No matter your opinion on President Bush’s decisions1, I’m writing here to praise the responsibility he is taking in this often panned sound-bite to take responsibility for making decisions.

Running programs for as long as I have, I think one of the traits in short supply is a willingness to make decisions. Organizational processes allow nearly anyone a clear path to kick the can down the road, and in my experience most people avail themselves of this option. More rare unfortunately, are people that have a bias to make a decision when it needs to be made.

An imperfect decision made now, may be better than the perfect decision made later.

Addendum March 11th 2020

The quote above was mine. Something I’ve never used with someone else but I stumbled upon a different but better version of it in the sci-fi series by James Corey in book 6 Babylon’s Ashes.

A decent idea now is way better than a brilliant plan when it’s too late

If I morph mine a little with Corey’s …

An imperfect decision made now, is better than the perfect one made too late.

  1. The 2nd Gulf War was a horrible decision with tragic consequences for millions. ↩