Best 136 quotes of Reid Hoffman on MyQuotes

A little-known company with a realistic framework that appeals to entrepreneurial employees is going to be more attractive than a famous company that treats its people like disposable assets.

All humans are entrepreneurs not because they should start companies but because the will to create is encoded in human DNA.

A networker likes to meet people. I don't. I like accomplishing things in the world. You meet people when you want to accomplish something.

A product needs to be sufficiently innovative to distinguish itself from the pack, but not so forward thinking as to alienate the user.

At Silicon Valley, I'm extremely sympathetic to the revolutionary response. I not only agree with it emotionally. I agree with it practically. And the only thing I disagree with is, I don't think Donald Trump is that. Trump is blow it up for no good reason at all. You want to actually do revolution with a target, with an idea, with building a new system.

Because in our boom times, everything is growing, usually, you know, the kind of things that come to mind are Wild, Wild, West, or land grabs, you know, these sorts of things, in order to make something, you know, kind of to grow into the future and to get all the growth that you need to have. So you tend to hire a lot because you're running fast to the future.

Before dreaming about the future or marking plans, you need to articulate what you already have going for you - as entrepreneurs do.

Benevolent, enlightened, wise dictators are the most efficient form of government. The problem is what comes afterwards.

Be persistent, and hang on to your vision. And at the same time, be flexible.

Boom and bust cycles are very difficult for businesses because you're hiring a bunch because you're planning for the future. And if the future is going to be very big, you need to hire people, or suddenly you go to boom to bust, then all of a sudden, you're kind of battening down the hatches and trying to sail, you know, through the storm, it's a different thing. So part of it is making good decisions about, well, how long is a boom cycle going to be, you know, don't plan on it going forever.

By 2030 over 2 billion jobs will disappear.

Companies hire a lot during boom times because they're trying to adequately accelerate into the future.

Data only exists within the framework of a vision you're building to, a hypothesis of where you're moving to.

Democracy is always frustrating.

Democracy tends to be a collaborative process, a committee, a consensus.

Donald Trump has shown that he will essentially attack individuals, make Second Amendment jokes.

During normal times or boom times, there are some parts of the business that are going to so well, that that can cover for weakness and other parts of the business. What happens during recessions, is you have less windfalls just helping you cover mistakes. You have to be more careful about not making mistakes.

Economic tough times are great times to be investing in the future.

Entrepreneurship is a life idea, not a strictly business one; a global idea, not a strictly American one.

Every individual is essentially now a small business and entrepreneur.

Everyone, you know, during crises times, is much more focused on, okay, how do we get the boat completely seaworthy, sailing along well, and everything going well? And so as long as you're communicating how the general strategy of the company and how the work they can do to add to that and to make that more successful and the thing that they can contribute to that, that is generally very motivating for employees in crisis times.

Finished ought to be an F-word for all of us. We are all works in progress. Each day presents an opportunity to learn more, do more, be more, grow more in our lives and careers.

First mover Advantage doesn't go to the company that starts up, it goes to the company that scales up

Giving birth to something that could possibly change the lives of millions of people for possibly decades, hundreds of years, whatever the length of time the run is, is a great feeling.

Good ideas need good strategy to realize their potential.

Having a great idea for a product is important, but having a great idea for product distribution is even more important.

Help the people in your network. And let them help you.

[Hillary Clinton] is also smart, she talks to people, she hears, and she says, "OK, I need to update, we need some much bigger changes.

[Hillary Clinton] is part of the establishment, and that's good for foreign policy and for understanding the ongoing health care system.

I actually think we need to put our energies, as entrepreneurs, as technology inventors, as government, to being much more inclusive. I think the key thing is actually working together.

I am most heartened when I'm talking to a team when they're reasoning to each other.

I don't normally think of like most successful moments, because like most entrepreneurs, I tend to think that however how high of a mountain I've climbed, I'm always looking at the next mountain to climb.

If I ever hear a founder talk about oh this is how I have a balanced life so on and so forth - they're not committed to winning.

I find that the interesting challenges, because there's obvious things where, you know, don't be unethical, don't be evil, you know, don't break the law, don't do immoral things, those are all straightforward and don't create ethical dilemmas. The thing that's interesting is when you actually have multiple interests at stake and you have to kind of navigate your way through it.

If you are not embarrassed by the first version of your product, you've launched too late.

If you have to conduct layoffs, which is always a regrettable thing, there's kind of three things that are very important. One is to communicate well with your employees in order to help them understand why it is you're doing, and how. Second is to make sure that the employees who are part of the go forward, understand kind of what happened and are not like the ground doesn't keep moving. It's like, okay, we did that, we're moving forward, here we go. And then for the employees that you unfortunately have to let go, try to provide as much support for them as possible.

I get energy from one-on-one conversations most often, and I lose energy from group conversations most often.

I'm sympathetic to the people who go, "Whoa, we'd like to have the benevolent, wise dictator. It will all work much more efficiently," but the reason that we remain staunch democrats - with a small d - is it's a decades long, it's a centuries long, it's a country long process for being inclusive.

In crisis times, it's actually not more difficult to motivate your staff, because everyone gets much more focused on how they control their own economic destiny. So, what you do is you have clear communication, which is always a good leadership technique, and you talk about how you can build something good and strong in the future, and how you can work together in order to do that.

Innovation comes from long-term thinking and iterative execution.

In software speed to market, speed to learning is really key. In hardware if you screw it up you are dead. So accuracy really matters.

Ironically, in a changing world, playing it safe is one of the riskiest things you can do.

I think Hillary [Clinton] has [woken up to the plight of the middle class] and is working toward it in a democratic process.

I think Hillary [Clinton] hears the anger in a broad swath of the American people, and she says, "OK, how do I help create a future that's good for you?

I think I knew how frightened people were [when Donald Trump was elected], and I think I knew that people were worried about their future. I don't think I realized that they would be willing to risk kind of a 1920s Germany in order to blow it all up, not realizing that we've accomplished a lot as Americans, and we want to keep the good things and revolutionize the new things.

I think most of [people] are not very well educated themselves to understand the Winston Churchill line - democracy is the worst of all governments until you consider all the other ones.

I think the randomness by Donald Trump's governing, by tweeting, sloganeering, attacking, will create great chaos in the entire market. I think people will have difficulties in predicting the future. I think capital will recede.

I think the right way to do this is just to step up and do it, so I actually think we'll see more of that over the next coming weeks, because I think they'll say, "We'd like to be good for business and quiet on politics, but this is too urgent, it is too much of a key crisis in who we are going to become as Americans. We can risk too much, and so we have to step forward." And I think you will see more and more people stepping forward, like Howard Schultz, Steve Case and other folks, in order to try to make a difference in this [Donald Trump] election.

I think we realized the depth of frustration through the current political process. So we said, "OK, we know there's a serious problem here, we know we need to work on it," and now it's "Oh, we need to work on it a lot faster.

It’s actually pretty easy to be contrarian. It’s hard to be contrarian and right.