“Working without a plan may seem scary. But blindly following a plan that has no relationship with reality is even scarier.”

“Even the master plan has room for improvement.”

“And even, if circumstances required, a contingency plan for his contingency plan's contingency plan.”

“Plan your work for today and every day, then work your plan”

“A good deal of the corporate planning I have observed is like a ritual rain dance; it has no effect on the weather that follows, but those who engage in it think it does. Moreover, it seems to me that much of the advice and instruction related to corporate planning is directed at improving the dancing, not the weather.”

“A plan is a real thing, and things projected are experienced. A plan once made and visualized becomes a reality along with other realities—never to be destroyed but easily to be attacked.”

“This plan will work.”

“We're all looking for a plan that will work. The current plan is not working, and 21,500 additional troops -- it's a snowball in July. It's not going to work.”

“All the things she planned to feel, the way she planned to look and seem, the appropriate things she planned to say. None of them came to pass.”

“First comes thought; then organization of that thought, into ideas and plans; then transformation of those plans into reality. The beginning, as you will observe, is in your imagination.”