Sallie Krawcheck Quotes

Powerful Sallie Krawcheck for Daily Growth

About Sallie Krawcheck

Sallie Krawcheck, a trailblazer in finance and an influential voice for women in business, was born on November 16, 1968, in Atlanta, Georgia. Growing up with a mathematician father and English teacher mother, her early years were filled with the love of learning and the importance of education. Krawcheck attended Smith College, where she graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor's degree in economics. She later pursued her MBA from Columbia University Business School. In 1992, she began her career at Salomon Brothers, where she quickly rose through the ranks, becoming one of the youngest executive directors at the firm. In 1995, Krawcheck moved to Sanford C. Bernstein & Co., where she was named president in 2002. In 2004, she became the first woman to run a major Wall Street brokerage as CEO of Merrill Lynch Wealth Management. Her tenure there included significant growth and improvement, but she left in 2011 following a series of missteps by parent company Bank of America. Undeterred, Krawcheck founded and led several successful ventures, including 85 Broads (later Ellevate Network), an organization supporting women's career advancement, and Ellevest, an investment platform for women. Her leadership and advocacy for gender equality in finance have earned her numerous accolades, including Fortune's "Most Powerful Women in Business" list and Barron's "World's Best Financial Advisors." Krawcheck is also a prolific speaker and author, penning the best-selling book "Own It: The Power of Women at Work" (2019). Her quotes, such as "Don't ask for permission, ask for forgiveness. But then don't do anything too outrageous," encapsulate her bold and empowering approach to business and life. Today, she continues to advocate for gender parity in finance and beyond.

Interpretations of Popular Quotes

"If you don't ask for it, you won't get it."

This quote emphasizes the importance of assertiveness and proactivity in attaining one's goals or desires. It suggests that if an individual does not express their needs, aspirations, or requests, they will not receive what they seek. In other words, it is essential to communicate openly and boldly when aiming for success or advancement in any area of life.

"Women are not a niche market; we are the majority market."

The quote by Sallie Krawcheck, "Women are not a niche market; we are the majority market," underscores the importance of understanding and catering to the needs and preferences of women as consumers. Given that women make up more than half of the global population, they represent an enormous and influential market segment, which should be a priority for businesses across industries. Ignoring or underestimating this demographic could lead to missed opportunities for growth and profitability. Therefore, companies must take a gender-inclusive approach in their strategies and marketing efforts to ensure they appeal to the diverse needs and preferences of women consumers.

"I've been in rooms where I was the only woman and felt that I had to overcompensate just to be heard. It's exhausting."

This quote expresses the emotional and physical fatigue experienced by women when they are the sole female in a predominantly male setting, often leading them to feel the need to work harder or "overcompensate" simply to be heard and recognized. It highlights the systemic gender imbalance in many professional environments where women are underrepresented, potentially facing biases, prejudices, and unequal opportunities. This situation can be mentally and physically taxing for those affected, as they strive for equal footing in such settings.

"The way you measure success is by how many minds that you change, how many rules you break, and how many times you change the game."

This quote by Sallie Krawcheck emphasizes a unique perspective on success. It suggests that conventional measures of achievement, such as wealth or power, are not the only indicators of a successful life. Instead, success is quantified by the impact one makes on others' minds, the number of barriers broken to pave new paths, and the times when one changes the status quo or game entirely. It encourages innovation, change-making, and education as crucial elements for a meaningful and fulfilling life.

"In the world of finance, we need to focus on talent, not tomboys."

This quote by Sallie Krawcheck highlights the need for the financial industry to prioritize and nurture talent regardless of gender expression or stereotypes. The use of "tomboy" suggests a traditional masculine role model, which can exclude many talented individuals who may not fit that mold but bring valuable skills and perspectives to the field. In essence, Krawcheck is advocating for an industry culture that values abilities over preconceived notions about what it means to be successful in finance.

Women bring some great qualities to work. We bring risk-awareness. We bring a greater focus on relationships. We bring more holistic decision-making than gentlemen do. We bring a more long-term perspective than gentlemen do. We tend to look for meaning and purpose in our jobs to a greater degree than gentlemen do.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Purpose, Some, Bring, Holistic

You may find it more relaxing to work with people just like you, but entrepreneurship is about finding new approaches to problems, and discomfort can be an important part of that process.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Process, New, May, Approaches

To empower women, power must be given to them, presumably by an entity that already has it. And that entity is the patriarchy. This also implies that women must be on the receiving end, waiting - politely - to be empowered. Very Victorian-era courtship, isn't it?

