Top 40 Charles M. Schwab Quotes

There is no royal road to a successful life, as there is no royal road to learning. It has got to be hard knocks, morning, noon, and night, and fixity of purpose.

A man to carry on a successful business must have imagination. He must see things as in a vision, a dream of the whole thing.

All successful employers are stalking men who will do the unusual, men who think, men who attract attention by performing more than is expected of them.

I’m making better than two million a year, but it’s hard work. The luxuries and pleasures I enjoy in my spare time keep me in condition to do that work. Carnegie and Frick have more money than I have, but I’m getting more value for my dollars than they are.

There is nothing a worker resents more than to see some man taking his job. A factory can be closed down, its chimneys smokeless, waiting for the worker to come back to his job, and all will be peaceful. But the moment workers are imported, and the striker sees his own place usurped, there is bound to be trouble.

Here I am, a not over-good business man, a second-rate engineer. I can make poor mechanical drawings. I play the piano after a fashion. In fact, I am one of those proverbial Jack-of-all-trades who are usually failures. Why I am not, I can’t tell you.

What little success I may have won in life I attribute to the loyalty I had for a dear old friend who was my first steel master, whom you perhaps have never heard of: Captain Bill Jones.

The aristocracy in the future is not one of wealth or university education, but the aristocracy of the men who have done something for themselves and their fellow men.

My own experience is that there is no real effort in life that is not done better under encouragement and approval of our fellow men.

When I first went to work… I had over me an impetuous, hustling man. It was necessary for me to be up to the top notch to give satisfaction. I worked faster than I otherwise would have done, and to him I attribute the impetus that I acquired.

Let us suppose you become a craneman. Suppose you become a clerk in a lawyer’s office. Give the best that is in you. Let nothing stand in the way of your going on.

If you are going into any manufacturing establishment, don’t go there by reason of any influence you may have. Start upon your own merits, and start in some lowly position, no matter what it is. Be a laborer, if you will. I don’t know but that is the best way to start.

The men who miss success have two general alibis: ‘I’m not a genius’ is one; the other, ‘There aren’t the opportunities today there used to be.’ Neither excuse holds. The first is beside the point; the second is altogether wrong.

If I were asked to say the most important things that lead to a successful life, I should say that, first of all, was integrity – unimpeachable integrity.

You can make up your mind to do one of two things: You can have a good time in life, or you can have a successful life, but you can’t have both. You have got to make up your mind at the start which of the two you are going to have.

The man who has done his best has done everything.

When a man has put a limit on what he will do, he has put a limit on what he can do.

Be friends with everybody. When you have friends, you will know there is somebody who will stand by you.

Most talk about ‘super-geniuses’ is nonsense. I have found that when ‘stars’ drop out, successors are usually at hand to fill their places, and the successors are merely men who have learned by application and self-discipline to get full production from an average, normal brain.

A concern that produces its own raw materials, and works them up through the various processes until it delivers the manufactured product in the domestic or foreign market, can work on a narrower margin all around, and yet do full justice to its stockholders and employees.

About all that is needed to put the world on its feet are the right qualities of mind and heart on the part of all men.

You can tell a workingman you like him, but he knows whether you are sincere or not. You can’t make him believe you are interested in his welfare unless you are.

The captains of industry do not keep on working for the sake of making money, but for the love of completing a job successfully.

There’s no limit possible to the expansion of each one of us.

Money is often a matter of chance or good fortune and is not the mark of a successful life. It is not the thing that brings a throb of pleasure or a thrill into my life. And I would not pose as a successful man if that were to be the measure.

I find my greatest happiness in thinking of those days in Homestead when I labored to bring a thing to perfection entirely by myself. In the evenings, I would go into the hills and look down on my work, and I knew that it was good, and my heart was elated.

I was once asked if a big business man ever reached his objective. I replied that if a man ever reached his objective he was not a big business man.

The Bethlehem profit-sharing system is based on my belief that every man should get exactly what he makes himself worth. This is the only plan I know of which is equally fair to the employers and every class of employee. Someday, I hope, all labor troubles will be solved by such a system.

The hardest struggle of all is to be something different from what the average man is. I don’t believe in ‘super-men,’ for the world is full of capable men, but it’s the fellow with determination that wins out.

A man who trims himself to suit everybody will soon whittle himself away.

Concentrate and think upon the problem in mind until a satisfactory conclusion is reached, and then finally go ahead. If you have made a mistake, all right. Never find fault with a man because he has made a mistake. It is only a fool that makes the same mistake the second time.

I disagreed with Carnegie’s ideas on how to best to distribute his wealth. I spent mine! Spending creates more wealth for everybody.

I mention the need of cooperation and confidence among the men who work, no matter what may be their relative ranks, because it is the vital factor underlying everything. Only as we are willing to work today, work as we never have worked before, will civilization survive.

As the train rounded the curve, the great smoking stacks of the Edgar Thomson works, the flaming converters belching forth, made such a vivid impression upon my youthful mind that it will never fade. I thought I had seen the very acme of what might be accomplished in an industrial way.

Bare hands grip success better than kid gloves. Be thorough in all things, no matter how small or distasteful! The man who counts his hours and kicks about his salary is a self-elected failure.

I have always believed that the aristocracy of any country should be the men who have succeeded – the men who have aided in upbuilding their country – the men who have contributed to the efficiency and happiness of their fellow men.

The Homestead plant, taken as a whole, is complete and finished in every department. There is nothing of any consequence to be desired. It is the first time I have ever been connected with any works that I could say it is finished and complete and to my entire satisfaction.

Personality is to a man what perfume is to a flower.

We make our own labor unions. We organize our labor into units of 300, and then the representatives of these 300 meet together every week. Then every fortnight they meet with the head men.

Set out with some definite purpose in life and accomplish that purpose. There is little that the human mind can conceive that is not possible of accomplishment. The thing to do is to make up your mind what you are going to drive for, and let nothing stand in the way of its ultimate accomplishment.