Damian Woetzel Quotes

I call 2015 a year of deconstruction. I needed to deconstruct myself, my businesses, and find all of the holes in my empire. I had to find holes and fill them with people who could do it better.

Philanthropists can learn important lessons from business entrepreneurs. They both spend their time solving problems. And to be successful, they both must overcome physical challenges and create self-sustaining operations. And ultimately, they must allow people to take action for their own benefit.

I am just at that stage of wondering where I go from here. I came into this business almost by accident, but now it has become serious. What started as a bit of fun, something to do other than be a model, has taken on a different career curve. I have been forced to ask where that curve is going to end up.

In the not-for-profit world, there can be wastefulness because there's not the desperate urgency of when you're on a clock.

I discovered early in my career as an entrepreneur that I'm not good at many things, and I said 'I need help.'

Why isn't it natural for people who have lived and worked at something to want to use the knowledge and capacity in a new way, free from the burden of making a living?

My hobbies just sort of gradually became my vocation.

The major challenge facing most foundations is that they are risk averse. This inhibits their ability to experiment and commit to the experimentation and innovation process.

A philanthropic venture requires all the energy, knowledge and money from its founder that a company requires from the leadership team.

While other industries have suffered, the nonprofit arts world continues to build in strength while it encourages the growth of innumerable small businesses on its periphery, thereby creating more jobs.

The most abundant resources that we possess amongst the 1.5 million nonprofits in the United States are passion and knowledge, yet our most scarce resource is collaboration.

I make a personal commitment to the direction and success of all the programs in which I invest. I make all major philanthropic decisions myself after taking account of a range of expert opinion.

I love and always have loved policy issues and trying to have an impact on the issues that are out there. I cherish my years in government. I have loved my participation at CNN, at Current; writing; teaching. Where I will go next, I will have to sort out.

I am so excited to extend myself behind the scenes as a designer and to - as my father puts it - finally have a real job.

I should have just become a manager.

Now I am ready to set new goals and start a new career for myself outside of the ring.

And I discovered after a couple years that I really didn't miss making movies.

When I was working on my career, I was very aware of what I had done, what I wanted to do next. I'm having a good time just reading things that might be interesting to do.

Well, I think I've had a fairly meandering career.

I was trying to figure out how to use the skills I had developed in the world of social change.

Too often, nonprofits are viewed as rigid and bureaucratic - less nimble and capable of adapting in this fluid environment than our corporate counterparts. I don't agree.

I kind of look at my modeling career and the Hitchcock years as stepping stones to what I'm doing now.

I'm on a lot of nonprofit boards, but if I didn't enjoy it I wouldn't do it. I haven't yet done anything that's transformational in philanthropy. But I hope at some point to target two or three causes or organizations and really make transformational gifts.

In the charitable world as in the business world, opportunities should drive budgets, not the other way around.

I went to Carnegie Mellon and was an electrical engineer, but electrical engineering wasn't right for me.