Stephen Bungay Quotes

#1. We are extraordinarily reluctant to admit that luck plays a part in business success.

Stephen Bungay

#2. Do not try to predict the effects your actions will have, because you can't. Instead, encourage people to adapt their actions to realize the overall intention as they observe what is actually happening. Give them boundaries which are broad enough to take decisions for themselves and act on them.

Stephen Bungay

#3. What matters about creating alignment around a strategy is not the volume of communication, but its quality and precision.

Stephen Bungay

#4. If Clausewitz is right, no one should develop a strategy without taking into account the effects of organizational friction. Yet we continue to be surprised and frustrated when it manifests itself. We tend to think everything has gone wrong when in fact everything has gone normally.

Stephen Bungay

#5. Understanding gets compliance. Only belief gets commitment.

Stephen Bungay

#6. What cannot be made simple cannot be made clear and what is not clear will not get done.

Stephen Bungay

#7. Sins of omission should be regarded as far more serious than sins of commission,

Stephen Bungay