Stelios Haji-Ioannou Quotes

If you create something that makes a difference in people's lives, you are likely to become a business success as well

When I look at all the people that I have working for me and the company I've started and all the people that benefit from it and have a living because of it, it's very motivating to continue to do it.

When you create a business, you create something that improves the life of your customer, of another person, maybe of ten people, of a thousand people, of a million people. There's no higher calling.

There is no greater feeling in business than building a product which impacts people's lives in a profound way. When we look around at the thousands of people who have attended Summit gatherings, it makes us smile to see the new friendships, business partnerships and philanthropic initiatives that each event produces.

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.

I'm about impact. One can make impact if they run a big business with a lot of zeroes. I've done that. One can also make an impact when you're a research analyst, where it's you and your associate. I've done that.

I want people to be entrepreneurs, but I want them to do it for the right reasons, because they think they can change the world, because they think they have got something of value to give to the world. Not because they think they can make a lot of money.

I love creating things, and as an entrepreneur, I've taken on quite a lot of major corporations and done well. Capitalism is the only system that works, but it has its flaws; for one, it brings great wealth to only a few people. That wealth obviously brings extreme responsibility.

The best way to become a billionaire is to help a billion people.

The entrepreneurs who succeed usually want to make a difference to people’s lives, not just their own bank balances.

Running a business is making a difference in people's lives

There is no point in going into a business unless you can make a radical difference in other people’s lives.

I have always looked on my businesses not just as money-making machines, but as adventures that can, I hope, make people better off.

What is the most powerful force in the world? And I think you would agree that is a big idea if it is in the hands of an entrepreneur who is actually going to make the idea not only happen, but spread all across society. And we understand that in business but we have need for entrepreneurship just as much in education, human rights, health, and the environment as we do in hotels and steel.

You need to spend all of your time and energy on creating something that actually brings value to the people you're asking for money!

That business we started with 10 people has now grown into a great American success story. Some of the companies we helped start are names you know. An office supply company called Staples – where I’m pleased to see the Obama campaign has been shopping; The Sports Authority, which became a favorite of my sons. We started an early childhood learning center called Bright Horizons that First Lady Michelle Obama rightly praised. At a time when nobody thought we’d ever see a new steel mill built in America, we took a chance and built one in a corn field in Indiana.

It's a very exciting time in the history of this country, to even see people responding to a different way of doing business and really wanting to make a change.

Entrepreneurial knowledge has little to do with certified expertise, advanced degrees, or the learning of establishment schools. The fashionably educated and cultivated spurn the kind of fanatically focused learning commanded by the innovators. Wealth all too often comes from doing what other people consider insufferably boring or unendurably hard.

When I ran, people know I have a very big business. So I mean they elected me I guess partially for that reason.

Being able to touch so many people through my businesses and make money while doing it, is a huge blessing.

Sorry, investing was pretty boring and I really missed being part of building something. I felt like I was always standing on the sidelines, so Zappos... really liked the people there and got involved full-time and I've been full-time ever since.

Believe in better is one of the most powerful words you can use in the business community.

Being an entrepreneur simply means being someone who wants to make a difference to other people's lives.

It's not government that makes business successful. It's not government investments that makes businesses grow and hire people.

Most entrepreneurs are not doing it for financial motives in the first place. They're just people who love creating.