Pamela Slim quotes: gems from the business mentor.
“Recognize that you are the sole agent of your career.”
“Individuals who structure their careers around autonomy, mastery, and purpose will have a powerful body of work.”
“Consistent impact over the course of your life on a body of work you care about deeply is legacy. Your body of work is everything you create, contribute, affect and impact. For individuals, it is the personal legacy you leave at the end of your life, including all the tangible and intangible things you have created. A body of work is big and deep and complex. It allows you to experiment and play and change and test.”
“For organizations, it is the products, property, inventions, ideas and value they share throughout the course of their existence.”
“All of the pieces, parts and fragments of what you do at work and away from work assemble together to create your body of work.”
“The world of work is permanently not stable. You need to have a backup plan. Uncertainty, fear and doubt are inevitable parts of building a body of work.”
“Focusing on building a body of work will give you more freedom and clarity to choose different work options throughout the course of your life, and you’ll be able to connect your diverse accomplishments, sell your story, and continually reinvent and relaunch your brand.”
“Potential fame, fortune, or freedom aside, there is simply no better way to learn about yourself than starting a business. And when you truly know yourself, you tend to design a business that matches your strengths. Because you are the one in charge, you care more. No longer constrained by a labyrinthine bureaucracy, you think bigger. And given the flexibility to design whatever you want, you are more likely to do something that means something to the world.”
“No one is looking out for your career anymore. You must find meaning, locate opportunities, sell yourself, and plan for failure, calamity, and unexpected disasters. You must develop a set of skills that makes you able to earn an income in as many ways as possible. The new world of work requires a new lens and skill set to ensure career success.”
“Trying to wait until you have enough courage to start your business is fighting the way your brain is wired. Instead of trying to suppress these lizard fears, learn from them.”
“We are made to create. We feel useful when we create. We release our ‘stuckness’ when we create. We reinvent our lives, tell new stories, and rebuild communities when we create. We reclaim our esteem, our muse, and our hope when we create.”
“Your thoughts, beliefs, and assumptions drive everything in your life and career. People who operate on a high level of creativity and mastery are rigorous about mental awareness and preparation. Top athletes, fighters, artists, writers, businesspeople, and scientists use different methods to stay clear, focused, motivated, and productive. Not only are precise and motivating thoughts critical to maintaining momentum toward big goals, but the ability to look at things from new and critical perspectives is a fundamental skill in creating a diverse, interesting, and integrated body of work.”
“Success is to enjoy my life while living it. Hating your job intensely is not a business plan. Define your service, choose a price, set up your payment account and boom, you can test something to see if somebody’s willing to pay you for the service. The act of planning is critical for a small business owner. People want to feel like their life has meaning.”
“Take a piece of tough feedback, sift out the pieces that have some use or truth to them and let the rest flow down the sink. The easiest way to do this is to ask yourself, ‘What part of this feedback will make me better, more successful in the marketplace and happier at what I do if I apply it?’ Keep that piece of advice and let the rest go.”
“All of us have inner critics that whisper in our ear when we are trying something new. ‘Who do you think you are to run a business? You call yourself a writer? Everyone will think I am a slimy salesperson if I try to sell my products or services.’ Recognize your self-saboteurs and move forward anyway.”
“Don’t shoot the messenger. Blog readers can be exceptionally direct with their feedback. Some people are downright mean and make personal attacks in addition to criticizing your ideas. If you ever receive a comment like this, your first inclination may be to shoot back a biting, profanity-laden response. Don’t do it. It will solve nothing to engage with someone who is obviously trying to provoke you. You many even encourage the person to continue to post personal attacks. Punch a pillow, write a nasty response and then delete it, or print out the person’s comment and burn it in a glorious ceremony in your backyard.”
“Find ways to be kind to yourself. Even if you are very strong emotionally, some negative feedback will burrow past your armor and pierce you. Learn what makes you feel better. No problem of mine is too big for a heaping bowl of Ben and Jerry’s ice cream and a hot bath. Thankfully I don’t have too many bad days, or I would have a serious cholesterol problem and be very clean. Identify your self-pampering activities and engage in them whenever your inner child wants to cry.”
“The bigger you choose to play in the world, the more negative criticism you will receive. If you learn to deal with it gracefully, nothing will stop you from accomplishing your goals.”
