Like many people, you probably face challenges in your career that can lead to frustration or stagnation if not addressed. Yet many of those issues are avoidable or can be minimized if you have the right guidance from the right people.

Through interviews on the Strategic Momentum Podcast, we’ve been privileged to collect professional advice from experts in a range of fields and industries, from AI to psychology to government. Each has shared how they’ve overcome major challenges and what they learned in the process. 

To help you, we’ve curated our favorite words of wisdom about career development, success, relationships, and more to give you the insight and perspectives that will help break through that inertia, find clarity and purpose, and supercharge your career.

Quotes about Career Development

1. “Always [try] new things because even though what you are doing is working, you never know if it could work better.” - Anita John

2. “If you're taking someone else's goal as your personal goal, and then you're doing that, you're not going to be happy.” - Yao Huang

3. “Life is too short to do work that you don't care about. When you do work in the world that has a positive impact, it's so much easier to go to work and so much more enjoyable.” - Meghan French Dunbar

4. “Think about your career like a business...having that viewpoint should light a fire in focusing your efforts towards building a strategy and then the subsequent tactics that need to happen.” - Dan Yu 

5. “Recognize [managing your career] is a marathon...you can always do that bolder thing that's more authentic to you...Just make sure to do it eventually because you're going to feel great about it.” - Stephane Fitch

6. “Do what you do, be patient along the way. This is not a sprint, it's a marathon. And what needs to be revealed will be revealed. And the epic performance, the experiences you need to have are all preparing you for the next great experience.” - Michael Wilkinson

7. “Don't let your job description define what your impact can be. It's okay to swim outside your lane sometimes if you think that's the right thing to do for the organization.” - Bhavna Dave

8. “When you have a higher purpose to what you do, it can get you through hard times in your career.” - Meghan French Dunbar

9. “When you go into a company, oftentimes, they tell you to stay in the lines. You need to just push through those boundaries.” - Ines Lebow

Quotes about Networking

1. “Relationships take time to develop. You can't just show up with a need and demand that people fulfill it for you.” - John Newtson

2. “People are a lot more blind to their entire industry and the people in it than they should be.” - John Newtson

3. “Every person you meet is really a doorway to this whole sea of opportunities that you wouldn't access otherwise.” - John Newtson

4. “People approach networking from a very transactional basis... Like I need this relationship, or deal, or opportunity right now. And so, right now, I'm going to start thinking about who can I go out there and meet, who can I go out there and find to fill this. But it really doesn't work that way.” - John Newtson

5. “It's so important to be generous and to be kind, especially in networking.” - Dan Yu

6. “Knowing how to do things is really important – But knowing people is just as important!” - John Newtson

7. “The more we can make each other successful, the more it's going to come back and drive success for ourselves as well.” - John Keeling

Quotes about Relationships

1. “The more we can make each other successful, the more it's going to come back and drive success for ourselves as well.” - John Keeling

2. “If you really take responsibility for other people's success, the things that come out of that are so huge.” - John Newtson

3. “Choose the people you want to work with, not the companies.” -  Pierre Hadaya

4. “In your professional life, it's treating the people around you in that generous way...You never know who can be a mentor to you and who can potentially make that connection.” - Dan Yu

5. “Without a personal touch, without communication between teams, without the team mentality, a company isn’t going to last long.” - Hayden Lee

6. “It's important to have ‘friendlies.’ The people who will cheer you on, that will enable you to do better things. They'll pick you up and they'll help remind you about why you're doing what you're doing.” - Scott DiGiammarino

7. “What it means to be an active upstander is that in every situation you're in, your focus is on the other person.” - Dr. Phil Zimbardo

8. “Be aware that other people are different, and stop judging people because of those differences.” - Yao Huang

Quotes about Success

1. “People do not decide their futures. They decide their habits, and their habits decide their futures.” - Geoff Woods

2. “It's hard to not fall in love with your own success, but that success was based on what you did yesterday – not what you did today.” - Greg Johnston

3. “All opportunities start out looking like problems. So solve the problem, and an opportunity will emerge you couldn't even see before.” - John Keeling

4. “Don't hide behind the things that are easy in replacement for things that are really valuable.” - Michael Zipursky

5. “As long as you're still passionate about what you're doing, just never quit.” - Meghan French Dunbar

6. “Having the clarity, having the people to hold you accountable, having the people who will support you: these are things that are just part of the recipe for success.” - Dr. Richard Shuster 

7. “One myth is that optimizing your performance is complicated – when you break it down, it is pretty simple...You build momentum by building mini victories.” - Dana Cavalea

What’s your best work advice? Share in the comments below! 👇