Top 98 Quotes & Sayings by Marc Benioff

Presentation skills are key. People who work for you represent your brand. You want them to present themselves - and represent you - in a certain way.

You can do things in every part of the world. You can do things in every discipline. You can do large things, you can do small things. But it takes a while to figure out what you actually want to do. And it changes. As you change your interests and desires in philanthropy change, I think you have to be open to that change.

Technology's always taken jobs out of the system, and what you hope is that technology's going to put those jobs back in, too. That's what we call productivity.

My approach to politics is that I'm not a Democrat or a Republican. I'm an American and I always support candidates I think are great for the country.

Learning how to interact with customers is something that anyone starting any business must master. It's an amazing opportunity to be able to learn the ropes at an established company and then employ your expertise at your own company.

Journalists immediately think of me as a resource for a quote or comment because they know that I will be available to offer fresh insight and meet their deadlines.

If someone asks me what cloud computing is, I try not to get bogged down with definitions. I tell them that, simply put, cloud computing is a better way to run your business.

I love software and I love technology.

I couldn't imagine a more incompetent politician than myself.

In business, we say that people overestimate what you can do in a year and underestimate what you can do in a decade. This is true in philanthropy as well.

When I look at the next set of technologies that we have to build in Salesforce, it's all data-science-based technology. We don't need more cloud. We don't need more mobile. We don't need more social. We need more data science.

The bigger and more successful Salesforce becomes, the more we'll invest in our public schools, the more we will invest in homeless, the more we will invest in public hospitals, the more we will invest into NGOs.

Nothing is more important, certainly during these times of artificial intelligence, than our public education. And as it continues to grow and evolve, I think you and I know this is going to be critical that we are constantly training and retraining and creating these next-generation jobs.

This idea that we can take hundreds of thousands, which we've done so far, and scale it to millions and move them into a new workforce, this is really critical because Salesforce is a platform.

I think everybody understands how important the cloud is.

I like to be in locations that I kind of feel are very creative, that stimulate me in a creative process.

The future of communicating with customers rests in engaging with them through every possible channel: phone, e-mail, chat, Web, and social networks. Customers are discussing a company's products and brand in real time. Companies need to join the conversation.

I have failed a lot in my philanthropy, where I will make philanthropic contributions and they just won't be effective.

In school all I wanted to do was build technology. That's what I loved.

There are a lot of politicians who are just obstructionists.

I always knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I started my own software company in high school and went to college to study entrepreneurship.

The only constant in the technology industry is change.

Most of all, I discovered that in order to succeed with a product you must truly get to know your customers and build something for them.

What part of media doesn't need to connect with their customers more smartly?

It's not so unusual for me to have a week of meetings that includes not only my employees, not only my customers, not only media, but could also include principals of local K-12 schools; it could include non-governmental organizations or nonprofit organizations or members of the community.

You look to Google, you see this incredible world of information, you see the advertising, but you also get Google Analytics. And Google Analytics coupled with Salesforce's sales and service and marketing means that both of our customers are going to have customer insights that they've never had before. That is really exciting.

The antidote to inequality is equality. The question is how do you achieve equality? I believe that, for business, which is where I can speak, we have to shift from shareholder maximization to stakeholder maximization.

We need a new generation of executives who understand how to manage and lead through data. And we also need a new generation of employees who are able to help us organize and structure our businesses around that data.

I think the most surprising thing about giving is it takes a while to find out what you're really interested in and what you really want to do.

I strongly believe the business of a business is to improve the world.

I want to remind everyone that we have a no alcohol policy at Salesforce. Alcohol is a drug, and having alcohol on a Salesforce premise is simply unfair to the Ohana who either do not want it or are intolerant of it.

Technology is a continuum. It's constantly getting lower-cost and easier to use, and you see that, and that's true with our company.

When I get something in my head, it's hard for me to just let it go.

I mentor a lot of CEOs and entrepreneurs, and when I see that product is the number-one thing, the only thing that matters, that's a real red flag.

The whole concept of data science is that the software becomes the expert, and you, as the average user, are able to understand what's going on.

A lot was happening in A.I. But I also realized it wasn't clear what Salesforce's role in A.I. was. That's when we started acquiring quite a few artificial intelligence companies, maybe a dozen.

We need to make sure we do more job retraining, and that's why we're working to have a 5-million-apprenticeship dream.

The world is being re-shaped by the convergence of social, mobile, cloud, big data, community and other powerful forces. The combination of these technologies unlocks an incredible opportunity to connect everything together in a new way and is dramatically transforming the way we live and work.

The best way that I can give my best advice is not to be encumbered with any job with any administration.

You must always be able to predict what's next and then have the flexibility to evolve.

I think everybody understands mobility because everybody's got a cellphone and lots of apps and seen how they've moved off of PCs and onto mobility.

Businesses cannot be extricated or disintermediated from the communities they serve. Businesses who do that will do that at their own peril. They will draw fire. And companies who are integrated will be lauded by their communities and not draw fire.

Although I loved working on technology - I've always been a computer geek at heart - my professors encouraged me to get a real-world job working with customers.

I think a lot of people don't understand how deep AI already is in so many things.

I think a critical part of being successful in our industry is having a beginner's mind

The secret to successful hiring is this: look for the people who want to change the world.

All this green stuff is great, it's great we don't have plastic bottles or plastic bags and all of that, but how about some great schools?

Life grows relative to one’s investment in it.

You need to have a beginner's mind to create bold innovation.

I know Donald Trump quite well. We've never shared values, he and I. But I respected his ability to turn it around. So I respect somebody who can turn things around and be successful. I think the president's communication style is the most difficult thing because he actually does care, people who know him know he cares. But his style of communication, his combative approach, the elements of ego that are obviously there in all of us but seem to be more easy to see in the president sometimes than other people, get in the way of his capacity to lead, unfortunately.

If there wasn't any competition, I'd be very worried, because it would mean we were not doing very well.

Relationships with the media are really important. The media has a more important voice today than it has ever had. We don't advertise. We only have one marketing vehicle, which is editorial, and our ability to get our message out and communicate it effectively.

You have chosen the wrong path if it's not fun. And you are probably not taking enough risk if it's not hard and rocky sometimes.

If you look at the top 10 enterprise software companies, a lot of them are important but irrelevant companies. It's really important to be relevant and important.

I’ve seen how important this concept is in business. To be truly successful, companies need to have a corporate mission that is bigger than making a profit. We try to follow that at salesforce.com, where we give 1% of our equity, 1% of our profits, and 1% of our employees’ time to the community. By integrating philanthropy into our business model our employees feel that they do much more than just work at our company. By sharing a common and important mission, we are united and focused, and have found a secret weapon that ensures we always win.

Most of all, I discovered that in order to succeed with a product, you must truly get to know your customers and build something for them.

Once you know what you want and what is important for you to achieve, also define the values associated with it. What is important? That is something a lot of entrepreneurs pass by too quickly. For us, the things that were important were, No. 1, customer success. Nothing is more important to us than making sure every customer is successful in our service.

You need to get to the future, ahead of your customers, and be ready to greet them when they arrive.

Customers want new functionality, but they don't want the traditional complexity that has marred products in the past.

I always tell people: Life is the dance between what you desire most and what you fear most. You've got to be able to deal with the threshold of control.