Altman Quotes

#1. You have to be intense. This only comes from the CEO, this only comes from the founders.

Sam Altman

#2. Whatever clutter may be getting in your way during a conversation or communication, use the simple acronym HEAR to enter a more spacious and less defensive awareness. HEAR stands for: hold all assumptions; enter the emotional world; absorb and accept; and reflect, then respect. H

Donald Altman

#3. What is an ending? Theres no such thing. Death is the only ending.

Robert Altman

#4. You think you have this great idea that everyone's going to come join, but that's not how it works.

Sam Altman

#5. You have to be decisive. Indecisiveness is a startup killer.

Sam Altman

#6. If someone is choosing between joining McKinsey or your startup it's very unlikely they're going to work out at the startup.

Sam Altman

#7. The second part of how to hire: try not to.

Sam Altman

#8. Many Russia experts note the deep and sad capacity of the Russian people for suffering.

Roger Altman

#9. My intention was to enroll at McGill University but an unexpected series of events led me to study physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Sidney Altman

#10. Location is the sole difference between mobile and traditional Web.

Sam Altman

#11. The only way to generate sustained exponential growth is to make whatever you're making sufficiently good.

Sam Altman

#12. We hear again and again from founders, that they wish they had waited to start a startup until they came up with an idea they really loved.

Sam Altman

#13. Don't hire for the sake of hiring. Hire because there is no other way to do what you want to do.

Sam Altman

#14. Founders are usually very stingy with equity to employees and very generous with equity to investors. I think this is totally backwards.

Sam Altman

#15. So you should always stay on top of people's vesting schedules.

Sam Altman

#16. Titanic I thought was the most dreadful piece of work I've ever seen in my entire life. Another film that I think is equally bad was American Beauty. So badly acted and directed. But people like that.

Robert Altman

#17. People appreciate when you make an effort to speak their language.

Sam Altman

#18. China is beginning to act more like a world citizen. We need China to be more active on the world stage. For example, we should want China to be a bigger participant and a bigger shareholder in the IMF. We should want it to be an even more active participant in the G8 and G20.

Roger Altman

#19. Seed investing is the status symbol of Silicon Valley. Most people don't want Ferraris, they want a winning seed investment.

Sam Altman

#20. I care much more about the growth rate of the market than it's current size and I also care if there's any reason it's going to top out.

Sam Altman

#21. Many of the companies in the mobile location space are trying to figure out different ways to tie what they're doing to commerce.

Sam Altman

#22. I've had it-the agencies, the winking, the networks, the ratings. Anyone who thinks TV is an art medium is crazy-it's an advertising medium.

Robert Altman

#23. You can have a startup and one other thing, you can have a family, but you probably can't have many other hobbies.

Sam Altman

#24. The most important thing is that there is clear reporting structure and everyone knows what it is.

Sam Altman

#25. AirBnB happened because Brian Chesky couldn't pay his rent, but did have some space.

Sam Altman

#26. Maybe I am a bit unusual here, but I am less stressed if I have my phone with me. Because I can spend like an hour in the morning taking care of everything instead of I sit there and wonder what I missed or wonder what's happening. So it's way less stressful for me to just answer my phone.

Sam Altman

#27. As a so-called "civilized" people, and as members of a society in search of lasting peace in the world, we cannot remain callous to our responsibility toward nature and insensitive to the inherent rights of the animals.

Nathaniel Altman

#28. I hate to go out on a limb after only one viewing, but Nashville strikes me as Altman's best film, and the most exciting dramatic musical since Blue Angel.

Andrew Sarris

#29. I have plenty of investments that I wish I'd never made. But the model is to lose money on a lot of investments and then make 1,000X or 10,000X on an investment.

Sam Altman

#30. You can think about that for everyone you hire: will I bet the future of this company on this single hire? And that's a tough bar.

Sam Altman

#31. You'll get more support on a hard, important, project than a derivative one.

