Thinking Is One Thing No One Has

You Are Always Too Late With A Development If You Are So Slow That People Demand It Before You Yourself Recognize It. The Research Department Should Have Foreseen What Was Necessary And Had It Ready To A Point Where People Never Knew They Wanted It Until It Was Made Available To Them.

Research Is Industrial Prospecting. The Oil Prospectors Use Every Scientific Means To Find New Paying Wells. Oil Is Found By Each One Of A Number Of Methods. My Own Group Of Men Are Prospecting In A Different Field, Using Every Possible Scientific Means. We Believe There Are Still Things Left To Be Discovered. We Have Only Stumbled Upon A Few Barrels Of Physical Laws From The Great Pool Of Knowledge. Some Day We Are Going To Hit A Gusher.

People Think Of The Inventor As A Screwball, But No One Ever Asks The Inventor What He Thinks Of Other People.

Bankers Regard Research As Most Dangerous A Thing That Makes Banking Hazardous Due To The Rapid Changes It Brings About In Industry.

When I Was Research Head Of General Motors And Wanted A Problem Solved, I'd Place A Table Outside The Meeting Room With A Sign: "leave Slide Rules Here." If I Didn't Do That, I'd Find Someone Reaching For His Slide Rule. Then He'd Be On His Feet Saying, "boss, You Can't Do It."