Let’s stop thinking about business like it’s a war
You talk, you type, you stare into space. You drink coffee and somehow end up on the Daily Mail website but keep it a secret. Maybe you do all of this in your pyjamas sometimes.
It can be fun and rewarding, and other times it’s hard.
But it’s hardly the trenches, is it?
It was actually relatively recently, in the 1960s, that strategic planning first started becoming a thing. It’s pretty incredible to think how much of capitalism evolved without the need for strategy. Now don’t get me wrong, strategy is important, but the problem with “strategy” is that it’s a word that derives its origin from Sun Tzu’s ancient text The Art of War. Strategy consultants and business gurus LOVE The Art of War, and because the text itself is so old, this somehow deceives us into thinking that business has always been this way.
Thanks to these strategy gurus, war narratives dominate the language of business: we go on ‘retreats’ to talk about our ‘mission statements’, ‘touch base’ and ‘rally the troops’. We ‘take the flak’ or get ‘caught in the crossfire’ hoping that one day our strategy means we ‘make a killing’. Microsoft’s former CEO Steve Ballmer famously said, “I bleed Microsoft”, which sounds completely normal until you think about it for more than ten seconds and then realise it’s just absurd.
Yes, of course there’s competition, but so much more of what we all do at work is about how we co-operate, not how we compete. Business is a team sport, no matter how egotistical the founder or CEO. Even when we look at some of the world’s biggest brand rivalries — Microsoft vs Apple, Nike vs Adidas, McDonald's vs Burger King, Airbus vs Boing — the competitive edge pushes both companies to be better. They create the markets for each other — the rising tide raises all the boats.
Many of these relationships are often more complex than mere competition, too: we should remember that Apple probably wouldn’t exist today without Microsoft’s co-operation in the 80’s and 90’s. Charities compete for certain funds but form coalitions with these same competitors to secure government contracts. Small businesses or freelancers win business on their own terms but work as subcontractors for their larger competitors — often simultaneously.
What’s conveniently forgotten when people quote passages from The Art of War as business advice is that it’s not a manual for war at all. It’s a manual for peace. Michael Nylan is a translator who has studied and translated the classic text:
“The Art of War might as well be named The Art of Life, since it famously advises readers (originally all-powerful men at court) to avoid war, by any means, if possible, on the two cogent grounds that it is far too costly a substitute for diplomacy and long-term strategies, and that the outcome is never assured, given all the variables at play”.
There are other narratives that I think describe much more accurately the endeavours of most 21st-century work:
Business as science, where we follow a process of continuous improvement and advancement.
Business as art or creation, where we invent and conceive new ways to make people happy.
Business as service or contribution, where we devote our attention to someone else’s needs and help fulfil them.
Business as a game, where we try to better ourselves or be more ingenious than before.
Business as change, where we fix what’s wrong with the world.
So my question is a slightly abstract one:
“If we can agree that you’re not a soldier going to war in your pyjamas, then what does that allow you to become?”
