Sandy Weill Quotes

100 Sandy Weill Quotes

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Could it be that we had bitten off more than we could chew?
Sandy Weill

Insurance may have been a mature business, but that didn’t stop us from making well-timed acquisitions and leveraging our superior management to produce stellar investment returns.
Sandy Weill

I really never could imagine walking away from working, let alone from a company as great as the one we were putting together.
Sandy Weill

I’m not a big fan of helicopters, let alone the Mexican variety…
Sandy Weill

I relished the idea of making a substantial investment in Mexico as the local financial services market seemed ready to take off. I was amazed by the low percentage of financial product sales relative to the size of the economy and reasoned that growth would surge as the country proved its new stable political and economic underpinnings.
Sandy Weill

Unfortunately, we overestimated the quality of Associates’ management in Tokyo, which had expanded too aggressively just as the Japanese consumer economy had begun deteriorating. Loan losses in our Japanese finance company surged with little warning, rising more than $500 million between 2000 and 2002, and profits soon fell by more than half. The errors in judgment forced us to change our team…
Sandy Weill

There was no way to sugarcoat the situation…
Sandy Weill

I hated the idea that my ethics and character could be doubted and bridled at having to devote precious time to defending myself rather than focusing on running Citigroup.
Sandy Weill

I always placed a premium on teamwork and loyalty…
Sandy Weill

I always read voraciously and constantly probed others for information on how we might run our company better or to learn about parts of the business I didn’t understand.
Sandy Weill



I hindsight, I wish I had been able to spend more time with my kids in those years, but I felt that the majority of my time and energy had to go toward building my business. It was a matter of basic survival.
Sandy Weill

Good instinct alone doesn’t necessarily translate into success, although combining the attribute with skill in getting others to follow represents a powerful combination.
Sandy Weill

I always tried to anticipate the industry’s future direction in order to be alert to opportunities before others were.
Sandy Weill

Being human, people make mistakes. When things go wrong, it’s crucial to surface the errors in judgment, correct the mistakes, and move one.
Sandy Weill

By nature, I’m good at explaining away setbacks and have convinced myself that better events inevitably follow disappointments.
Sandy Weill

Undoubtedly, an acquisition should offer one of three things: 1) it should consolidate a company’s existing businesses and generate savings and efficiencies; 2) it should add products and diversity and thereby enhance the value offered to customers; and/or 3) it should add management talent.
Sandy Weill

In negotiations, it’s wise to avoid pushing for the absolute cheapest deal. It is better that the seller feels good about the transaction. When you develop a reputation as a fair buyer, it raises the odds that others will take you seriously as a potential acquirer.
Sandy Weill

While it’s important not to push for the absolute lowest-cost deal, I still believe an acquisitive company does best when it enters negotiations from a position of strength.
Sandy Weill

Effective businesspeople get to know their competitors so that if the time comes to discuss an acquisition, they understand what makes the seller tick.
Sandy Weill

I always had a view of where the train was going but knew that it had to stay on the tracks in order to get there.
Sandy Weill



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