The Mission, the Men, and Me Quotes

“the human mind works in three elementary phases: saturate, incubate, and illuminate. Time allows us to saturate our mind with context, so we can incubate and spark the eureka moments of illumination that connect the dots, snap together patterns, and discover the options that allow us to find our paths.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“How do perfectly smart people make bad decisions? In an organizational context, it’s almost always the result of a lack of shared reality.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Think of developing the situation as enlightened procrastination. Instead of indecision, going off half-cocked, or doing nothing, we understand that time is an ally that allows us to actively build context and uncover the options hidden from those who create “traditional plans” based on limited information that’s frozen in the past—before most options and opportunities have availed themselves. Developing the situation treats life like a movie, not a snapshot.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Anyone can recognize a pattern; it’s having the courage of your convictions to act on it that matters. Audacity isn’t taking senseless risks, or being rash; it’s a natural by-product of confidence and knowledge, and I was supremely confident in my people and in how much we knew about what was going on around us.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“What is common sense? It’s knowledge of patterns—both conscious and unconscious.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“With all the latest whiz-bang technology and massive databases and communications pipes at their disposal, there was a constant self-generated pressure to put all the technology to good use, to do something. Unfortunately, that something was the unending creation of timelines, policies, and plans—the embalming fluid of organizational nimbleness.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Years earlier, while briefing Colin Powell on the missions we conducted in Colombia, I mentioned to him that we were successful because we were nimble. We didn’t ask anyone to approve our concepts; we moved first, and figured things out as we went along. Listening intently to the story, he smiled and reflected to me that good leaders don’t wait for official blessings to try things out. They use common sense to guide them because they understand a simple fact of life in most organizations: if you ask enough people for permission, you’ll inevitably find someone who believes that they should tell you no.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“The ultimate goal of this book is to share what I consider to be life-saving and life-changing lessons that I was fortunate enough to learn as a key participant in many of recent history’s most impactful events. The single most important lesson I learned, and the plain but powerful foundation that supports the entire book, is that the most effective weapon on any battlefield—whether it be combat, business, or life—is our mind’s ability to recognize life’s underlying patterns.

Patterns of thinking, patterns of nature, and patterns of history are just a few of the infinite examples of life’s underlying patterns that inform the behavior of the complex world that swirls around us. Patterns reveal how the real world works. When recognized, they allow us to understand, adapt, and master the future as it unfolds in front of us.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, the Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“One of the keys to survival in the wilderness is quality preparation. If you fail to prepare, you prepare to fail.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Whether in combat, business, or your personal life, to master any situation, no matter how complex; learn the lesson of Delta Force, of Lewis and Clark, and even John Walker Lindh: When in doubt, develop the situation!”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Don’t get treed by a chihuahua!” Before making mission-critical decisions, always ensure that you have context. It’s common sense.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Getting treed by a chihuahua is a metaphor for making decisions without context. Context is the reality of the situation around us. Without context, our minds have a tendency to take shortcuts and recognize patterns that aren’t really there; we connect the dots without collecting the dots first. Overreacting, underreacting, and failing to do anything at all are all symptoms of “getting treed.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“You have to take care of yourself, but you should only do so after you have taken care of the mission, and the men. Never put your own personal well-being, or advancement, ahead of the accomplishment of your mission and taking care of your men. . . .”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“understand the importance of looking at things as they are and not as they were”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, the Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“without the danger there cannot arise the opportunity.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“The acid test for guy-on-the-ground relevance is whether the individual possesses tacit knowledge, which is developed from direct experience and action in the actual environment. When it comes to tacit knowledge, it is generally true that the closer the person is to the environment, the more likely he or she is to possess tacit knowledge. However, when it comes to tacit knowledge, the word close does not solely connote distance. Close is a holistic concept that entails interaction, understanding, knowledge, and experience.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“To find the kinds of people with the type of on-the-ground knowledge that can enable us to understand and connect the dots, we have to imagine how to seek out and listen to them. It’s very rarely the self-styled expert or the academician, though both can make positive contributions to our knowledge base. Rather, it’s the person who has walked the specific ground, lived the specific lifestyle, and possesses a specific psychosocial mind-set whom we need.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Tacit knowledge is contextualized knowledge of people, places, ideas, and experiences. It involves knowing how to obtain desired endstates, knowing what to do to obtain them, and knowing when and where to act on them. It’s knowledge in practice that’s developed from direct experience and action, and usually is shared only through highly interactive conversation, storytelling, and shared experience.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Risk aversion and fear of the unknown are direct symptoms of a lack of context, and are the polar opposites of audacity.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Instead of focusing on the opportunity at hand, risk-averse leaders get treed by the potential risk, and fall victim to the greatest operational failure of all: the failure to try.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“It’s been said that there are no mistakes in life, only lessons. Every mistake is an opportunity to ensure that we never make it again, especially when future consequences can be much more dire.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“Although the Delta Force culture is one of quiet professionalism that values humility over self-aggrandizement, that same culture also instills an innate sense of responsibility to always strive to make a contribution to the greater good.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“The single best thinking and decision-making tool a leader has is to consistently conduct reality checks by asking a profoundly simple question: “What’s your recommendation?”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“General Hagenbeck then did something that should provide a salutary lesson for all future leaders in every profession: he changed his mind! He did this based on the reality-correcting context of the guy on the ground. Despite having stated his previous decision over a satellite radio heard by his superiors and subordinates all across the globe, General Hagenbeck pushed aside his ego and did the right thing. It would turn out to be the right decision for the mission, the right decision for his men, and the right decision for General Hagenbeck.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“By refocusing on the mission and the men, and leaving the me out of the equation, I was able to view the overall situation from an altitude that allowed me to understand the key underlying patterns through the unemotional lens of common sense. I vowed I wouldn’t waste another precious second worrying about why the commanding general disliked me, or whether he would relieve me from my command and destroy my career.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“1. Innovation: discovering innovative options instead of being forced to default to the status quo. 2. Adaptation: freedom of choice and flexibility to adapt to uncertainties instead of avoiding them because they weren’t part of the plan. 3. Audacity: having the audacity to seize opportunities, instead of neglecting them due to risk aversion and fear of the unknown.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“The question that high-ranking leaders always seemed to inject in any risk-averse-oriented discussion was, “Is it worth getting a man killed for?” Forty thousand people die on our highways each year, but when you get into your car each morning, do you ask yourself if driving to work is worth getting killed for? The main question that high-level leaders should ask is whether the mission is important to our country. If the answer is yes, then we in the Unit had no issues with laying our lives on the line to accomplish it. Could someone end up getting killed? You bet—we’re talking about combat. But we had no intention of ever letting that happen.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“In combat, when leaders make decisions without context, the cost is mission failure, and all too often, the price is paid with the blood of their men.”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander

“The power of the guiding principles shared in this book, such as “Always listen to the guy on the ground”; “When in doubt, develop the situation”; and “Don’t get treed by a Chihuahua”
― Pete Blaber, The Mission, The Men, and Me: Lessons from a Former Delta Force Commander