Quote

Reduce the layers of management. They put distance between the top of an organization and the customers.

Donald Rumsfeld

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Donald Rumsfeld
Age: 88 †
Born: 1932
Born: July 9
Died: 2021
Died: June 29
Author
Businessperson
Diplomat
Former U.S. Secretary Of Defense
Military Officer
Politician
Chicago
Illinois
Donald Henry Rumsfeld
Reduce
Managers
Customers
Management
Distance
Organization
Layers

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I tend over the years to have developed a certain hesitancy about believing that headlines tell the whole story.
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There will be good moments, and there will be less good moments.
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Our task, your task... is to try to connect the dots before something happens. People say, 'Well, where's the smoking gun?' Well, we don't want to see a smoking gun from a weapon of mass destruction.
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Success tends to go not to the person who is error-free, because he also tends to be risk-averse. Rather it goes to the person who recognizes that life is pretty much a percentage business. It isn't making mistakes that's critical it's correcting them and getting on with the principal task.
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[on Osama bin Laden] He is either alive and well or alive and not too well or not alive.
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Work continuously to trim the White House staff from your first day to your last. All the pressures are to the contrary.
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Be precise. A lack of precision is dangerous when the margin of error is small.
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Control your time. If you're working off your in-box, you're working off the priorities of others. Be sure the staff is working on what you move to them from the President, or the President will be reacting, not leading.
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Look for what's missing. Many advisors can tell a President how to improve what's proposed or what's gone amiss. Few are able to see what isn't there.
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Now, settle down, settle down. Hell, I'm an old man, it's early in the morning and I'm gathering my thoughts here.
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Is it likely that an aircraft carrier or a cruise missile is going to find a person?
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... something under $50 billion for the cost. How much of that would be the U.S. burden, and how much would be other countries, is an open question.
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Control your own time. Don't let it be done for you. If you are working off the in-box that is fed you, you are probably working on the priority of others.
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The United States isn't going to do anything that it's not capable of doing. And if we do something, we'll be capable of doing it.
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Most of the 50 or so invitations you receive each week come from people inviting the President's Chief of Staff, not you. If you doubt that, ask your predecessor how many he received last week.
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If you foul up, tell the President and correct it fast. Delay only compounds mistakes.
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There are known knowns there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don't know we don't know.
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Many people around the President have sizeable egos before entering government, some with good reason. Their new positions will do little to moderate their egos.
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Imagine, a September 11 with weapons of mass destruction. It's not 3,000. It's tens of thousands of innocent men, women and children.
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General Boykin has requested that an inspector general review this matter. And I have indicated that if that's his request, I think it's appropriate.
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