Don Rumsfeld polarizes.He's also the most intriguing systems guy to become Secretary of Defense since Robert McNamara (pre-revisionist) arrived from Ford. (same glasses too, although 40 years apart) Tom Barnett publishes an interview he did with Rumsfeld, who says contemptuously of the Military and Pentagon;”it was so clear that the Cold War was over, that we were in a new era. And technologies had advanced by leaps and bounds, and that the institution was still kind of industrial-age instead of information-age.”

Barnett used the interview for a long treatise in Esquire. Both are required reading. Especially for anyone  in big organizations say, like corporations, with goal and process issues.

Change doesn't come easily says Rumsfeld. It has to be driven, “..if you go down deep enough in this institution where nobody notices and nobody sees it and nobody understands it, and it's hard to figure out…..And you get those things going right, they're going to go on for a long time….But you can't do it superficially along the top. It just doesn't happen.”

Remember Rumsfeld's rules? Read Rumsfeld. He's clear.

The guys' insight on confronting, moving, adapting difficult, entrenched organizations is striking. He elevates flexibility as the key to success anywhere today. Rumsfeld has the brains, power and determination to actually effect lasting change in the Pentagon. (For better or worse!)  

Best of all. He's letting his ideas and reasoning all hang out. Judgment against Rumsfeld's own criteria will be easier than for any previous Secretary of Defense. That's a real step into a different world. 

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Posted in Government Main Page by Richard McKinnon No Comments Yet