Sam Yagan Quotes

It's important for anyone working at a hyper growth company such as Airbnb to embrace learning and be open in order to keep pace with the changing environment.

I never stop making sure that what I say is the best of what could be said about a particular thing. It's a constant evolution. If I planted a tree one way yesterday, and somebody tells me of a better way to plant a tree, I think, 'You know, they're right, that's better.' Then I change my way to accommodate the new way of planting trees.

Persistence and determination are incredibly important. But sometimes you need to analyze the situation and understand when you're wrong. You need to be able to cop to being wrong, learn to change, and continue to grow as a human being.

As soon as you know what you're doing, you're doing it wrong.

A mistake is simply another way of doing things.

I don't ever want to be comfortable with anything I'm doing.

Some are very hostile if mistakes are pointed out. I'm not. If I make a mistake, I make a mistake.

In a start-up company, you basically throw out all assumptions every three weeks.

I'm always open for people saying I'm wrong because most of the time I am.

No one is perfect, and criticism is always welcome and expected.

At Udacity, we always strive to make things better and learn from our mistakes.

I'm always looking to learn and am never happy with how I am going. I think once you get comfortable with what you are offering it is dangerous territory to be in.

Win or lose or draw, you always go back and critique your performance and say you could have done things better. Even if I put the guy away in one round, I can go back and say I made a lot of mistakes and need to tighten up. But that's the type of person I am. Improve. Improve. Improve. When I lose I come back stronger than ever.

In success there's a tendency to keep on doing what you were doing.

Humility in this business [acting] isn't just a matter of being polite, it's kind of a matter of survival. You can't ever afford to think that you're the bee's knees, because you could always afford to be better. You have to always be searching for something better.

No one is exempt from the rule that learning occurs through recognition of error.

You can't just keep doing what works one time, everything around you is changing. To succeed, stay out in front of change.

I can always see ways to improve what I've done. At the same time, knowing it's all an ongoing life's work allows me to be less precious about blind alleys, failed experiments, and misfires.

Habit is necessary. It is the habit of having habits, of turning a trail into a rut, that must be incessantly fought against if one is to remain alive ... one can remain alive long past the usual date of disintegration if one is unafraid of change, insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in the big things, and happy in small ways.

The only way to avoid disruption is to constantly do what you would if you were just starting out.

Don't assume a door is closed; push on it. Don't assume if it was closed yesterday that it is closed today. Don't ever stop learning and improving your mind. If you do, you're going to be left behind.

Continually challenge and be willing to amend your best loved ideas.

Some positive persisting fops we know, Who, if once wrong, will needs be always so; But you with pleasure own your errors past, And make each day a critique on the last.

Leaders never outgrow the need to change.

One must not hold one's self so divine as to be unwilling occasionally to make improvements in one's creations.