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Four Keys to Strategy

Submitted by Robert on Thu, 2012-05-17 13:32

 

Recently I co-facilitated a three-day strategy retreat with a 80 managers representing 15 business units of a multinational corporation, all of which operate in complex and murky competitive spaces. As we progressed through the three days, these managers really understood four key themes of what I might call strategic literacy: the importance of knowing, legal poaching, getting to the battlefield first, and finding places of overriding advantage.

Mismeasuring Sun Tzu

Submitted by Robert on Mon, 2011-11-14 20:07

[This article was adapted from one that first appeared in the Oxford Leadership Journal in December 2009.]

The fifth-century BCE text The Art of War attributed to Sun Tzu is perhaps the world’s most famous manual on strategy. It is a classic military text in its own right, and its sparse and evocative language has also captured the interest of many non-military people – people who are wrestling with conflict or chaos or who seek strategic advantage in the midst of uncertainty. Some people and websites put forth excerpts from The Art of War as solutions to your business, marketing and strategic dilemmas, and those people and websites will explain the deeper meaning of the text to you … oftentimes for a fee.

And truth be told, the most common experience of The Art of War is perplexity: Is our competition for market share really like an ancient battle? Are the branch managers really “feudal lords” who would “ride one’s distress” given half a chance? Is my relationship to my boss like the relationship of general to sovereign? And where, exactly, in this text will I find the right advice for my current dilemma?

The Art of War is a profound text, and as such, it does not surrender its wisdom easily. Without doubt, it does have application beyond the military sphere. In this article, I will show four of the most common misunderstandings the Sun Tzu text – and suggest more promising alternatives.

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