“You believe that when you choose one idea it will forever rule out the possibility of doing another. This feels restrictive and makes your inner entrepreneur want to rebel like a teenager. Or, you have no decision criteria. All ideas feel like beloved children, and you cannot bear to give preference to one over the other. Brainstorm decision criteria based on your current life and financial situation. A critical criterion would be: quickest path to market, quickest path to money, greatest passion, easiest to implement, easiest to explain to your relatives, fewest resources to start, greatest chance for success or greatest impact on the world.”
“By choosing to move forward with a specific business idea, you do not rule out other business opportunities in the future. A healthy consulting practice could beef up your bank account so you could test out one of your action adventure tours. A successful product launch could fund the down payment on your bed and breakfast. It is hard to start many businesses at once, so by staggering your efforts, you give each idea a chance for success. The only way to guarantee failure in business is to never move your ideas out of your head and into the real world. So get moving, and if one idea doesn’t work, move on to the next.”
“You aren’t crazy—there are good reasons why starting a business feels hard. This first stage of change happens when you consciously choose to move from employee to entrepreneur. Nothing is familiar anymore, and you grasp to both feel normal and explain your new work identity to others.”
“Stay focused inward, on your own insights and creativity. Exercise, eat right and stay grounded. Don’t worry about figuring everything out at this stage, just pay attention to how you feel, and stay open to possibility.”
“Don’t edit your imagination. Run wild and think up new ideas for products and services. Don’t worry if they don’t make sense, or that no one you have ever known has ever been successful at it. The important thing is to brainstorm as many possible ideas as you can and gather lots of data from different sources.”
“Don’t get flustered. Expect that things will go wrong. Do not beat yourself up when they do. Focus on tweaking, learning from mistakes, and moving forward. Surround yourself with smart people and good support.”
“Enjoy it while you can! Save your money, clean up your systems, and be smart about growth. Sooner or later, you will either be forced through the cycle again—or will go through it willingly.”
“I believe that people have the power to shape the world through their work. So much so, that I traded in my job as a corporate training manager for a solo career in the late ’90s and I’ve been changing the world ever since.”
“Look, life really is too long to work for an organization that doesn’t believe what you believe. My core purpose is to inspire others to break free from that very situation—to find the life where they feel strongest. My core belief is that we all need each other.”
“I never set out to be a writer or speaker. After being a management consultant for 10 years in Silicon Valley, I felt called to a new mission: helping unhappy corporate employees start successful businesses. I started my blog, Escape from Cubicle Nation, in 2005, with the intention of sharing useful content that would attract ideal coaching clients. Little did I know that it would blow up and attract my publisher who asked me to write a book of the same title.”
“I’m best known for my first book Escape from Cubicle Nation: From Corporate Prisoner to Thriving Entrepreneur, along with my follow-up, Body of Work: Finding the Thread That Ties Your Story Together. In 2016, I launched the Main Street Learning Lab in Mesa, Arizona, as a grassroots, community-based think tank for small business economic acceleration.”
“I was very passionate about the topic of my book, so speaking became a great way to connect with larger audiences and inspire them to give entrepreneurship a chance. The more I wrote and spoke, the more I enjoyed it. After a few years, I was ready to add ‘author and speaker’ to my core skill of ‘business coach.'”
“I have a master list of big projects. It is not always possible to finish everything in one day, but when I approach my list with calm and prioritize, I feel much better.”
“I feel privileged to have worked with people in just about every work environment, from huge corporations to non-profits, to tiny side businesses started on kitchen tables. There is no right way to work—only the way that brings out your very best contribution to the world, and fits your definition of success.”
“The secret to high-performance and satisfaction—at work, at school, and at home—is the deeply human need to direct our own lives, to learn and create new things, and to do better by ourselves and our world.”
“Admit what you don’t know. Ask for help. If you can’t help someone, find someone who can. Don’t be afraid to laugh. Mean what you say and say what you mean. Don’t worry about being perfect. It’s an exhausting facade. Apologize right away if you screw up. Take responsibility for yourself, and your business. If people aren’t satisfied, ask why. If they ask for their money back, give it to them. Don’t be a fanboy or fangirl of anything. Be you.”
“Remembering the grace of who you are in your most innocent state, outside of any personal or professional situation, is the most pure form of success.”
“Your body of work is defined by how you articulate your purpose in the world, and then by what steps you take to support it. How you talk about yourself (and to yourself) about what you do and why you do it is a major part of who you are, and therefore of your personal brand. Become conscious of the stories you tell.”
“The quality of your life is directly related to the quality of your stories. Especially those you tell yourself. You must craft them well.”
“My definition of success is really enjoying my life while I’m living it, and that includes not completely burning myself out.”
Related: Chris Brogan quotes.
