Ruth J. Simmons Quotes

The cool part about working for Disney is that they've allowed me to be a change agent.

I never thought we had a chance of impacting anything. I am just starting to realize that we can change things - not just VICE, but all of us. In fact, we have to.

It all sounds almost silly, but the fact is that the only way to change a corporate culture is to just change it.

I believe that companies are, above all, agents of transformation.

When you are led by values, it doesn't cost your business, it helps your business.

If you go through some big corporate change, it's just not going to be the same. If we sold to Yahoo, they would have done something different; if you want to continue your vision of the company, then don't sell because there's inevitably going to be some change.

Women will change the corporation more than we expect.

My goal was never to just create a company. A lot of people misinterpret that, as if I don't care about revenue or profit or any of those things. But what not being just a company means to me is not being just that - building something that actually makes a really big change in the world.

There's been a sea change in our focus on corporate ethics. We've made more progress in the last three years than the previous 30.

None of us believe that in order to run a business, you have to leave your humanity at home.

We have ripped the humanity out of our companies. It's threatening the very underpinnings of our society.

I have always believed that business should be a force for good.

The State of Israel will prove itself not by material wealth, not by military might or technical achievement, but by its moral character and human values.

What we are trying to do is to create a new business paradigm, simply showing that business can have a human face and a social conscience.

If you want the best things to happen in corporate life you have to find ways to be hospitable to the unusual person. You don't get innovation as a democratic process. You almost get it as an anti-democratic process. Certainly you get it as an antithetical process, so you have to have an environment where the body of people are really amenable to change and can deal with the conflicts that arise out of change an innovation.

If you run your business fairly; if you treat people well; if you try to move your business into areas that are making a real positive difference to other peoples lives; I think you'll A. have much pleasant life, but B. I think you'll have a much more successful business.

It is my responsibility to take advantage of my position to make the world a better place

It turns out that doing the right thing, treating people right, is also the right thing for the company.

Profit has to be a means to other ends rather than an end in itself.

To know is to care, to care is to act, to act is to make a difference.

In a world as wrong as this one, all we can do is make things as right as we can.

We don't have to reinvent the wheel, just go back to what it was in terms of how corporations acted in terms of their collective responsibility just 20 years ago.

The success of the Starbucks has been based on this balance between profitability and a social conscience. Everywhere we're doing business, were trying to manage the business through the lens of humanity.

Individuals by themselves can make a difference. And by making a difference, you can improve the world.

Channel your outrage ... Do that which you are able to do.