26 Inspirational Fred Smith Quotes [2024] Founder And CEO Of FedEx

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Updated: January 20th, 2022

Fred Smith is an American businessman.

He is known for being the founder and CEO of FedEx American multinational shipping & delivery services and supply chain management company.

Fred served two tours of duty in Vietnam and was honourably discharged in 1969 with the rank of captain, having received the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, and two Purple Hearts.

We've put together an incredible collection of Fred Smith quotes to read.

Here they are:

26 Inspirational Fred Smith Quotes [2024] Founder And CEO Of FedEx

List of Inspiring Fred Smith Quotes

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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.

A good Christian is a velvet-covered brick.

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

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.

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

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

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

Try to be a happy memory for your friends.

Some days, being J.D. Salinger seems like a good idea.

Passion is born when you catch a glimpse of your true potential.

A manager is not a person who can do the work better than his men; he is a person who can get his men to do the work better than he can.

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

The biggest part of our business has always been moving things, not paper. With the Internet, people in Mississippi can buy things from Macedonia, without regard to time or place or quantity.

Information about the package is as important as the package itself.

Every time we make an investment decision at FedEx, we ask ourselves: 'What is the return on this investment?

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Pat Walls

I'm Pat Walls and I created Starter Story - a website dedicated to helping people start businesses. We interview entrepreneurs from around the world about how they started and grew their businesses.

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