Startup Culture Quotes

I started SpaceX with the expectation of failure.

Founding a successful startup is no different than forming a rock band.

Never invest in a tech CEO that wears a suit.

I think that's exactly what Silicon Valley was all about in those days. Let's do a startup in our parents' garage and try to create a business.

Since most startups operate at a break-neck pace, with a concept to prove or a product to launch within a rapidly shortening runway of financing, company culture often gets shoved aside. This is a big, big mistake: Nobody serious about their business should put culture in the corner.

Starting a company is a cause, not a job. Once it becomes a job, that's when you lose

The market is ridiculously overcrowded with early stage investors. This results in a talent drain, where the best talent gets diffused and work for their own startups.

The wunderkinder of Silicon Valley—their fortunes, business empires, and, more fundamentally, entire sense of self—exist because of the nation that in many cases made their rise possible.

At Uber, we say, 'Always be hustling.' Even if you are an introvert and you haven't got hustle in you, you better get a co-founder who does. And if you haven't got enough hustle to find a co-founder who's got hustle, it's going to be tough. You've got to have a little hustle in you.

That's what America's all about. Entrepreneurs who can start a business in their basement and have it grow into a global company - that's exactly what we want.

We are calling ourselves a startup nation, but the number of people who set out on their own is very low; even 10,000 a year would be low in a country like India. We can say we are a startup nation but the world won't say it.

I really knew almost nothing about Silicon Valley. I read that Steve Jobs book and watched a bunch of documentaries, and read the book about Mark Zuckerberg. I tried to learn some stuff, but there are consultants on the Silicon Valley show that know so much about it where you can get answers. To me, it's more important to get the particulars about that type of person as opposed to the specifics of the technology world.

Everybody who goes into government gets somewhat chewed up in the process. Being a senior appointee is like being at a startup, only more so: You run into opposition from the entrenched oligopoly of contractors whose business model is to extract as much money from government as possible for doing as little as possible.

Doing startups is all about making mistakes.

At the core of Silicon Valley is a passion for 'yes.'

I hate it when people call themselves 'entrepreneurs' when what they're really trying to do is launch a startup and then sell of go public, so they can cash in and move on. They're unwilling to do the work it takes to build a real company, which is the hardest work in business.

Startups are rapidly changing systems. If you use an annual review cycle, you aren't getting feedback at the same pace that you need to adapt and change the business.

Entrepreneurship is the engine fuelling innovation, employment generation and economic growth. Only by creating an environment where entrepreneur- ship can prosper and where entrepreneurs can try new ideas and empower others can we ensure that many of the world’s issues will not go unaddressed.

Ideas are the currency of the new economy.

Even by Silicon Valley standards, PayPal's vision was massively ambitious.

... if you talk to say any of the first 40 or 50 employees, they all feel like they were a part of the founding of the company.

Entrepreneurship is neither a science nor an art. It is a practice.

Atari showed that young people could start big companies. Without that example it would have been harder for Jobs and Bill Gates, and people who came after them, to do what they did.

At YC we have this public phrase, and it's relentlessly resourceful.

In the startup world, 'not working' is normal.