Showing posts with label The Art of War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Art of War. Show all posts

Sunday, September 5, 2010

What advice would Sun Tzu give an audience of business leaders today?

I just finished the audiobook of Sun Tzu's classic "The Art of War". Sun Tzu clearly understood battle tactics, but I must say that the hundreds of times that I've heard this book referred to as a business strategy must read is total hype.

If you believe the hype that this book will reveal the secrets of a winning business plan, marketing strategy, salesforce motivational piece, and operational competitiveness...don't pay more than 4 bucks for it. It's a fine 1 hour listen. You can decide for yourself how best to adapt Sun Tzu's advice on where to camp relative to the sun, terrain, and weather conditions for your next corporate SWOT analysis.

There are clear key universal strategy mantras here (know your enemy, use randomness to fool your enemy and be less predictable, use your enemy's aggressiveness against them, etc).

For anyone interested in connection between military strategy and lessons that can be applied to life and business, I highly recommend the following:
  • Strategy by Lawrence Freedman is an outstanding history of military strategy
  • Innovation and Entrepreneurship by Peter Drucker is and will always be a timeless classic for business strategy including Drucker's example of the Civil War strategy of "Firstest with the Mostest" as an analogy to the first mover advantage in business

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