Before the program manager can be worth anything to the team, he or she must be thoroughly disabused of the notion that he or she has any direct control. –Jim McCarthy…

— Steve McConnell, Rapid Development

Without suffering, what pleasure would there be in it—everything would turn into an endless prayer service: holy, but a bit dull.

— Fyodor Dostoevsky, Richard Pevear, and Larissa Volokhonsky, The Brothers Karamazov

I ask you to consider three medical miracles we take for granted: X-rays, cardiac catheterization, and general anesthesia. I contend all three would be stillborn if we tried to deliver them in 2005.

— Steven Pinker, Enlightenment Now

There is a point where cynicism is so high, no single first step will ever provide enough value to prove the project will work.

— Marianne Bellotti, Kill It With Fire

Kindly consider the question: what would your good do if evil did not exist, and what would the earth look like if shadows disappeared from it?

— Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita