Frederick W. Smith Quotes

• My four years in the Marine Corps left me with an indelible understanding of the value of leadership skills.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Marine, Years, Skills

  48 Copy quote

• Fear of failure must never be a reason not to try something.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Inspirational, Fear, Fall

  16 Copy quote

• Leadership is simply the ability of an individual to coalesce the efforts of other individuals toward achieving common goals. It boils down to looking after your people and ensuring that, from top to bottom, everyone feels part of the team.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Team, People, Goal

  8 Copy quote

• Leaders get out in front and stay there by raising the standards by which they judge themselves - and by which they are willing to be judged.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Motivational, Leadership, Inspiration

  7 Copy quote

• I do not believe I could have built FedEx without the skills I learned from the Marine Corps.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Believe, Marine, Skills

  6 Copy quote

• A Yale University management professor in response to student Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service: The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C', the idea must be feasible.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Ideas, Yale, Order

  9 Copy quote

• If you look historically, what creates growth and wealth is innovation and investment, and increase in scale - more customers.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Innovation, Growth, Looks

  4 Copy quote

• I’m not afraid to take a swing and miss.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Swings, Missing, Not Afraid

  10 Copy quote

• It is impossible to manage the health care requirements of tens of millions of American citizens at the federal level. It is impossible to manage all of the permutations of people's economic aspirations and lives through a complex tax code. It is impossible to try to second-guess the market. It is impossible, from a managerial standpoint, for the federal government to do the things it is trying to do today.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Government, People, Trying

  10 Copy quote

• I paid every effort to seek deregulation throughout FEDEX's start-up and expansion periods, because the biggest impediment to our growth was the government regulations that restricted new entry into the air cargo market.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Government, Air, Effort

  5 Copy quote

• My innovation involved taking an idea from the telecommunications and banking industries, and applying that idea to transportation business.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Ideas, Innovation, Banking

  7 Copy quote

• A good Christian is a velvet-covered brick.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Christian, Velvet, Bricks

  8 Copy quote

• There is no free market for oil. It's controlled by a cartel, OPEC.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Oil, Cartels, Opec

  10 Copy quote

• A lot of the economy is indeed being supplied by goods that are produced offshore. And much of the reason for that is societal.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Reason, Economy, Goods

  5 Copy quote

• The United States tax system today is very prejudiced towards financialization, leverage, and lack of investment.

  Frederick W. Smith

  United States, Today, Investment

  4 Copy quote

• I am not someone who tends to advocate for increased government involvement in the private sector.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Government, Involvement, Private Sector

  4 Copy quote

• The tax rate of 35 percent is impossible to provide an incentive to the large corporations, that have $1.7 trillion offshore, to put their money back in the United States.

  Frederick W. Smith

  United States, Incentives, Corporations

  4 Copy quote

• Only electricity can give the transport sector the flexibility to switch fuels when one or more become too expensive.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Giving, Fuel, Electricity

  8 Copy quote

• Beginning in 1973 and then acts in '77, '78, 1980, 1994 and then into the 21st century in the international arena, governments have steadily gotten out of the transportation business.

  Frederick W. Smith

  Government, Arena, Century

  5 Copy quote

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