Daily Inspiration Quote by Stephen Ambrose

Power, Ambrose reminds us, is not a committee meeting. It has an address, a nameplate, and usually a gatekeeper. The line is bluntly transactional: talking to the second- or third-ranking executive might feel like progress, but it often produces the corporate equivalent of a memo to nowhere. Intent matters here. Ambrose isn’t praising hierarchy as much as warning against mistaking proximity to it for influence. “See” is the key verb: you can be granted face time, exchange polite assurances, even get sympathy - and still walk away empty because the person across the table can’t actually decide.

The subtext is a historian’s cynicism about institutions: organizations sell the appearance of access. Mid-level leaders are frequently deployed as shock absorbers, tasked with listening, managing expectations, and translating urgency into safe language. Ambrose implies you’re being managed, not heard. “Have to get through” frames the corporation as an obstacle course, not a relationship. It’s not networking; it’s penetration.

Contextually, Ambrose spent his career tracing how outcomes hinge on who holds authority at pivotal moments: generals who commit divisions, presidents who sign orders, executives who greenlight budgets. That sensibility turns into practical advice. If your goal is a decision - resources, policy, accountability - you need the person who can say yes, or at least the person who can’t plausibly say, “It wasn’t mine to decide.” The quote’s sting is its realism: in systems built to diffuse responsibility, only the top can concentrate it.