Glenn Kelman Quotes

I've never had a business plan. Every project we've ever done was the intersection of somebody with a real need, a real passion to do something, and hustling.

I think one of the reasons why our brand has grown is because we never close any opportunity. We are open to anything and then we sort of move forward from there.

Inventing is a lot like surfing: you have to anticipate and catch the wave at just the right moment.

When something doesn't go exactly to plan, money is tight or a business is struggling - see it as a challenge rather than a failure. Look outside the box and try and find a solution - you'll be surprised how many great opportunities and possibilities arise when things look bad. You've just got to open your mind and not be afraid of sticking your neck out!

To create an organization that's adaptable and innovative, people need the freedom to challenge precedent, to 'waste' time, to go outside of channels, to experiment, to take risks and to follow their passions.

You need to be honest and always see new opportunities coming. So I call it intuition, innovation, execution - these are my working principles.

A lot of people have a lot of faith in Karole Armitage. They see her as bold, inventive, indefatigable. 'America isn't working out? There's always Europe. Ballet? No? Go modern. Keep going! Show 'em!'

As an entrepreneur, you work out solutions.

I get to partner up with all different types of opportunities.

I often don't know what I'll be working on next year or a year from now. There is often a chance meeting, or something that I worked on 10 years ago suddenly becomes important again.

Projects you think are no-brainers stall, and other things see the light of day. You never count anything out.

Being a start-up has nothing to do with the numbers. It's that everyone who works there has the chance to do everything and have an impact.

You get the idea. Every business, like a painting, operates according to its own rules. There are many ways to run a successful company. What works once may never work again. What everyone tells you never to do may just work, once. There are no rules. You don't learn to walk by following rules. You learn by doing, and by falling over, and it's because you fall over that you learn to save yourself from falling over. It's the greatest thrill in the world and it runs away screaming at the first sight of bullet points.

What is an entrepreneur? Someone who jumps off a cliff and builds a plane on the way down.

The metaphor that I frequently use for entrepreneurship is jumping off a cliff and assembling an airplane plane on the way down.

Always think outside the box and embrace opportunities that appear, wherever they might be.

I have always lived my life by thriving on opportunity and adventure. Some of the best ideas come out of the blue, and you have to keep an open mind to see their virtue.

All great work is preparing yourself for the accident to happen.

You gotta keep trying to find your niche and trying to fit into whatever slot that's left for you or to make one of your own.

The biggest threat to a better life is the desire to keep the future under control - to make the world predictable by reining in creativity and enterprise. Progress as a neat blueprint, with no deviations and no surprise, may work in children's cartoons or utopian novels. But it's just a fantasy.

The important thing to remember, if you are trying something that is an innovation, is not to think too much about it. Because if you take too long, by the time you get there, the world will have changed. You take a risk, and if it doesn't work, you make a change. We are not betting our lives on it.

Life is like the monkey bars: you have to let go to move forward. Once you make the decision to leap into entrepreneurship, be sure to loosen your grasp on old concepts so you can swing your way to new ones.

I like to write in all different genres. I just like a new challenge.

When I do a take, I very often try things that I haven't planned to try to see if I can pull it off.

When you meet someone with a vision, you have to give them a shot and an opportunity to see what they can do.