Herding Cats

Quote of the Day

“I Have Tens of Thousands of Hours of Experience. I’ve made Every Mistake That They're Going to Make.” — ­Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan on the importance of putting experienced leaders in Army Futures Command Read more →

Quote of the Day - Plucked by Puffery

To the layperson, puffery seems like a license to lie, which, frankly, isn’t totally wrong. A well-known book on torts by William Prosser and W. Page Keeton stated it this way: “The puffing rule amounts to a seller’s privilege to... Read more →

Quote of the Day

There is nothing more difficult to carry out, nor more doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to handle, than to initiate a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all who profit by the old order, and... Read more →

Quote of the Day

"Uncertainty management is not just about managing perceived threats, opportunities, and their implications; it is about identifying and managing all the many sources of uncertainty that give rise to and shape our perceptions of threats and opportunities. It implies exploring... Read more →

Quote of the Day

For companies where software is important to business operations and to the products that they market, excellence in software is a vital business goal. However, software has long been one of the most troublesome technologies of the 20th century, and... Read more →

Quote of the Day

I am used to thinking three or four months in advance, about what I must do, and I calculate on the worst. If I take so many precautions, it is because it is my custom to leave nothing to chance.... Read more →

Quote of the Day

Strategies are intellectually simple; their execution is not From "The CEO as Coach: An Interview with Allied Signal's Lawrence A. Bossidy," N. M. Tichy and R. Charan, Harvard Business Review, Mar-Apr, 1994, pp. 68-78. Read more →

Quote of the Day

Critics are our friends, they show us our faults ― Benjamin Franklin Read more →

Quote of the Day

"Would you tell me, please which way I ought to go from here? 'That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,' said the Cat. 'I don't much care,' said Alice. 'Then it doesn't matter which way... Read more →

Quote of the Day - Mathematics

By concentrating on what, and leaving out why, mathematics is reduced to an empty shell. The art is not in the “truth” but in the explanation, the argument. It is the argument itself which gives the truth its context, and... Read more →

Quote of the Day - Motivation

When I was reading The Manhattan Project and came across a statement that resonated with me. Dr. Vannevar Bush (George Bush senior’s father and George W. Bush’s grandfather) was assigned the role to lead the development of the atomic bomb... Read more →

Quote of the Day

If you don't know where to look, you have to look everywhere - Professor Keith Ulmer, in a Physics Saturday lecture about his work on CMS in search for the Higgs Boson. Read more →

Quote of the Day

“The place where optimism most flourishes is the lunatic asylum.” — Henry Havelock Ellis, British psychologist Read more →

Augustine's Laws

Norm Augustine was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Martin Marietta Corporation. Here are some Laws he defined The Laws of Unbounded Enthusiasm Law I - The best way to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear is... Read more →

Quote of the Day

“All truths are easy to understand once they are discovered; the point is to discover them." – Galileo Galilei The challenge is what is the basis of the truth. In our software-intensive system of systems domain, there are many claiming... Read more →

Quote of the Day

“A great systems engineer completely understands and applies the art of leadership and has the experience and scar tissue from trying to earn the badge of leader from his or her team.” - Harold Bell, NASA Headquarters Read more →

Quote of the Day

Just because you don't understand it, does mean it isn't so – Lemony Snicket Read more →

Quote of the Day

“We trained hard, but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams, we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a... Read more →

Quote of the Day

Never bring the problem-solving stage into the decision-making stage. Otherwise, you surrender yourself to the problem rather than the solution. — Robert Schuller No problem can be solved until we know the root cause of the problem. If you start... Read more →

Quote of the Day

No sensible decision can be made without taking into account not only the world as it is, but the world as it might be — Isaac Asimov To make sensible decisions, in the presence of uncertainty - reducible and irreducible... Read more →