- Sallie Krawcheck

Waiting, Very, Given, Presumably

In the old world of business, there was often just one seat at the leadership table for women, two at best. That meant that only so many women could advance. But in a world where women recognize the power that they own - and where technology can upend the traditional rules of engagement - one woman winning doesn't mean another loses.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Own, Engagement, Old World

My low point was after being reorganized out of running Merrill Lynch. That dismissal deeply contradicted my sense of fairness, since, at the time, my team and I had done what we were brought in to do: We had turned Merrill Lynch around from the depths of the financial crisis.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Financial Crisis, Brought, Low Point

Networking has been cited as the number one unwritten rule of success in business. Who you know really impacts what you know.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Business, Been, Cited, Impacts

The Ellevest target client is the professional woman who either has her own money or has agency over her family's money. She is among the 75 million women in the U.S. workforce who want to take financial control and is looking for a straightforward way to achieve her dreams on her own terms.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Straightforward, Workforce

If you don't share information among your startup's team, then it'll be just about a coincidence if product, marketing, and engineering are ever aligned. Those odds are too low to succeed.

- Sallie Krawcheck

About, Your, Too, Odds

I hated being a junior investment banker. I loved the research business, the wealth management business.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Business, Wealth, Loved, Banker

If you are going to fire this person or hire that person, do it all in a concentrated period. The Band-Aid gets ripped off, and everybody goes back to work.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Hire, Everybody, Period, Ripped

Investing isn't a game to be won. At the end of the day, it's a way to achieve your big goals, like buying that home, starting that business, and retiring on your own terms.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Business, Game, Big, Goals

A dysfunctional team means a dysfunctional - and likely doomed - company.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Dysfunctional, Means, Likely, Doomed

One thing I never thought about in my big-company job? Cash flow. When your business has billions of dollars in revenue, you can make a lot of mistakes and still have a viable business. But in a startup, make a few hiring mistakes, and you can find yourself in real jeopardy fast.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Thought, Hiring, About, Flow

Starting a business from scratch and having little money in the bank focuses your mind in a way that running a multibillion-dollar business never does. It brings the key drivers of performance into sharp relief. I promise.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Running, Promise, Your, Drivers

The only time in my career I've lost sleep - wake up 3:30 in the morning, and you know you're not going back to sleep - is when I've been an entrepreneur. Even in the financial crisis.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Career, Financial Crisis, Only Time

I'm about impact. One can make impact if they run a big business with a lot of zeroes. I've done that. One can also make an impact when you're a research analyst, where it's you and your associate. I've done that.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Business, Impact, Big, Big Business

Ask any woman who has gone through a divorce and had her standard of living decline substantially. Ask any woman who's been fired or 'reorg'ed out' and had to scramble to take a job she didn't want. Ask any woman who wanted to quit a job but couldn't afford to. Investing is possibly the best career advice women aren't getting.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Through, Been, Standard, Possibly

We all know money is power. And women won't be equal with men until we are financially equal with men. Getting more money into the hands of women is good for women, but it's also good for their families, for the economy, and for society.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Hands, More, Also, Financially

Follow the money at all costs, and you might wind up regretting it.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Money, Might, Costs, Wind

If you aren't committed to diversity of thought, you have no business launching a startup.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Diversity, Committed, Startup

We shouldn't think anyone needs a Ph.D. in advanced investing in order to begin to invest.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Think, Needs, Advanced, Investing

The research indicates that when we women invest, we women do tend to be more patient, take a longer-term perspective and as a result of it, tend to be better investors than men. But the messages we get are that investing is sort of 'the guys' world.'

