“Change isn't made by asking permission. Change is made by asking forgiveness, later.”

As quoted in the U.S. Navy's Chips Ahoy magazine (July 1986)
As quoted in Built to Learn: The Inside Story of How Rockwell Collins Became a True Learning Organization (2003) by Cliff Purington, Chris Butler, and Sarah Fister Gale, p. 171
The future: Hardware, Software, and People in Carver https://books.google.com/books?id=5Q7uAAAAMAAJ, 1983
Actually attested since mid-19th century.
Variant: If it's a good idea, go ahead and do it. It is much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.
Variant: That brings me to the most important piece of advice that I can give to all of you: if you've got a good idea, and it's a contribution, I want you to go ahead and DO IT. It is much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.
Source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2018/06/19/forgive/

Prime Minister
Source: Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1919/jul/03/territorial-adjustments#column_1215 in the House of Commons on the Treaty of Versailles (3 July 1919)

"The Death of Me", p. 151
Awareness (1992)
Source: Awareness: Conversations with the Masters
Context: Don't ask the world to change — you change first. Then you'll get a good enough look at the world so that you'll be able to change whatever you think ought to be changed. Take the obstruction out of your own eye. If you don't you have lost the right to change anyone or anything. Till you are aware of yourself, you have no right to interfere with anyone else or with the world.

Variant: I always say, better ask forgiveness than permission.
Source: Eragon

Source: The Diviners

Source: As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh: Journals and Notebooks, 1964-1980