Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
It suggests the person is inactive or ineffective despite still being present.
In plain terms
He is still there but not doing anything useful.
What can you take from it?
Presence without action is often ineffective.

Where it applies

  • leadership critique
  • parliamentary context

Putting it to work

  • measuring impact over presence

Questions to consider

  • Are you active or just present?
  • When is doing nothing enough?

Another view

Some roles require quiet presence rather than visible action.

More from Paul Keating

  1. Hewson: I ask the Prime Minister: if you are so confident about your view of Fightback, why will you not call an early election? Keating: The answer is, mate, …

    Permalink to quote #33
  2. This is the sort of little-boy, stamp your foot stuff which comes from a financial yuppie when you shoe him into parliament.

    Permalink to quote #35
  3. An abacus gone feral.

    Permalink to quote #32

Related quotes

  1. What we have got is a dead carcass, swinging in the breeze, but nobody will cut it down to replace him.

    Paul KeatingPaul Keating quote #46
  2. Ladies and gentlemen, I came here to avoid as much as possible treading on your corns. I had intended to deal only with the basic issue of economics that dicta…

    Emma GoldmanEmma Goldman quote #1
  3. George W. Bush is a man who seems to be the center of his own universe. He seems to have learned little of human nature and even less of human history over his…

    Robert ByrdRobert Byrd quote #1