Sam Altman

#32. Words don't tell you what people are thinking. Rarely do we use words to really tell. We use words to sell people or to convince people or to make them admire us. It's all disguise. It's all hidden
a secret language.

Robert Altman

#33. I think the best thing you can do is be aware that as a first time founder you are likely to be a very bad manager.

Sam Altman

#34. I'm a huge Robert Altman fan and don't take issue with his filmmaking, as eccentric as it is. But I just think 'Nashville' was a world he didn't know.

J. D. Souther

#35. Traditional local advertising is not what retailers want. They want not just for you to see an ad - they want you to come into the store, to be a repeat customer and to spread the word.

Sam Altman

#36. Why I said cofounders that aren't friends really struggle, is that you can't be focused without good communication.

Sam Altman

#37. More important than starting any startup, is getting to know a lot of potential co-founders.

Sam Altman

#38. Everyone is looking for the hack, the secret to success without hard work.

Sam Altman

#39. Chance is another name that we give to our mistakes. And all of the best things in my films are mistakes.

Robert Altman

#40. Pretty soon, we should see a few large regional blocs dominating global trade. The ones that lower trade barriers faster will grow faster.

Daniel Altman

#41. Why now, why is this the perfect time for this particular idea, and to start this particular company?

Sam Altman

#42. I really believe that the single hardest thing in business is building a company that does repeatable innovation ... and just has this ongoing culture of excellence as it grows.

Sam Altman

#43. Move fast. Speed is one of your main advantages over large competitors.

Sam Altman

#44. I was of course discussing the book of Leviticus. I don't know why your mind is so filthy these days, Bingley.

Marsha Altman

#45. One thing that founders always underestimate is how hard it is to recruit.

Sam Altman

#46. Long term thinking is so rare anywhere, but especially in startups. This is a huge advantage if you do it.

Sam Altman

#47. I think you can say a lot of evil behavior by companies is short-term optimization.

Sam Altman

#48. For most software startups, this translates to keep growing. For hardware startups, it translates to don't let your ship date slip.

Sam Altman

#49. Experience matters for some roles and not others.

Sam Altman

#50. What you want to do is innovate on your product and your business model, management structure is not where I would try and innovate.

Sam Altman

#51. Men make clothes for the women they'd like to be with or in most cases the women they'd like to be.

Robert Altman

#52. For our immediate family and relatives, Canada was a land of opportunity.

Sidney Altman

#53. All of my films deal with the same thing: striving, socially and culturally, to stay alive.

Robert Altman

#54. I don't think people spend nearly enough time thinking about what they like and what they're good at.

Sam Altman

#55. I don't often get involved with campaigns at all.

Sam Altman

#56. The mystique associated with the bomb, the role that scientists played in it, and its general importance could not fail to impress even a six-year old.

Sidney Altman

#57. Nevertheless, as is a frequent occurrence in science, a general hypothesis was constructed from a few specific instances of a phenomenon.

Sidney Altman

#58. You can't be focussed without really great communication

Sam Altman

#59. One thing I tell startups all the time is that the best way to grow is to make their product better.

Sam Altman

#60. If it takes more than a sentence to explain what you are doing, it's almost always a sign that what you are doing is too complicated.

Sam Altman

#61. If you want something in a deal, just ask for it.

Sam Altman

#62. I love Bob Altman. I always admired him so much because I always thought he was a genuine voice.

Malcolm McDowell

#63. Altman works in such an interesting way, letting things occur in the film even if he didn't particularly plan them.

Julie Christie

#64. You're either not hiring at all or it's probably your single biggest block of time.

Sam Altman

#65. You want an idea about what you can say. I know it sounds like a bad idea but here's specifically why its actually a great one. You want to sound crazy but you want to ask to be right.

Sam Altman

#66. Robert Altman made that movie Kansas City about the jazz scene in the city, and we saw that band all together, and that was an amazing show. That's what I got into. I like jazz.

Nick Kroll

#67. There are 3 things I look for when I hire people. Are they smart? Do they get things done? Do I want to spend a lot of time around them?