- Sallie Krawcheck

More, Invest, Sort, Investing

On Wall Street, the industry in which I grew up, a culture in which 'my word is my bond' shifted over the past few decades toward one where the big print can say 'Free' while the small print gives the real costs.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Small, Big, Industry, Decades

First, pay off your high-interest-rate debt. If you have student loan debt - that's low interest rate; that has a tax benefit - you can leave that out. A mortgage can be an OK one. Credit card debt is poison. That needs to be paid off right away.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Student, Loan, Away, Right Away

As an entrepreneur, it's easy to feel ownership over every aspect of your business because you're putting your reputation, your money, and other people's money on the line. Oh, and you're sleeping, breathing, and eating your passion project - that, too. But if you try to do it all yourself, you're almost certain to fail.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Other, Putting, Almost, Entrepreneur

As an entrepreneur, I've learned how crucial it is to be able to call a spade a spade and avoid falling in love with a particular strategy or product. Instead, you need to let the customer tell you what she needs - and to change her as she changes.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Love, Tell, Crucial, Entrepreneur

You know those days at the office when you used to come in and not really do much? You don't get days like that as an entrepreneur. If you don't do the work you need to, nothing happens that needs to. It's that simple.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Need, Like, Needs, Entrepreneur

Whenever you start a new business, the sheer number of variables at hand makes failure a constant possibility.

- Sallie Krawcheck

New, Variables, New Business, Possibility

Albert Einstein is reported to have said compounding is the eighth wonder of the world. Obviously, a dollar invested in your 20s is worth so much more than a dollar invested in your 60s.

- Sallie Krawcheck

More, Eighth, Obviously, Compounding

Assume the best intent in others around you. You will often be right, and even when you're not, people can rise to your view of them. Not always, but enough that I believe it's worth it.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Worth It, Will, Always, Assume

I've managed many people in my career. I've managed very diverse teams. And it's interesting because what I've found over time is that when it would come to bonus time or raise time, I would hear from the gentlemen, 'I want to make X.' I don't think I ever heard from a woman who worked for me, 'I want to make X.'

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Career, Very, Diverse

Women aren't driven by or thrilled by outperforming the market. They're much more excited about, 'Can I meet my goal?'

- Sallie Krawcheck

Goal, Excited, More, Thrilled

Your career is not going to go the way you planned. It is impossible at the age of 23 to pick the right industry, the right company, and you can visualize what you're going to be doing in your 40s, 50s, and 60s, but chances are that it's going to be something quite different. So remain open to opportunities and change.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Impossible, Career, Doing, Visualize

One of my passions is women in business and helping women to get ahead in business. For women, that feedback loop can be broken. Women won't get as much feedback from male bosses as men will get. Therefore, they have to make an extra effort, whether that is unfortunate, good, bad, indifferent.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Bad, Ahead, Helping, Extra

As a society, we have this perception that women are emotional. The research, however, tells us that, on trading floors, that poor risk rises and falls with testosterone levels, and these trading floors are 85 percent, 90 percent male, and these gentlemen tend, under periods of stress, to show off for each other. That's dangerous.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Other, However, Trading, Levels

When I feel risk-averse, I am much more likely to surround myself with middle-aged, professional, southern females; I just am.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Southern, Likely, Females, Surround

What you hear and what the research shows is that gentlemen negotiate for their first job. Women do not negotiate from their first job and on. And I tell women there is no H.R. fairy godmother. There might be, but you better not count on it.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Tell, Might, Negotiate, Godmother

My kindest interpretation of my younger self is, 'Boy, was I busy.' I had two kids, a husband, two stepkids. I mean, how many darn things can a person do at the end of the day?

- Sallie Krawcheck

End Of The Day, Younger, Had, Kindest

We haven't always been aware of it, but the 'locker-room bro talk' has long been going on not just in locker rooms but in some corporate conference rooms. Of course, not by all men. But by some - including some who hold positions of power. And that matters in holding women back.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Some, Been, Rooms, Locker

I make it a priority to keep in touch with people with whom I've worked in the past. And I'm fortunate, because I've worked with some terrific folks.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Past, Some, In The Past, Priority

I wish I had known that that process of figuring out what you're good at, what you want to do, and where you want to have an impact is not a one-time exercise, but an ongoing one. Instead, I bought into success being an endpoint rather than a constant process.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Exercise, Constant, Rather, Figuring

If you are a senior woman in business, you intuitively know two things: If a white man promotes a woman or a person of color, he gets credit for it. If a woman says great things about a woman, you get dinged for it. Research is clear on this.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Color, About, Intuitively

The whole icon of a bull that stands for Wall Street - you couldn't come up with an image of a more male environment. Women feel that the brand doesn't speak to them.

