Richard Holbrooke Quotes

Credentials are critical if you want to do something professional. If you want to become a doctor or lawyer or teacher or professor, there is a credentialing process. But there are a lot of other things where it's not clear they're that important.

Study the field that you want to get into and know everything about it.

Every one of my opponents, every one of my critics, will tell you that I am a generalist spread far too thin in an age when this is not done anymore, when responsible knowledge is specialized knowledge.

I'm unqualified to do anything other than music.

I have never dealt with people who have so little political sagacity as the Turks.

There is something about the Foreign Service that takes the guts out of people.

Over the last 40 years, more U. S. ambassadors than generals have been killed in the line of duty. But unlike this country's military, the U. S. Foreign Service is maligned, undercut and underutilized.

A candidate’s command of foreign policy acts as a proxy for assessing broader leadership abilities.

No particular prior experience—not business or academia, or think tanks, or law—suggests that an individual will master the bureaucratic politics of Washington DC.

Sometimes the agency head is picked because he or she is thought to be an expert on the subject, but many times the President has no real idea of the content or policy implications of this expertise.

They want to send me abroad, as a Consul or a Minister …. Good knows, I am mean enough and lazy enough without being a foreign consul.

In the age of the specialist, the generalsit gets short shrift.

Americans must place greater emphasis on the more subtle dimensions of national power, such as innovation, education, the balance of force and diplomacy, and the quality of political leadership.

Donald Trump tells us that he is very, very smart. I'm afraid that when it comes to foreign policy, he is very, very not smart.

Donald Trump has put some professional people around himself. Experienced. Successful. I know a lot of people seem to think that success and experience are reasons you shouldn't serve in public office. But they are knowledgeable and smart, and they've been around the world.

Training, that's my specialty.

Clearly, the qualities Poles admire in a secretary of state - foreign languages, diplomatic experience, even sense of humor - are emphatically not those desired in a head of state: So be it.

I don't think that experience is a very useful or convincing attribute for a sensible foreign policy. Henry Kissinger had a lot of experience.

I could heartily wish that every commission officer was to be previously examined; for, to my certain knowledge, there are persons who have already crept into commission without abilities or fit qualification: I am myself far from desiring to be excused.

I think, at some point, all of us - I'm gonna speak personally, not for everybody else - you're gonna feel like a one-trick pony, and you might even be a one-trick pony. But at some point, if it's a really good trick, everybody's still gonna appreciate it.

The downside of dabbling in different industries is that you don't have your roots anywhere and you don't know where your real demand is.

The more you work and get known for something, sometimes things begin to narrow a bit, and your opportunities get more... specific.

There are not too many people who are polymathic these days.

Brexit is not only not just about left and right. Brexit is about expertise.

I've said many times that people are policy. And to be truly successful in any big organization you need to put people into jobs where they have relevant experience, relevant subject-matter expertise and the capacity to actually perform.