WIST Quotations

Kennedy, Marilyn Moats -- “The Case Against Performance Appraisals,” Across the Board (Jan 1999)

Dave — Wed, 31 Mar 2021 19:49:11 +0000

It’s better to be boldly decisive and risk being wrong than to agonize at length and be right too late.

Marilyn Moats Kennedy (1943-2017) American educator, business and career consultant, writer
“The Case Against Performance Appraisals,” Across the Board (Jan 1999)

Sondheim, Stephen -- “Sunday in the Park with George” (1984)

Dave — Tue, 01 Nov 2016 01:59:09 +0000

I chose and my world was shaken. —
So what?
The choice may have been mistaken,
The choosing was not.
You have to move on.

Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) American composer and lyricist
“Sunday in the Park with George” (1984)

Heinlein, Robert A. -- Friday [Friday Jones] (1982)

Dave — Tue, 03 Nov 2015 14:23:19 +0000

How many people have died because they could not abandon their baggage?

Robert A. Heinlein (1907-1988) American writer
Friday [Friday Jones] (1982)

Hugo, Victor -- Victor Hugo’s Intellectual Autobiography [Postscriptum de ma Vie], “Thoughts,” sec. 3 (1901) [tr. O’Rourke (1907)]

Dave — Wed, 26 Nov 2014 13:43:03 +0000

Concision in style, precision in thought, decision in life.

[Concision dans le style, précision dans la pensée, décision dans la vie.]

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
Victor Hugo’s Intellectual Autobiography [Postscriptum de ma Vie], “Thoughts,” sec. 3 (1901) [tr. O’Rourke (1907)]
(Source)

(Source (French))

Dixon, Norman F. -- On the Psychology of Military Incompetence, Part 1, ch. 2 “Generalship” (1976)

Dave — Tue, 29 Oct 2013 11:44:58 +0000

Having gradually (and perhaps painfully) accumulated information to support a decision people become progressively loath to accept contrary evidence.

Norman F. Dixon (1922-2013) British cognitive psychologist, author, military engineer
On the Psychology of Military Incompetence, Part 1, ch. 2 “Generalship” (1976)
(Source)

Lynd, Robert Wilson -- Searchlights and Nightingales (1939)

Dave — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 13:00:50 +0000

The belief in the possibility of a short decisive war appears to be one of the most ancient and dangerous of human illusions.

Robert Wilson Lynd (1879–1949) Irish writer, literary essayist, journalist, nationalist (Robiard Ó Flionn; pseud. "Y. Y.")
Searchlights and Nightingales (1939)
(Source)

Emerson, Ralph Waldo -- Essay (1860), “Power,” The Conduct of Life, ch. 2

Dave — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 12:20:57 +0000

But in our flowing affairs a decision must be made, — the best, if you can, but any is better than none. There are twenty ways of going to a point, and one is the shortest; but set out at once on one. A man who has that presence of mind which can bring to him on the instant all he knows, is worth for action a dozen men who know as much but can only bring it to light slowly.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) American essayist, lecturer, poet
Essay (1860), “Power,” The Conduct of Life, ch. 2
(Source)

Based on a course of lectures by that name first delivered in Pittsburg (1851-03).

Macaulay, Thomas Babington -- “John Hampden,” Essays Contributed to the Edinburgh Review, Vol. 1 (1843)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 16:00:00 +0000

Hampden, on the other hand, was for vigorous and decisive measures. When he drew the sword, as Clarendon has well aid, he threw away the scabbard. He had shown that he knew better than any public man of his time how to value and how to practice moderation. He knew that the essence of war is violence, and that moderation in war is imbecility.

Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800-1859) English writer and politician
“John Hampden,” Essays Contributed to the Edinburgh Review, Vol. 1 (1843)
(Source)

Review of Lord Nugent, Some Memorials of John Hampden, His Party, and His Times (1831).

Lorimer, George Horace -- Old Gorgon Graham: More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son, ch. 3 (1903)

Dave — Sun, 01 Feb 2004 18:00:00 +0000

The man who can make up his mind quick, makes up other people’s minds for them. Decision is a sharp knife that cuts clear and straight and lays bare the fat and the lean; indecision is a dull one that hacks and tears and leaves ragged edges behind it.

George Horace Lorimer (1867-1937) American journalist, author, magazine editor
Old Gorgon Graham: More Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son, ch. 3 (1903)
(Source)