Decision-Making Authority Quotes

In the end, the actor's main power is the power to say, 'No.'

Being the boss of your own career, you get used to having veto power and getting what you want, or as close to what you want as you have mapped out.

I went to school at MIT with a whole bunch of engineers. And then I started work one day and asked myself, 'Why do all of these MIT Ph.D.s work for Harvard M.B.A.s?' Why should it be like that? I was one of those engineers who thought, 'Why are these people making those dumb decisions?' So it's fun to be the person making them.

the leader of armies is the arbiter of the people's fate, the man on whom it depends whether the nation shall be in peace or in peril.

You can think of all the things a Congress or a legislature does, and then you kind of overshadow that with the fact that a few people are going to make those decisions.

Unless combated and overcome by social and political action, the influence of the new industrial and technological order favors the concentration of wealth, power and decision-making in the hands of a small public or private controlling group.

When a company gets bigger, when it begins to bring on employees, it naturally goes through this tendency of wanting to control, of wanting to build process - essentially to say not every one of our customers or employees has great judgment.

The 9/11 Commission strongly recommends that the National Intelligence Director be fully in control of the budget, from developing it to implementing it, to ensuring that the National Intelligence Director has the clout to make decisions.

When political and business leaders tell the public - any public - 'We don't trust you to make the right decision' - they prejudice that electorate against the very proposals they want it to accept and undermine public confidence in themselves.

If just a few people make decisions about what this world looks like, what this country looks like, then you have people sitting in offices at major media outlets and Hollywood who think they can deal with a small group of people, to get them to jump through the hoops they want you to.

A war minister is able to force the adoption of any measure desired by the Camp or to block any measure that meets his disapproval.

A lot of companies have teams, but they are not really independent. They still have to get stuff approved by the boss. You have to change how and where decisions are made. If the hierarchy makes the decision, it will be based on politics.

When I give a minister an order, I leave it to him to find the means to carry it out.

The only people who have quick answers don't have the responsibility of making the decisions.

It's weird because there is progress somehow. But there's so much that just feels the same. How important is that rank? How important is it that I am allowed to make these decisions? What does that really mean? What is progress? Is it progress that a black guy gets to push a button for the nuclear bomb? Is that progress? Maybe, I don't know.

I think the policy makers like the idea of being the boss. I mean people who like to boss other people around like to go into politics so they can become the boss.

I think it's possible to have a conservative serve in a cardinal position, a subcommittee chair position, and be very effective.

In large companies, the CEO is very distant from operations.

It never worked having a management style where someone would try to tell us what to do. It's never been the sort of group that we are.

When any organizational entity expands beyond 21 members, the real power will be in some smaller body.

In creating superdelegates, the Democratic Party recognized the expertise that its top holders of public office have gained by running for office themselves. They are experts at winning. They know the issues. They are in a unique position to evaluate presidential candidates.

The frustration of Washington is you have to concentrate on just a few areas to really make a difference, and then so much of the power is at the top, at the committee chairman level.

President Hindenburg had ultimate say over whether the government would survive or not.

In the case of maternal health care, you look at, well naturally, it's the mother who's the customer, who makes the decisions. But in truth, the mother in many areas, in certain parts of India, the mother has very little decision-making power at all. The real decision-maker is the mother-in-law.

One big lesson I learned from movie [making] was I don't do creative projects that I headline unless I have all the control. I can't deal with having to live with other people's screw ups, and that's just sort of the way the movie business works. The people with the money are in charge. Until I'm in charge, I don't want to play that game.