Norman R. Augustine - Augustine's Laws (1986)

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Law Number II: If today were half as good as tomorrow is supposed to be, it would probably be twice as good as yesterday was.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXII: If stock market experts were so expert, they would be buying stock, not selling advice.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number VI: A hungry dog hunts best. A hungrier dog hunts even better.

Norman R. Augustine
One of the most feared expressions in modern times is 'The computer is down.'

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number X: Bulls do not win bullfights; people do. People do not win people fights; lawyers do.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XLIII: Hardware works best when it matters the least.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XVII: Software is like entropy. It is difficult to grasp, weighs nothing, and obeys the Second Law of Thermodynamics; i.e., it always increases.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XLIX: Regulations grow at the same rate as weeds.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number I: The best way to make a silk purse from a sow's ear is to begin with a silk sow. The same is true of money.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XX: In any given year, Congress will appropriate the amount of funding approved the prior year plus three-fourths of whatever change the administration requests, minus 4-percent tax.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XLVIII: The more time you spend talking about what you have been doing, the less time you have to spend doing what you have been talking about. Eventually, you spend more and more time talking about less and less until finally you spend all your time talking about nothing.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXVI: If a sufficient number of management layers are superimposed on each other, it can be assured that disaster is not left to chance.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXXIII: Fools rush in where incumbents fear to tread.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XLVII: Two-thirds of the Earth's surface is covered with water. The other third is covered with auditors from headquarters.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number L: The average regulation has a life span one-fifth as long as a chimpanzee's and one-tenth as long as a human's, but four times as long as the official's who created it.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXVII: Rank does not intimidate hardware. Neither does the lack of rank.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXV: A revised schedule is to business what a new season is to an athlete or a new canvas to an artist.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number VIII: The most unsuccessful four years in the education of a cost-estimator is fifth grade arithmetic.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXIII: Any task can be completed in only one-third more time than is currently estimated.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number IV: If you can afford to advertise, you don't need to.

Norman R. Augustine
A recent government publication on the marketing of cabbage contains, according to one report, 26,941 words. It is noteworthy in this regard that the Gettysburg Address contains a mere 279 words while the Lord's Prayer comprises but 67.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXXIV: The process of competitively selecting contractors to perform work is based on a system of rewards and penalties, all distributed randomly.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XLIV: Aircraft flight in the 21st century will always be in a westerly direction, preferably supersonic, crossing time zones to provide the additional hours needed to fix the broken electronics.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XIV: After the year 2015, there will be no airplane crashes. There will be no takeoffs either, because electronics will occupy 100 percent of every airplane's weight.

Norman R. Augustine
Law Number XXIX: Executives who do not produce successful results hold on to their jobs only about five years. Those who produce effective results hang on about half a decade.

Norman R. Augustine