Top 50 Carlos Slim Helu Quotes and Lessons

Before we read the best Carlos Slim Helu Quotes, Let’s know a bit more about him.

Carlos Slim Helu is an entrepreneur, Mexican businessman, investor and a philanthropist. He dominated the ‘World’s Richest Person List’ by Forbes  between 2010 and 2013 and ranked as the richest person in the world. Slim is a self made man who has built his fortune from his extensive holdings in a number of Mexican companies. He is the chairman and CEO of telecom giants Telmex and América Móvil. He has amassed a net worth which is upwards of $7o billion and often runs neck and neck with Warren Buffet and Bill Gates as the wealthiest man in the world.

As of Sept 2019, he was the fifth richest person in the world according to Forbes’ listing of The World’s Billionaires with a net worth estimated at $64 billion. He is the richest man in Mexico and Latin America. His diverse business empire includes various industries such as education, health care, industrial manufacturing, transportation, real estate, media, energy, hospitality, entertainment, high-technology, retail, sports and financial services.

  • With foreign telecom partners, Slim bought a stake in Telmex, Mexico’s only phone company, in 1990. Telmex is now part of America Movil.

  • His son-in-law Fernando Romero designed the Soumaya Museum in Mexico City, home to Slim’s extensive, eclectic art collection.

  • He also owns stakes in Mexican construction, consumer goods, mining and real estate companies and 17% of The New York Times.

Top 50 Carlos Slim Helu Quotes and Thoughts for everyone

1. “Competition makes you better, always, always makes you better, even if the competitor wins.” – Carlos Slim Helu  (From QnA – Carlosslim.com, 2007 )

2. “When you live for others’ opinions, you are dead. I don’t want to live thinking about how I’ll be remembered.” – Carlos Slim Helu

3. “Anyone who is not investing now is missing a tremendous opportunity.” – Carlos Slim Helu

5. “Any personal crisis—you have to use it to get stronger.” – Carlos Slim Helu (New Yorker, June 1, 2009)

6. “All times are good time for those who know how to work and have the tools to do so.” – Carlos Slim Helu

7. “Success is not about doing things well or even very well, or being acknowledged by others. It is not an external opinion, but rather an internal status. It is the harmony between the soul and your emotions, which requires love, family, friendship, authenticity and integrity.” – Carlos Slim Helu

8. “Most people try to make a better world for our children when what they should be doing is making better children for our world.” – Carlos Slim Helu

9. “Well, when I was very young, maybe 12 years, I began to make investments.” – Carlos Slim Helu

10. “Poverty isn’t solved with donations.” – Carlos Slim Helu

11. “Firm and patient optimism always yields its rewards.” – Carlos Slim Helu

12. “Staying occupied displaces preoccupation and problems, and when we face our problems, they disappear.” – Carlos Slim Helu

13. “I’ve always said that the better off you are, the more responsibility you have for helping others. Just as I think it’s important to run companies well, with a close eye to the bottom line, I think you have to use your entrepreneurial experience to make corporate philanthropy effective.” – Carlos Slim Helu

14. “Money is not a goal. The goal is to make companies grow, develop, be competitive, be in different areas, be efficient to have a great human team inside the company.” – Carlos Slim Helu

15. “The truth is, you leave this world with nothing. What you are is a temporary administrator, and you must administer well… the wealth in your care, and generate more. The surplus can be used to do many things for people.” – Carlos Slim Helu

16. “If you are in business, you are not enjoying. You are working.” – Carlos Slim Helu

17. “The only way you finish with poverty is with jobs.” – Best Carlos Slim Helu Quotes

18. “In this new wave of technology, you can’t do it all yourself, you have to form alliances.” – Carlos Slim Helu

19. “It’s very important for leaders in business to work to create human capital, a team that has the same sense of purpose and alignment.” – Carlos Slim Helu

20. “Work well done is not only a responsibility to yourselves and society; it is also an emotional need.” – Carlos Slim Helu

21. “Choose the right employees and then set them loose.” – Carlos Slim Helu

22. “When we decide to do something, we do it quickly.” – Carlos Slim Helu

23. “In business, you invest when things are not in good shape. When you invest at these times, you take a better position than your competitors. When there is a recession and your competition does not invest, they are giving you the advantage.” – Carlos Slim Helu

24. “People need to feel very good about their achievements. They get pride from what they are doing.” – Carlos Slim Helu

25. “All businesses make mistakes. The trick is to avoid large ones.” – Carlos Slim Helu

26. “One of the big errors people are making right now is thinking that old-style businesses will be obsolete, when actually they will be an important part of this new civilization. Some retail groups are introducing e-commerce and think that the bricks are no longer useful. But they will continue to be important.” – Carlos Slim Helu

27. “You cannot have people in your organization who are pessimists. They take you to mediocrity.” – Carlos Slim Helu

