Sun Tzu's Warrior's Rules -- for Winning Productively

1. Positions and Opportunities > 3. Finding Opportunities > 2. Rival's Weaknesses

Which of the following best describes your competitive situation?

1. I have rivals who are much larger than I am.
   3.1 Strategic Economics

   3.1 Strategic Economics

   "Many advantages add up to victory.
   Few advantages add up to defeat."
   Sun Tzu's The Art of War 1:5:5-6

   Situation: 

   Sun Tzu's competitive strategy is based on simple economics. One of the most destructive human tendencies is our ability to mentally separate the advantages of a position from its disadvantages, its benefits from its costs. The wost aspect of this tendency making decision on the basis of benefits without concerning ourselves with costs. Sun Tzu uses positing to avoid wars of attrition because such wars are costly and "winning" does not assure a real pay-off. Decisions have consequences and all decisions have costs. Even deciding not to act has costs, the costs of missing opportunity. Experience has shown that the most costly decisions of all are those that focus on only benefits.

   
   

2. My competitors are not larger but are stronger than me in different ways .
   3.5 Strength and Weakness

   3.5 Strength and Weakness

   "You must adapt to opportunities and weaknesses."
   Sun Tzu's The Art of War 8:2:2
   

   Situation: 

   Strength draws our attention. We naturally focus on the strengths of others. One of the most common strategic mistakes is thinking that we have to duplicate the strengths of others in order to be competitive. Nothing is further from the truth. Though we are a thousand times more likely to hear about the strengths of others, especially our rivals, than we are their weaknesses, this doesn't mean that our success lies in copying them. That path only leads to duplication of effort and often to conflict as a test of similar relative strengths.

3. My competitors are not better, but people seem to think that they are better.
   3.6 Leveraging Subjectivity

   3.6 Leveraging Subjectivity

   "You can be as mysterious as the fog.
   You can strike like sounding thunder."
   Sun Tzu The Art of War 7:3:7-8
   

   Situation: 

   An opportunity requires two components: an opening in the environment and the resources to move into it. These resources take many different forms. A new job requires qualifications. A new business requires investment. The problem is that all resources are limited. Our resource limitations are especially a problem when we are first starting out, but, even as we advance, it always seems that each additional step forward always requires more resources than the last. The use of physical resources is like the use of force. The more force we use, the more resistance we meet.