Quotes from Colin Powell

Organization doesn't really accomplish anything. Plans don't accomplish anything, either. Theories of management don't much matter. Endeavors succeed or fail because of the people involved. Only by attracting the best people will you accomplish great deeds.

Always be looking for that which you do well and that which you love doing, and when you find those two things together — man, you got it.

The day people stop bringing you their problems is the day you have stopped leading them.

One of the fondest expressions around is that [America] can't be the world's policeman. But guess who gets called when suddenly someone needs a cop.

Bad news isn't wine. It doesn't improve with age.

War should be the politics of last resort. And when we go to war, we should have a purpose that our people understand and support.

Fit no stereotypes. Don't chase the latest management fads. The situation dictates which approach best accomplishes the team's mission.

We got rid of a terrible dictator. We gave the Iraqi people an opportunity for a new life under a representative form of government.

Politics is not bean bags. It's serious, tough stuff.

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.

I don't think we handled the aftermath of the fall of Baghdad as well as we might have. But that's now history.

What you're seeing with Occupy Wall Street and the others are people who are unhappy and they're directing their unhappiness now toward Wall Street and toward those they think are doing too well in our society.

My own experience is use the tools that are out there. Use the digital world. But never lose sight of the need to reach out and talk to other people who don't share your view. Listen to them and see if you can find a way to compromise.

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.

Wouldn't it be great if we could look forward to a whole world in which no child will be left behind?

In other words, don't expect to always be great. Disappointments, failures and setbacks are a normal part of the lifecycle of a unit or a company and what the leader has to do is constantly be up and say 'we have a problem, let's go and get it'.

You should see what our Founding Fathers used to say to each other and in the early part of our nation. But what they were able to do, especially in Philadelphia in 1787, four months, they argued about what a House should be, what a Senate should be, the power of the president, the Congress, the Supreme Court. And they had to deal with slavery.

90 percent of my time is spent on 10 percent of the world.

It isn't enough just to scream at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations. We need our political system to start reflect this anger back into, 'How do we fix it? How do we get the economy going again?'

In terms of the legal matter of creating a contract between two people that's called marriage, and allowing them to live together with the protection of law, it seems to me is the way we should be moving in this country.

I respect the fact that many denominations have different points of view with respect to gay marriage and they can hold that in the sanctity in the place of their religion and not bless them or solemnize them.

We all hoped in 2001 that we could put in place an Afghan government under President Karzai that would be able to control the country, make sure al-Qaeda didn't come back, and make sure the Taliban wasn't resurging. It didn't work out.

[On invading Iraq:] You break it, you own it.

We need to understand that we as citizens and as a government in any community throughout this country have no more important obligation than to educate those who are going to replace us.