Quotes By Charles Kettering

Believe and act as if it were impossible to fail.

You will never stub your toe standing still. The faster you go, the more chance there is of stubbing your toe, but the more chance you have of getting somewhere.

My interest is in the future because I am going to spend the rest of my life there.

People think of the inventor as a screwball, but no one ever asks the inventor what he thinks of other people.

If you have always done it that way, it is probably wrong.

People are very open-minded about new things - as long as they're exactly like the old ones.

The only difference between a problem and a solution is that people understand the solution.

We need to teach the highly educated man that it is not a disgrace to fail and that he must analyze every failure to find its cause. He must learn how to fail intelligently, for failing is one of the greatest arts in the world.

There exist limitless opportunities in every industry. Where there is an open mind, there will always be a frontier.

The opportunities of man are limited only by his imagination. But so few have imagination that there are ten thousand fiddlers to one composer.

There will always be a frontier where there is an open mind and a willing hand.

The biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee how to fail intelligently. We have to train him to experiment over and over and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.

An inventor fails 999 times, and if he succeeds once, he's in. He treats his failures simply as practice shots.

No one would have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in the storm.

One fails forward toward success.

High achievement always takes place in the framework of high expectation.

Problems are the price of progress. Don't bring me anything but trouble. Good news weakens me.

There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it.

Every time you tear a leaf off a calendar, you present a new place for new ideas and progress.

I object to people running down the future. I am going to live all the rest of my life there.

Our imagination is the only limit to what we can hope to have in the future.

If you want to kill any idea in the world, get a committee working on it.

We often say that the biggest job we have is to teach a newly hired employee to fail intelligently... to experiment over and over again and to keep on trying and failing until he learns what will work.

The only time you mustn't fail is the last time you try.

Keep on going and the chances are you will stumble on something, perhaps when you are least expecting it. I have never heard of anyone stumbling on something sitting down.

My definition of an educated man is the fellow who knows the right thing to do at the time it has to be done. You can be sincere and still be stupid.

The world hates change, yet it is the only thing that has brought progress.

In America we can say what we think, and even if we can't think, we can say it anyhow.

A problem well stated is a problem half-solved.

Knowing is not understanding. There is a great difference between knowing and understanding: you can know a lot about something and not really understand it.