Sam Altman

#68. I don't think there's a more battle-hardened veteran anywhere than Larry Summers.

Roger Altman

#69. You need to have a culture where people have very high quality standards in everything the company does, but still move quickly.

Sam Altman

#70. The correlation of quality of life and cost of energy is huge.

Sam Altman

#71. We live in an era where the global capital markets are the super power in the world, and when they move against you as they've moved against Russia, as we've all seen in the ruble, there's nothing that can stop that.

Roger Altman

#72. It's become popular in recent years to say that the idea doesn't matter.

Sam Altman

#73. Counterfeit Kings is the King Lear of space operas. Science fiction has a fresh, new, no-nonsense voice and his name is Adam Connell.

Steven-Elliot Altman

#74. Remember that the idea will expand, and become more ambitious as you go.

Sam Altman

#75. The whole concept of rewarding customers is a big trend.

Sam Altman

#76. Happy endings are absolutely ludicrous, they're not true at all. We see the guy carry the girl across the threshold and everybody lives happily ever after
that's bullshit. Three weeks later he's beating her up and she's suing for divorce and he's got cancer.

Robert Altman

#77. I don't think screenplay writing is the same as writing - I mean, I think it's blueprinting.

Robert Altman

#78. There is a power within and without. If you ask, it answers. It's just a matter of being calm and wise and listening. It takes years.

John Altman

#79. Most of the best hires that I've made in my entire life have never done that thing before.

Sam Altman

#80. I myself used to believe ideas didn't matter that much, but I'm very sure that's wrong now.

Sam Altman

#81. Great execution is at least 10 times more important and a 100 times harder than a good idea ...

Sam Altman

#82. The thing about Y Combinator that's cool is that most companies won't happen if we don't fund them.

Sam Altman

#83. You should think about for the next 10 years, you're going to be giving out 3-5% of the company every year.

Sam Altman

#84. Even though plans themselves are worthless, the exercise of planning is very valuable and totally missing in most startups today.

Sam Altman

#85. If George W. Bush is elected president, I'm leaving for France.

Robert Altman

#86. If you have a startup that's keeping it up at night because you think it's so great, then you should do that.

Sam Altman

#87. As a mindfulness student once said to his teacher, "Every time I start to think about how I'm finally in the here and now, I realize the moment has already passed." The

Donald Altman

#88. You need conviction in your own beliefs, and the willingness to ignore others naysaying.

Sam Altman

#89. You have to let your team get all the credit for all the good stuff that happens, and you take responsibility for the bad stuff.

Sam Altman

#90. Good startups usually take 10 years.

Sam Altman

#91. I did 'Celebrity' by Woody Allen. I did 'The Gingerbread Man' with Robert Altman. These were big talents.

Kenneth Branagh

#92. If you pivot, do it fully and with conviction. The worst thing is to try to do a bit of the old and the new-it's hard to kill your babies.

Sam Altman

#93. You can create value with breakthrough innovation, incremental refinement, or complex coordination. Great companies often do two of these. The very best companies do all three.

Sam Altman

#94. Too many companies are just being big for the sheer sake of it. Too many CEOs thinking bigger is better.

Roger Altman

#95. If you ask a founder how their company is doing, they always say, 'Oh it's great. We're totally crushing it,' and that's almost never true.

Sam Altman

#96. People so far have been very fond of the Robert Altman movie, as I am, and when one things goes well it shines light on your other projects and now I seem to have a number of projects that are moving forward.

Bob Balaban

#97. That culture of frugality and discipline is really important for the Y Combinator mindset.

Sam Altman

#98. There are a lot of anachronisms in Washington, but the need to periodically raise the debt limit by Congressional vote is certainly one of them.

Roger Altman

#99. It's really easy to get PR with no results & it actually feels like you're really actually cool, but in a year you'll still have nothing.

Sam Altman

#100. Very ambitious startups often take a long time to work - or sometimes they take a very long time to look ambitious.

Sam Altman