- Sallie Krawcheck

More, Icon, Image, Brand

People just haven't saved enough for retirement. And they're going to outlive their money.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Money, Saved, Going, Outlive

The 'aha' moment came one to me one morning when I was applying my mascara, and I realized that the retirement crisis is actually a woman's crisis: Women live longer than men yet retire with less money.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Moment, Less Money, Retire

Recognize that the issues we face as women advancing in business are issues my grandmother would have loved to have had. And fight the good fight nonetheless. For yourself and your peers - but also for your daughter, when it's her turn.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Business, Grandmother, Peers, Advancing

In terms of challenges, I think finding the right people to maximize the chances the business will succeed is the hardest thing. You can crunch the numbers any way you want, but at the end of the day, you really need good employees and investors - and they aren't always easy to find.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Challenges, I Think, Crunch, Right People

I've taken a few public hits in my career, and I never hid the pain of it from my children. Nor did I hide the regrouping and rethinking that occurred after each one. After all, that process allowed me to re-emerge and go on to build a more impactful - and more engaging - career path than the one I had been knocked off of.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Career, Each One, Hid, Career Path

My advice for folks on networking is give, give, give. You will later receive. But you are really planting these seeds. Some of them will die, and they won't become anything. Many of them will take many, many years before they pay off for you if at all.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Die, Some, Before, Planting

I never talk about my money! It is interesting how awkward it is to talk about it, even though I talk about it in the abstract every day.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Every Day, About, Though, Abstract

Knowing your customer inside and out is mission-critical, and it takes time. It's impossible to hit on the insights that will ultimately decide your company's fate without putting them to the test - literally - even if that takes longer than you'd have liked.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Fate, Impossible, Putting, Customer

Whatever your income level is, save as much as you can - up to 20 percent, but more if you can - and invest it. Put that into an IRA; put that into a brokerage account.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Income, Level, Brokerage, Account

I never really considered myself much of a feminist until I left Wall Street. I did all the right things - such as put together gender-diverse teams - but feminism wasn't deep in my bones.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Deep, Considered, Put, Feminist

I'm a Weeble. Remember Weebles? The toy whose tagline was, 'Weebles wobble but they don't fall down?' I'm resilient. Oh, and I work really hard.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Work, Down, Whose, Resilient

Like many entrepreneurs, I never have two days that are alike. One thing that's consistent is I wake up early, around 4:30 A.M. It's my most productive time of day because I can think and work uninterrupted.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Wake Up, Two, Entrepreneurs, Productive

We just haven't had enough women in senior roles on Wall Street overall - fewer women in the investment banking function overall as well.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Had Enough, Roles, Fewer, Senior

Stop hoping for a promotion that's not coming. Instead, start a business at which you want to work.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Stop, Hoping, Which, Promotion

People say to me, 'Has being a woman helped or hindered your career?' And the answer is yes.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Woman, Career, Answer, Helped

Leadership is a lot of hard work. I hoped, when I was younger, that I would just be a natural leader or that it was something that was innate, but it is really a learned skill.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Leader, Natural, Hoped, Skill

Somehow, there is this feeling that women require remedial financial education, and so everything must be dumbed down. The reality is that we all need a lot more education, but guys just go ahead and invest anyway.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Education, Financial, Need, Anyway

If your idea is truly innovative, you're going to hear from the naysayers. After all, if it really were such a good idea, someone would have already done it, right?

- Sallie Krawcheck

Idea, Going, Your, Innovative

I love to talk. I love to share. I love to vent. But I prefer action.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Love, I Love, Prefer, Vent

I read research like other people read sports magazines or fashion magazines.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Sports, Other, Read, Research

Most financial questions don't have one right answer - just an answer that's right for you.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Financial, Answer, Most, Right Answer

Hard work most often leads to success, but it's not every day, and it's not every week. It will pay off at different times over the course of your career.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Career, Week, Over, Leads

I have a very simple point of view, which is, I'm going to be alive for some amount of time; I don't know how long that's going to be. Then I'm going to be dead for a really, really long time. Right? You need to squeeze everything you can out of this time when you're alive.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Some, Very, Squeeze, Really Long Time

There are a lot of things in business that are completely out of your control, but hard work isn't one of them.

- Sallie Krawcheck

Work, Business, Them, Control

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