Soon after the election. Jack Kennedy called his closest advisers together in Palm Beach for a session on Cabinetmaking. His instructions were succinct: “I want to get the best men I can for these Cabinet jobs, and I don’t care if they are Democrats, Republicans or Igorots.” Kennedy’s lieutenants thereupon set forth on the great man hunt. It was a long, laborious and tedious process, checking out the past performances and future potentialities of dozens of men. There were grumblings that Kennedy was vacillating and taking a long time with the job.* But when he fed out the last of his Cabinet choices last week, there was widespread agreement that he had assembled some promising advisers and executives.
Source: Time Magazine article