Strategy and achievement

The late Professor John W. Tukey, when he was Chair of the Department of Statistics at Princeton University, summed up the strategic issues facing most organizations this way:

"People, researchers, companies and various other institutions usually make one of three kinds of error:

1. Cannot define the problem they need to solve in order to move forward.

2. Define the right problem but solve it too late.

3. Define and solve the wrong problem."

While this describes President Bush's administration all too well, it is not clear whether the Administration or Congress is more at fault. Unfortunately, even if President-elect Obama's administration turns out to be competent, it will be able to achieve little - at least in the long term - unless Congress can manage to prove Professor Tukey wrong.