28. “Courage taught me no matter how bad a crisis gets… any sound investment will eventually pay off.” – Carlos Slim Helu

29. “Focus on essentials and try not to get distracted and bogged down by things that don’t add value to the bottom line.” – Carlos Slim Helu

30. “When we face our problems, they disappear. So learn from failure and let success be the silent incentive.” – Carlos Slim Helu

31. “You cannot live without doing something.” – Best Carlos Slim Helu Quotes

32. “I learned from my father that you continue to invest and reinvest in your business – including during crises.” –Carlos Slim Helu

 

33. “Anything that has privileges have responsibility and all people that is clear about their responsibility has compromise.” – Carlos Slim Helu

34. “When you are convinced what to do and what you need to do, it’s not hard to do that.” – Carlos Slim Helu

35. “Live the present intensely and fully, do not let the past be a burden, and let the future be an incentive. Each person forges his or her own destiny.” – Carlos Slim Helu

36. “When there is a crisis, that’s when some are interested in getting out and that’s when we are interested in getting in.” – Carlos Slim Helu

37. “Mistakes are normal and human. Make them small, accept them, correct them, and forget them.” – Carlos Slim Helu

38. “Technology is going to transform people’s lives and society everywhere in the world. I spend most of my time studying new technologies. My main task is to understand what’s going on and try to see where we can fit in.” – Carlos Slim Helu

39. “Do not allow negative feelings and emotions to control your mind. Emotional harm does not come from others; it is conceived and developed within ourselves.” – Carlos Slim Helu

40. “The biggest things in life are not materials.” – Carlos Slim Helu

41. “Life’s road is very long, but it is travelled fast.” – Carlos Slim Helu

42. “You have to have an international reference of competition. You have to go beyond your home.” – Carlos Slim Helu

43. “What is most valuable in life does not cost anything but is very precious.” – Carlos Slim Helu

44. “When you give, do not expect to receive, fragrance clings to the hand that gives the rose.” – Carlos Slim Helu

45. “If you’re in business, you need to understand the environment. You need to have a vision of the future, and you need to know the past.” – Carlos Slim Helu

46. “To think that happiness comes from buying things is crazy. That happiness come because you have many material issues – to have 20 cars or 30 cars or the biggest one and 40 watches and – I think that’s not happiness.” – Carlos Slim Helu

47. “Wealth should be created by investing to create more wealth. Income is the fruit of wealth. If you do not do that, you will not have more income.” – Carlos Slim Helu

48. “Distribute a good part of the fruits, not the branches of the tree, and ‘reinvest’ part of the fruit sees to grow more trees and create wealth.” – Carlos Slim Helu

49. “Wealth should be best to create more wealth.” – Motivational Carlos Slim Helu Quotes

50 “If you’re in business, you need to understand the environment. You need to have a vision of the future, and you need to know the past.” —Academy of Achievement, December 2, 2007

Here are few more powerful and motivational quotes by Carlos Slim Helu

“Mistakes are normal and human. Make them small, accept them, correct them, and forget them.” — American University of Beirut, March 18, 2010

“Firm and patient optimism always yields its rewards.” —“Questions and Answers,” Carlosslim.com, 2007

“I don’t believe too much in luck, believe in circumstances and in work.” —George Washington University Global Forum, October 29, 2010

“When we face our problems, they disappear. So learn from failure and let success be the silent incentive.” -American University of Beirut, March 18, 2010

 

“Do not allow negative feelings and emotions to control your mind. Emotional harm does not come from others; it is conceived and developed within ourselves.” —“Letter to Young People,” Carlosslim.com, June 1994

 

“All businesses make mistakes. The trick is to avoid large ones” —Institutional Investor, June 1, 2007

“You have to have an international reference of competition. You have to go beyond your home.” —No Fear of Failure: Real Stories of How Leaders Deal With Risk and Change, 2011

Slim’s top 10 Lessons/Suggestions/Advice for current and future entrepreneur. 

1- Be practical, and have clear and attainable goals.

2-Invest prodigiously in your business, especially when others aren’t investing in theirs, and do so for the long-term.

3- Focus on the essentials, and try not to get distracted and bogged down by things that don’t add anything of value to the bottom line.

4- Don’t try to be and do everything yourself; rather, create alliances and partnerships with others.

5- Be optimistic, and not guided by your fears.

6- Relish competition, and understand that it’s healthy and will make you and your business stronger.

7- Don’t overwork your employees, make sure that they’re able to maintain a healthy work/life balance.

8- Choose the right employees and then set them loose.

9- Don’t stay local, go global.

10- Finally, acknowledge that as your business grows you may have to install a CEO and several management layers, but try to keep management as flat as possible, so that it stays close to operations because, ultimately, that’s where the money is made. (Source: Forbes.com)

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