Strategic Management:

Competitive Strategy

The Art of War

Ancient (app. 500 B.C) Chinese Book by Sun Tzu on Strategy and Competition

"The difference between a warrior and an ordinary person is that the warrior sees everything as a challenge while an ordinary person sees everything as a blessing or a curse."  – Carlos Castaneda

2,500 Years Old, Still Young

"The Chinese classics were written in a very general universal style.  They were meant to be templates for life experiences – templates to be used by anyone, at any time, in any situation.  The written language of China lends itself well to this phenomenon.  Each character, or ideogram, is a multidimensional picture of an idea. Each can be looked at from a number of angles and experienced in a variety of ways.  This mutable quality in the written language somehow triggers responses that feel personal and timely."¹

The Sun Tzu's 'The Art of War' is one of the world's best books on strategy and competition.

It was written in app. 500 B.C. and established itself as the leading treatise on confronting and defeating opponents through superior strategy.

For over twenty-five hundred years, it helped its readers find competitive advantage using the secrets of Sun Tzu. Its competitive methods work extremely well. 'The Art of War', the first of the military classic, offers a distinct philosophy on how to discover the path to success. This philosophy works in any competitive environment where people find themselves contesting with one another for a specific goal.

It is a work of subtlety and paradox that shows how to succeed effortlessly in rising to life's challenges.  Sun Tzu believed that victory is won long before the confrontation and insisted that a skilled warrior can observe, calculate and outwit the adversary without ever engaging in battle.

Today, many leading business schools around the world teach their students how to create a competitive advantage by applying the methods of Sun Tzu. Sun Tzu's The Art of War provided a strong basis for the Positioning School of strategic management. This school was the dominant view of strategy formulation in the 1980's.

 Today's Success Story  Gary Gagliardy

Gary Gagliardy, America's leading authority on using Sun Tzu's methods in modern competition, writes: 'Before I discovered The Art of War, I tried starting two businesses. The first consumed money for almost two years before we closed it down. The second fell apart and was sold within a year. After I started studying and using Sun Tzu's methods, the next business that I started went on to become one of the Inc. 500 fastest growing privately owned businesses in America."

Excerpts from "The Art of War"

Going to War

You can fight a war for a long time or you can make your nation strong. You can't do both.

Field Position

Know your enemy and know yourself – your victory will be painless.

Know the weather and the field – your victory will be complete.

Types of Terrain

You don't know the local mountains, forests, hills and marshes? Then you cannot march the army. You don't have local guides? You won't get any of the benefits of the terrain.

Doing the right things at the start of war is like approaching a woman. Your enemy's men must open the door. After that, you should act like a streaking rabbit. The enemy will be unable to catch you.

Planning an Attack

The best policy is to attack while the enemy is still planning.

The next best is to disrupt alliances... More

Weakness and Strength

When you form your strategy, know the strengths and weaknesses of your plan.

When you execute, know how to manage both action and inaction.

When you take a position, know the deadly and the winning grounds.

When you battle, know when you have too many of too few men... More

Armed Conflict

Seeking armed conflict can be disastrous. Because of this, a detour can be the shortest path. Because of this, problems can become opportunities. Use an indirect route as your highway. Use the search for advantage to guide you. You must know the detour that most directly accomplishes your plan.

Do not let any of your potential enemies know of what you are planning.

Still, you must not hesitate to form alliances.

You must know the lay of the land. You must know where the obstructions are. You must know where the marshes are. If you don't, you cannot move the army.

You must use local guides. If you don't, you can't take advantage of the terrain.

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