Sam Altman Quotes

Founders should think of their company as a product and build it and shape it with the same passion and care.

Entrepreneurship is not really building a product, it's not having an idea, it's not being in the right place at the right time. It's fundamentally company building.

I've worked in the business world and, as a futurist, the whole 20 years that I've led at Mosaic.

Founders need sizable egos to believe that what they are creating is good enough to change the world. What makes for great co-founders is having those egos focused on complementary, not competing, skills.

The marketplace is absolutely mercurial. But what I love about our company is that we create a vision, and then we go all in.

Technical co-founders are great at envisioning where the company's going from a strategic standpoint. They have what I call the 'gut-feel' of building out their business.

Mediocre founders spend a lot of time talking about grand plans, but they never quite make a decision.

I like to tell people that all of our products and business will go through three phases. There's vision, patience, and execution.

Good-to-great companies set their goals and strategies based on understanding; comparison companies set their goals and strategies based on bravado.

Building a visionary company requires one percent vision and 99 percent alignment.

Develop a clear vision for your organization. Where do you want to be in five years?

Your employees have lots of opinions about everything - your strategy and vision; the state of the competition; the quality of your products; the vibe in the workplace. There are tons of things you can learn from them.

You make sure to set True Norths for your company. You can't be involved in every decision and every meeting; you have to make sure the mission is very built into the culture, the product, and how you communicate.

You're supposed to have a passionate purpose as a CEO.

Creating the right advisory board for your startup can be the single most important step you take in building a new business.

I've learned a lot about business from snowboarding: how companies run, how the game works.

No one gave me a recipe for how to create company culture. I wish I had had one.

All good entrepreneurs have to start somewhere with a dedicated plan to finish in a great place.

Drew and I have always been very analytical at looking at the business opportunities. We're entrepreneurs through and through.

I aim to combine all the things I do in a comprehensive and holistic fashion that benefits startups and the people who make them grow.

I've had 20 years, 25 years of running business. I've been well trained by a number of amazing organizations and I've got a lot of implicit, subconscious pattern recognition on how to make business decisions.

Building a product is easy. But building the company that builds the product is hard.

You have to be decisive. Indecisiveness is a startup killer.

I begin by looking for megatrends, changes in the world that will create major new demands. My goal is to create a company that can be there to meet those demands.

As a founder you have to build a team some day, so why not start the day you found the company?