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Don't let your ego get too close to your position, so that if your position gets shot down, your ego doesn't go with it.

Colin Powell

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Colin Powell
Age: 87
Born: 1937
Born: April 5
Diplomat
Former United States Secretary Of State
Politician
Soldier
New York City
New York
Colin Luther Powell
Emotion
Position
Politics
Ego
Business
Shot
Doesn
Shots
Political
Close
Gets
Military

More quotes by Colin Powell

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Politics is different, because the mission is always to get the necessary votes. A good politician goes through everything in terms of mission and vision, and resourcing, but at the end of the day politicians have to make compromises in order to achieve consensus.
Colin Powell
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Think hard about it: I'm running out of demons. I'm running out of villians. I'm down to Castro and Kim Il Sung.
Colin Powell
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I have always gone through public life and saying that with respect to political candidates, I always measure each candidate against what I think the country needs at that time, and I will vote for the person I think who is most qualified to serve the nation at that time.
Colin Powell
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First you train the followers to accomplish the mission. Second, you resource them: Make sure that they have the tools to do the job. Third, you reward them: You give them medals or bonuses.
Colin Powell
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Pissing people off doesn't mean you're doing the right things, but doing the right things will almost inevitably piss people off.
Colin Powell
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The Court is perhaps one of the last citadels of jealously preserved individualism. For the most part, we function as nine, small independent law firms.
Colin Powell
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We knew that al-Qaida was a threat to our country. We knew that the Clinton administration understood this and was working against al-Qaida We did not ignore al-Qaida. We spent a lot of our time thinking about terrorism, what should we do about it.
Colin Powell
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Trust is the essence of Leadership.
Colin Powell
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The chief condition on which, life, health and vigor depend on, is action. It is by action that an organism develops its faculties, increases its energy, and attains the fulfillment of its destiny.
Colin Powell
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I have never seen a good organization where the standards weren't high.
Colin Powell
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The best way to create a winning team is to train them, give them everything they need to get the job done and second, make sure they know what the job is and what the job will be. So you connect strategy to resources.
Colin Powell
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Give me the right people and I don’t much care what organization you give me. Good things will happen. Give me the wrong people and it doesn’t matter what you do with the organization. Bad things will happen.
Colin Powell
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I understand that and I have had very candid discussions with Saudi leaders in the past. I respect their culture and their heritage and their traditions, but I think that they now, as they move forward, will have to start examining these traditions and these practices to see whether or not change is appropriate.
Colin Powell
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It ain't as bad as you think. It will look better in the morning.
Colin Powell
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You know you're a good leader when people follow you out of curiosity.
Colin Powell
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One of the greatest talents of all is the talent to recognize and to develop talent in others.
Colin Powell
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Perpetual optimism is a force multiplier.
Colin Powell
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I'll tell you what they're all going to face, whichever one of them becomes president on January 21st of 2009. They will face a military force - a United States military force that cannot sustain - continually sustain 140,000 people deployed in Iraq and the 20-odd or 25,000 people we have deployed in Afghanistan and our other deployments.
Colin Powell
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Foe means enemy. Now, will we have differences of opinion with the Russians? Yes. Will they get mad at us from time to time, and we get mad at them? That's part of the normal diplomatic relations.
Colin Powell
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What could be more important than equipping the next generation with the character and competence they need to become successful
Colin Powell