Top 40 Tom Kelley Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “Fail early, fail often, in order to succeed sooner.”

— Tom Kelley

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2. “That combination of thought and action defines creative confidence: the ability to come up with new ideas and the courage to try them out.”

— Tom Kelley

3. “Constraints can spur creativity and incite action, as long as you have the confidence to embrace them.”

— Tom Kelley

4. “The history of discovery is full of creative serendipity.”

— Tom Kelley

5. “The head that once was crowned with thorns Is crowned with glory now.”

— Tom Kelley

6. “Play with your physical workplace in a way that sends positive “body language” to employees and visitors.”

— Tom Kelley

7. “Like a muscle, your creative abilities will grow and strengthen with practice.”

— Tom Kelley

8. “At its core, creative confidence is about believing in your ability to create change in the world around you.”

— Tom Kelley

9. “Design thinking relies on the natural – and coachable – human ability to be intuitive, to recognize patterns, and to construct ideas that are emotionally meaningful as well as functional.”

— Tom Kelley

10. “Mark Twain said a century ago, “It’s not what you don’t know that gets you into trouble, it’s what you know for sure that ain’t so.”

— Tom Kelley

11. “Design thinking is a way of finding human needs and creating new solutions using the tools and mindsets of design practitioners.”

— Tom Kelley

12. “If you want a team of smart, creative people to do extraordinary things, don’t put them in a drab, ordinary space.”

— Tom Kelley

13. “I’m not gonna be perfect, but I’m gonna try stuff.”

— Tom Kelley

14. “The first step toward a great answer is to reframe the question.”

— Tom Kelley

15. “Deep empathy for people makes our observations powerful sources of inspiration.”

— Tom Kelley

16. “Work doesn’t have to feel like “Work with a capital W.” You should be able to feel passion, purpose, and meaning in whatever you do. And that shift in perspective can open up a world of possibilities.”

— Tom Kelley

17. “Effort is the path to mastery, so let’s at least give this a try.”

— Tom Kelley

18. “Cool technology alone is not enough. If it were, we’d all be riding Segways and playing with robotic dogs.”

— Tom Kelley

19. “It’s not what you don’t know that gets you in trouble, it’s what you know for sure that ain’t so” Mark Twain.”

— Tom Kelley

20. “Empathy means challenging your preconceived ideas and setting aside your sense of what your think is true in order to learn what actually is true.”

— Tom Kelley

21. “In our experience, one of the scariest snakes in the room is the fear of failure, which manifests itself in such ways as fear of being judged, fear of getting started, fear of the unknown. And while much has been said about fear of failure, it still is the single biggest obstacle people face to creative success.”

— Tom Kelley

22. “It’s not about just coming up with the one genius idea that solves the problem, but trying and failing at a hundred other solutions before arriving at the best one.”

— Tom Kelley

23. “As Brown writes: “When our self-worth isn’t on the line, we are far more willing to be courageous and risk sharing our raw talents and gifts.” One way to embrace creativity, Brown says, is to let go of comparison.”

— Tom Kelley

24. “Great groups believe they are on a mission from God. Beyond mere financial success, they genuinely believe they will make the world a better place.”

— Tom Kelley

25. “We didn’t know as children that we were creative. We just knew that it was okay for us to try experiments that sometimes succeeded and sometimes falied. That we could keep creating, keep tinkering, and trust that something interesting would result if we just stuck with it.”

— Tom Kelley

26. “Their ultimate “strokes of genius” don’t come about because they succeed more often than other people – they just do more, period.”

— Tom Kelley

27. “It’s hard to be “best” right away, so commit to rapid and continuous improvements.”

— Tom Kelley

28. “If simplicity were easy, we would see more of it.”

— Tom Kelley

29. “You cannot design better products by staying in the office.”

— Tom Kelley

30. “Start with a growth mindset, the deep-seated belief that your true potential is still unknown. That you are not limited to only what you have been able to do before.”

— Tom Kelley

31. “No matter how high you rise in your career, no matter how much expertise you gain, you still need to keep your knowledge and your insights refreshed. Otherwise, you may develop a false confidence in what you already “know” that might lead you to the wrong decision.”

— Tom Kelley

32. “I’m quite comfortable with making the odd mistake, if it comes in the pursuit of new opportunities and new ideas” Rob Fyfe, Air New Zealand CEO.”

— Tom Kelley

33. “But to act, most of us must first overcome the fears that have blocked our creativity in the past.”

— Tom Kelley

34. “Noticing that something is broken is an essential prerequisite for coming up with a creative solution to fix.”

— Tom Kelley

35. “Everything in modern society is the result of a collection of decisions made by someone. Why shouldn’t that someone be you?”

— Tom Kelley

36. “The key is to be quick and dirty – exploring a range of ideas without becoming too invested in only one.”

— Tom Kelley

37. “Creative confidence is like a muscle – it can be strengthened and nurtured through effort and experience.”

— Tom Kelley

38. “What matters most in the end, though, is this: your belief in your capacity to create positive change and the courage to take action.”

— Tom Kelley

39. “The surprising, compelling mathematics of innovation: if you want more success, you have to be prepared to shrug off more failure.”

— Tom Kelley

40. “But as you look at the sweep of your life and start to think of a legacy that survives beyond it, giving others the opportunity to live up to their creative capacity seems like a worthy purpose.”

— Tom Kelley

41. “Individuals who come to believe that they can effect change are more likely to accomplish what they set out to do. Bandura calls that conviction “self-efficacy.” People with self-efficacy set their sights higher, try harder, persevere longer, and show more resilience in the face of failure.”

— Tom Kelley

42. “As Nobel laureate Linus Pauling famously said, “If you want a good idea, start with a lot of ideas.” At.”

— Tom Kelley

43. “Cool News of the Day.”

— Tom Kelley

44. “If a problem is not worth solving, it’s not worth solving well.”

— Tom Kelley

45. “If your CEO has enough good ideas to fuel the company’s growth objectives in perpetuity, maybe you don’t need to tap into the reservoir of talent at other levels of the organization. But the most innovative companies in the twenty-first century have transitioned from command-and-control organizations to a participatory approach that involves collaboration and teamwork.”

— Tom Kelley

46. “They live in the active voice.”

— Tom Kelley

47. “When you open your mind to the possibility that your capabilities are unlimited and unknown, you already have your running shoes on and are ready to race forward.”

— Tom Kelley