Ironically, when a bunch of very smart people are sitting around a table for hours trying to figure out whether they should do something, that tends to not necessarily lead to the best results.
Interpretation
Overthinking decisions in a group often leads to poorer outcomes rather than effective actions.
This quote highlights the irony that highly intelligent individuals can sometimes hinder decision-making when they engage in prolonged discussions without action. Instead of generating effective solutions, lengthy deliberations may lead to analysis paralysis, where no decision is made despite the presence of capable minds. Effective leadership often requires decisiveness and the ability to act, rather than excessive discussion.
In practice
In a corporate meeting discussing a new project, this quote can remind the team to take action rather than get stuck in endless debate.
I have a saying: There are no brave old people in finance. Because if you're brave, you mostly get destroyed in your 30s and 40s. If you make it to your 50s and 60s and you're still prospering, you have a very good sense of how to avoid problems and when to be conservative or aggressive with your investments.
I don't feel like a wealthy person. Other people think of me as a wealthy person, but I don't. I feel the same as when I was a fifth-year associate trying to make partner at Lehman Brothers. I haven't changed.
Sometimes, success in life is knowing one's limitations.
The biggest mistake I've seen people make with their careers is, when they're good, after two or three years - and they happen to be smart - they announce that they're going out to start their own firm.
Presidents quickly realize that while a single act might destroy the world they live in, no one single decision can make life suddenly better or can turn history around for the good.
In government, our chief executives have been lawyers. The great majority of our cabinets and congresses are and have been men trained in the law. They have provided the leadership and the statecraft and the store of strength when it was needed.
When you have people together who believe in something very strongly - whether it's religion or politics or unions - things happen.
Leaders aren't born they are made. And they are made just like anything else, through hard work. And that's the price we'll have to pay to achieve that goal, or any goal.
Make your employer feel truthfully that you are sincere with him; that you are going to promote his interest; that you are going to stand for the things which he represents; that you are proud of being a member of his staff, and there is nothing that will reap you a richer reward. Loyalty above all!
If the head man in a company is not working 12 hours a day, doing things, taking risks, but also standing with his people in the trenches at the most difficult of times, then the company loses something.
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