“I'm in show business... I want to hang out with Janet Jackson, not Jesse Jackson.”
Business is where ambition meets reality. These quotes cover entrepreneurship, leadership, risk, failure, and the daily grind of building something that lasts. Expect hard truths alongside inspiration — the best business advice usually includes both.
“I'm quitting the business today. I'm going to open up an appliance store, I've always really been into toasters. I'm giving it all up.”
“I'm in show business... I want to hang out with Janet Jackson, not Jesse Jackson.”
“You can't be halfway in this business. If you don't meet the fans, you lose all you've got.”
“Many people see technology as the problem behind the so-called digital divide. Others see it as the solution. Technology is neither. It must operate in conjunction with business, economic, political and social system.”
“Every few seconds it changes - up an eighth, down an eighth - it's like playing a slot machine. I lose $20 million, I gain $20 million.”
“So we really need jobs now. We have to take jobs away from other countries because other countries are taking our jobs. There is practically not a country that does business with the United States that isn't making - let's call it a very big profit. I mean China is going to make $300 billion on us at least this year.”
“The thing that helped me get into the film business was that I went to school in Athens, Georgia and managed to get on, um, working on music videos for a band called R.E.M. and that kind of opened up a lot of doors for me.”
“In America, we no longer have an institutionalized, organized way of calling business to task - of taking them to account for what they've done - and this is especially true in the cultural realm.”
“A budget tells us what we can't afford, but it doesn't keep us from buying it.”
“Suits are looked at more now as a business thing which is kind of a shame. If you're not wearing it just for work, you should try and trick it up a bit.”
“It can be hard in this business, especially when you're very young, to figure out who you can and can't trust.”
“You know, I look like a woman but I think like a man. And in this world of business, that has helped me a lot. Because by the time they think that I don't know what's goin' on, I then got the money, and gone.”
“My home has always been show business.”
“I always wanted to be a zookeeper when I was growing up, and I've wound up a zookeeper! I've been working with the Los Angeles Zoo for 45 years! I'm the luckiest old broad on two feet because my life is divided absolutely in half - half animals and half show business. You can't ask for better than two things you love the most.”
“Creative people don't behave very well generally. If you're looking for examples of good relationships in show business, you're gonna be depressed real fast. I don't have time for anything else right now but work and my daughter. She's my first priority.”
“I think it is an immutable law in business that words are words, explanations are explanations, promises are promises - but only performance is reality.”