Quotes About Strategy

Life is like a game of poker, you are dealt a hand, and only you decide what to keep and what to throw away...

Your first choice doesn't come through, so you come and find me, your back-up plan.

It is beyond question that in the remote future a Franco-German rapprochement might come into being and would be highly profitable to both countries, nor would France have the worse of the bargain, I dare say, but I have never spoken of it because the fruit is not yet ripe, and if you wish to know my opinion, in asking our late enemies to join with us in solemn wedlock, I consider that we should be setting out to meet a severe rebuff, and that the attempt could end only in disaster.

In the course of a campaign, if it is at all long, you will see one belligerent profiting by the lessons furnished him by the successes and mistakes, perfecting the methods of the other, who will improve on him in turn. But all that is a thing of the past. With the terrible advance of artillery, the wars of the future, if there are to be any more wars, will be so short that, before we have had time to think of putting our lessons into practice, peace will have been signed.

The generals who get the most soldiers killed insist that they be well fed.

It is necessary to adapt oneself to the enemy's latest formula so as to defend oneself against him; then he starts a fresh innovation and yet, as in other human things, the old tricks always come off.

Always remember that, when all's said and done, what does most to accelerate the evolution of the art of war is wars themselves. In

The truly skillful politician is one who, when he comes to a fork in the road, goes both ways.

Strategy will compensate the talent. The talent will never compensate the strategy.

Managers are encouraged to focus on complex initiatives like reengineering or learning organizations, without spending time on the basics.

The Four Keys, select for talent, define the right outcomes, focus on strengths, find the right fit, reveal how they attack this goal.

So this is (a manager's) dilemma: The manager must retain control and focus people on performance. But she is bound by her belief that she cannot force everyone to perform the same way. ... The solution is as elegant as it is efficient: Define the right outcomes and let each person find his own route toward these outcomes.

we train for war and fight to win.

There are times when you have to put yourself at a disadvantage in order to accomplish a larger mission and secure a longer-tern goal.

Qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum — Flavius Vegetius Renatus, fourth century).

The cruise missiles had softened up the area, but that was only the start. The real heavyweight punch from the world's only superpower would come in the form of a gigantic bomb — the BLU-82B/C-130, known as Commando Vault in Vietnam and now nicknamed Daisy Cutter.

It's easy. Everybody else on the field, they look where the opposing line is. I look where they're going to be. Then I just head somewhere else." —BARRY ADAMS, RUNNING BACK FOR THE CHICAGO BEARS, ON HOW HE WAS ABLE TO RUSH 2,437 YARDS IN A SINGLE SEASON, SHATTERING THE PREVIOUS RECORD (2,105, BY ERIC DICKERSON IN 1984)

Look at a chessboard. Even the most elegant of wins required sacrifice.

The secret to the game is that beginners—actually, intermediate players, too, and sometimes masters—they tend to look at just the one side. But the trick to chess is to be paying more attention to what the other side is doing.

Despite what the last fifty years of American policy would suggest, 'They hit us so we're hitting back' is not a military strategy. I was taught that successful wars are waged for measurable goals. What's the goal here? I'd really like to know. What does victory look like?

the trick to chess is to be paying more attention to what the other side is doing.

Yeah, but Marcus, aren't you afraid you've now introduced them to the competition?" If you're thinking this, let's be clear about something: If someone wants to know who your competitors are, roughly, how long will it take them to figure it out? Seconds, if they're slow! The reality is this: Consumer ignorance is no longer a viable sales and marketing strategy.

We should never let our personal opinions screw up smart business choices.

The sinews of war are infinite money.