Quote Origin: A Mistake Is Just Another Way of Doing Things

Katharine Graham? Warren Bennis? Chris Hildyard? E. B. White? Luc de Clapiers? Anonymous?

Question for Quote Investigator: Making mistakes in life is inevitable. Thus, learning to respond resiliently to setbacks is essential. A healthy perspective is presented by the following adage:

A mistake is just another way of doing things.

This statement has been credited to Katharine Graham who was the publisher of “The Washington Post” newspaper and Warren Bennis who was a Professor of Business Administration. I have been unable to find a solid citation. Would you please help?

Reply from Quote Investigator: Warren Bennis conducted numerous interviews with talented leaders to identify principles and techniques employed by superior managers. Bennis and Burt Nanus co-authored the 1985 book “Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge”. The book described the adaptive responses of leaders confronting difficulties. Leaders were not discouraged and continued to focus their energies on accomplishment. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:[1]1986 (1985 Copyright), Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge by Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus, Chapter: Leading Others, Managing Yourself, Quote Page 69,  Perennial Library: Harper & Row, New … Continue reading

They simply don’t think about failure, don’t even use the word, relying on such synonyms as “mistake,” “glitch,” “bungle,” or countless others such as “false start,” “mess,” “hash,” “bollix,” “setback,” and “error.” Never failure.

One of them said during the course of an interview that “a mistake is just another way of doing things.” Another said, “If I have an art form of leadership, it is to make as many mistakes as quickly as I can in order to learn.”

The person delivering the quotation was not identified in the 1985 book; however, in 1994 Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith published a work titled “Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader”. This book ascribed the quotation to Katharine Graham:[2]1994, Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith, Chapter 1: Leadership for the 1990s and Beyond, Quote Page 6, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, … Continue reading

Most of the people Warren Bennis interviewed for On Becoming a Leader looked forward to mistakes because they felt that someone who had not made a mistake had not been trying hard enough. Norman Lear, writer-producer at CEO Act III Productions, put it this way: “Wherever I trip is where the treasure lies.” Katharine Graham, from the CEO Washington Post, said, “For me, a mistake is just another way of doing things.”

Additional details and citations are available in the article on the Medium platform which is located here.

Image Notes: Picture of an eraser from Hans at Pixabay. Image has been resized.

Acknowledgement: Great thanks to Lonneke Boels whose inquiry led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Boels noted that the quotation had been attributed to Katharine Graham and E. B. White.

 

References

References
1 1986 (1985 Copyright), Leaders: The Strategies for Taking Charge by Warren Bennis and Burt Nanus, Chapter: Leading Others, Managing Yourself, Quote Page 69,  Perennial Library: Harper & Row, New York. (Verified with scans)
2 1994, Learning to Lead: A Workbook On Becoming A Leader by Warren Bennis and Joan Goldsmith, Chapter 1: Leadership for the 1990s and Beyond, Quote Page 6, Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Reading, Massachusetts. (Verified with scans)

News Is What Somebody Does Not Want You To Print. All the Rest Is Advertising

George Orwell? Alfred Harmsworth? William Randolph Hearst? L. E. Edwardson? Robert W. Sawyer? Mark Rhea Byers? Brian R. Roberts? Malcolm Muggeridge? Katharine Graham? Lord Rothermere? Lord Northcliffe? Anonymous?

Dear Quote Investigator:  I have been trying to trace a popular saying about journalism which can be expressed in several ways. Here are four examples to show the core of the statement:

1) News is what somebody does not want you to print. All the rest is advertising.

2) News is something which somebody wants suppressed: all the rest is advertising

3) News is anything anybody wants to suppress; everything else is public relations.

4) Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed; everything else is public relations.

These remarks do differ, but I think it makes sense to group them all together. Press baron William Randolph Hearst and renowned author George Orwell have both been credited with originating this saying. Could you explore this topic?

Quote Investigator: The earliest strongly matching expression found by QI was published in 1918 in a New York periodical called “The Fourth Estate: A Newspaper for the Makers of Newspapers”. The words were printed on a sign at a journalist’s desk, and no precise attribution was given. Boldface has been added to excerpts:[1]1918 November 30, The Fourth Estate: A Newspaper for the Makers of Newspapers, (Filler item), Quote Page 18, Column 4, Publisher Ernest F, Birmingham, Fourth Estate Publishing Company, New York. … Continue reading

“Whatever a patron desires to get published is advertising; whatever he wants to keep out of the paper is news,” is the sentiment expressed in a little framed placard on the desk of L. E. Edwardson, day city editor of the Chicago Herald and Examiner.

In the following decades the saying evolved and instances were employed by or attributed to a wide variety of prominent news people including William Randolph Hearst, Alfred Harmsworth, Brian R. Roberts, and Katharine Graham.

This entry was improved with the help of top researcher Barry Popik who adroitly explored this topic and shared the results at his website “The Big Apple”.[2]Website: The Big Apple, Article title: “If you want something in the paper, that’s advertising; you want something kept out, that’s news”, Date on website: July 11, 2014, Website … Continue reading

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading News Is What Somebody Does Not Want You To Print. All the Rest Is Advertising

References

References
1 1918 November 30, The Fourth Estate: A Newspaper for the Makers of Newspapers, (Filler item), Quote Page 18, Column 4, Publisher Ernest F, Birmingham, Fourth Estate Publishing Company, New York. (Google Books Full View) link
2 Website: The Big Apple, Article title: “If you want something in the paper, that’s advertising; you want something kept out, that’s news”, Date on website: July 11, 2014, Website description: Etymological dictionary with more than 10,000 entries. (Accessed barrypopik on January 10, 2015) link

To Love What You Do and Feel That It Matters—How Could Anything Be More Fun?

Katharine Graham? Anonymous?

Dear Quote Investigator: I enjoy reading your website and refer to it frequently. I’ve been trying to ascertain the origin of the following:

To love what you do and feel that it matters, how could anything else be more fun?

This quote is all over the place credited to Katharine Graham, but I have found absolutely no source for it.

Quote Investigator: In October 1974 Ms. Magazine printed a profile of Katharine Graham by the journalist and biographer Jane Howard titled “The Power That Didn’t Corrupt”. At that time, Graham was Chairman of the Board of the Washington Post Company and also the publisher of the newspaper. She was quoted using a closely matching version of the expression above  without the word “else”:[1] 1974 October, Ms., Volume 3, Number 4, Katharine Graham: The Power That Didn’t Corrupt by Jane Howard, Start Page 47, Quote Page 124, Column 2, Ms. Magazine Corp., New York. (Verified on paper)

For myself, I’ve been lucky. It’s as I wrote to Bill and Betty Fulbright: ‘To love what you do and feel that it matters—how could anything be more fun?'”

Here are additional selected citations in chronological order.

Continue reading To Love What You Do and Feel That It Matters—How Could Anything Be More Fun?

References

References
1 1974 October, Ms., Volume 3, Number 4, Katharine Graham: The Power That Didn’t Corrupt by Jane Howard, Start Page 47, Quote Page 124, Column 2, Ms. Magazine Corp., New York. (Verified on paper)
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