom, Lt. Gov. of California, author and small business owner.
During his tenure as Mayor of San Francisco, Gavin Newsom participated in much of the development of the San Francisco tech scene and led the way with his visionary policy. But most people don’t make as much progress as they could, largely due to their fear of falling. Will you take the easy path, or the path of progress?