Prosecutors are assessed by their win-loss records, not by whether they have furthered the cause of justice.
Advice is judged by results, not by intentions.
We judge other according to results; how else?--not knowing the process by which results are arrived at.
Entrepreneurs are accustomed to accountability: If we fail to deliver value, we lose customers. If we misallocate capital, we absorb the loss. Government, too, should be judged by results, not intentions.
It's very easy to confuse confident motion with being productive - and they're not the same thing. Productive to me means measurable outcomes that apply to my most important to-dos that positively affect my life. That's it.
It's easy to measure success by the number of dollars spent or by the number of programs initiated, without having too much regard for what was bought and how useful it was to the people who need it - the war fighter and the analyst.
We judge people and initiatives by their results, and we expect events to happen for good, understandable reason. But our clear visions of inevitability are often only illusions.
You have to take away the idea that something you do is right or wrong. I don't think there's a right or a wrong; I think there's an "it works" or "it doesn't work" for the whole. And that's why you need a director you trust, so you can just keep throwing out suggestions.
Intentions don't matter. It's the end result we're all judged by. Evil in the name of good is still evil. And when you dance with the devil, you seldom get to pick the tune.
