Lessons from 'The Art of War' By Sun Tzu
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‘If a battle cannot be won, do not fight it.’ Pick your battles wisely. Not every conflict is worth turning into a major battle. Some battles cannot be won no matter how hard you work. It is important to not let your pride or anger cloud your thinking. As they say, the ultimate objective is to win the war, not each and every battle. Sometimes, it is important to simply move on, keeping the ultimate objective in mind.
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Know the cost of the project or task that you take on. Ts’ao Kung has the note, ‘He who wishes to fight must first count the cost’.
Sun Tzu says in the book:
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Win first, fight later
Sun Tzu said:
‘Every battle is won before it’s ever fought.’
First, you must come up with plans that will ensure victory and only then fight. If you don’t have a strategy to begin with, you won’t be able to win. In the game of Go, or even Chess, for example, the adept players typically think at least three steps ahead. They visualize in their head which move will lead to what outcome in three steps (or more), and play the movie which they believe will lead to the best possible outcome. Likewise, in the world of business, especially in technology, companies often spend a good amount of time validating the concept of the product before they actually try to build it. It is important to first know whether the product is worth building before investing the time and the resources to build it. Companies usually collect data, conduct analysis to come up with the monetary value of a business idea based on factors such as potential market size, market share, potential revenue per user etc. All successful companies follow this mantra. First they plan, research, and do their homework diligently. Once they know they have a successful product idea do they execute.
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Create a situation where failure isn’t even a possibility.
Sounds like something from Suits, doesn’t it? Well, it is!
Turns out Harvey’s original source was Sun Tzu afterall: