The Dao of Leadership (2): Opposite Sides of an Implemented Decision

There are two sides to the matter of General Stanley McChrystal.

View #1: It is better to tell truth to the public

View #2: When you work for someone, it is better to keep the differences behind closed doors.

Whenever there are two opposing views between two strong egos, . There will be one outcome.

Retrospectively, is this the best way to exit?

Compass Rule: Keep private matters behind the closed doors of the back room.

Dao of Leadership (1): The Boss is Always Right

The real truth comes in unscripted moments. ... As one prominent strategist used to say, "Script everything. ..."

Q: Was this situation scripted?

The Art of the Focus (7): How Focused Are The People Around You?

Study your terrain and the people that are within it. Determine whether the implementers are able to properly lead or implement their strategy. Examine whether their range of staying focused on target is limited to 60 seconds or 90 minutes.

Without the skill and the endurance of staying focused, these attention-deficient people are not able to operate efficiently.

What are the odds of their projects ever finishing on time, on budget and on target?

Side note: Most Silicon Valley companies know that a project that properly meets on those three points is quite a challenge. One company usually rewards their employees when a minimum of two of those three objectives are met.

On another note, some of the so-called Sunzi experts (students) believe that this type of project management can be accomplished by finding the path of least resistance. Most of them have never done it from a ground level view. They always talk the game, but have no process of assessing, positioning and influencing..

More information on this topic, can be found in the following Nicholas Carr's articles: "Is Google Making Us Stupid?"; and The Web Shatters Focus, Rewires Brains, You can also check out his latest book The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains.

The Next Big Trend! (1): The Privatization of Law Enforcement

Here is a political economic problem that will affect many cities.

The privatization of law enforcement might be the solution.

This situation reminded us of the Robocop movie #1 , where cities hired private security companies to prevent crimes.

Due to the financial constraints that many cities (i.e., Oakland, Ca; Baltimore, Md; Detroit, Mi; etc) are facing, one should not be surprised if the privatization of law enforcement solution becomes a reality.

Pragmatic Practices (4): Reading Data

To compete effectively in this information economy, the successful strategist usually knows the proper approach for any given situation.

Having the ability to absorb information and then connecting it to the big picture are two of the many needed skills that propels him/her to make quick strategic decisions.

Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare (Military Methods)

Following is an article that one of our associates have written many years ago.
Source: http://www.jadedragon.com/archives/martarts/sunbin01.html

Read, review, reflect and comment.


Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare (Military Methods)
By M.E.H.

Someone recently asked me what other Asian strategy and leadership books have I read besides Sunzi (Sun Tzu) and Zhuge Liang. Well, there are so many good books out there that I can't stop naming them.

One classic "strategy" book that I do recommend that is sometimes overlooked by general readers of strategy and leadership is Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare.

Sun Bin was believed to be a direct descendant of the distinguished military theorist Sun Tzu (Sun Wu), who flourished during the mid-fourth century B.C. during China's Warring States era, a period of unprecedented violence. He was named Sun Bin in ancient historic books because he suffered corporal punishment, which is named Bin, a form of punishment in ancient China. (Depending on the romanization, Sun Bin is also spelled as Sun Pin.)

The Warring States era was a period "… where independent nation states attempted to annihilate each other through incessant and escalating battles, and military tactics increased exponentially in sophistication and brutality (especially with the development of new war technologies). During mid-fourth century B.C. in China, it was common to see 80,000 soldiers perishing in a single defeat." At the same time, these wars of appropriation reduced the number of states to a group of seven powerful states. For that era, warfare was increasingly a way of life as well as a way of death. This quality of influence is found throughout Sun Bin's book.

Sun Bin was considered by many scholars as one of the most outstanding military strategist after Sunzi.

In April 1972 a large number of bamboo strips were unearthed by chance in an archeological find from a western Han (206 BC - 25 AD) tomb at Yin-ch'üeh-shan (Silver Sparrow Mountain) in Linyi County, Shan-dong Province in China. (The strips were dated somewhere between 140 - 118 BC.) Among the strips were Sun Tzu: The Art of War and Sun Bin: Military Methods (also know as The Art of Warfare).

The simultaneous discovery of both works from the same tomb provided conclusive evidence that both Suns existed in history, and that each had written a thesis on military strategic affairs. A millennium-long dispute was thus settled. A descendant of Sunzi, Sun Bin, summed up the military experiences prior to and during the mid-Warring States period (475 BC - 221 BC) on the basis of inheriting and enhancing the military thinking of Sunzi.

Scholars who analyzed the book, found that it was either technically uncompleted or in the process of being finished. Regardless of the incompleteness, the Sun Bin book on military strategy is now recognized as one of the essential texts of classical Chinese military philosophy.

Biography
Sun Bin possessed exceptional talent even in his early years. There were stories of Sun Bin having the ability to recite Sun Tzu: The Art of War and other Chinese classics by verbatim. His genius was envied by a classmate, Pang Juan, who later became a strategic general in the state of Wei. Afterward, Pang Juan deceived Sun Bin into going to Wei country and then framed him for being a traitor. Sun Bin suffered the corporal punishment of having his kneecap chopped off and the Chinese character "Traitor" stamped on the side of his head.

With assistance, Sun Bin escaped from the grasp of Pang Juan to the State of Qi. Once Sun Bin arrived at the State of Qi, he was immediately nurtured back to health and later, based on his reputation for strategic thinking, appointed to be the principal military advisor to King Wei of the Qi State.

* FYI: There are many different stories of how he escaped from Pang Juan to the State of Qi—from faking insanity to feigning his death.

The state of Wei, which was seeking total control of China, sent an army to attack the state of Zhao under the leadership of Pang Juan. The ruler of Zhao immediately asked the ruler of the Qi state for military assistance. Sun Bin was assigned the task of saving the Zhao state. He then devised a scheme of relieving the besieged by besieging the base of the besiegers. After a long battle, the Wei army gave up attacking Zhao as expected and returned to their home state. The army of "Qi" then maneuvered ahead of them and laid an ambush on the way, inflicting a crushing defeat on the army of Wei.

The above picture is from Sun-bin. blogspot.com

The Redemption of Sun Bin
Before the final battle, Sun Bin gave the impression of "frailty and retreat," inducing his rival Pang Juan to pursue and attack.

"Thus one who is skillful at keeping the enemy on the move maintains deceitful appearances, according to which the enemy will act." --- Sunzi

Upon the arrival at a locale called Maling (Horse Trout Way), Pang Juan fell into an ambush laid by the army of Qi. The army of Wei was completely annihilated and Pang Juan committed suicide by cutting his throat.

Tai Gong's (a strategist who lived between the end of Shang Dynasty and the early part of the Chou Dynasty) comment: "Make a display of weakness and want."

While Tu Mu (a ninth-century commentator) said: "If our force happens to be superior to the enemy's, weakness may be simulated in order to lure him on; but if inferior, he must be led to believe that we are strong, in order that he may keep off. In fact, all the enemy's movements should be determined by the signs that we choose to give him."

The strategic lesson here is that Sun Bin created the bait based on a deceptive rumor that he knew his counterpart would pursue.

After this incident, it has been said that Sun Bin retired from warfare, devoted himself to the research of military science, and completed his brilliant book Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare (Military Methods). Many scholars consider it to be a brilliant elaboration and a good supplementary text to Sun Tzu: The Art of War.



This classical 16 chapters thesis inherits and advances the military thinking of Sun Pin's grandfather (or great grandfather), Sun Tzu (Sunzi), by covering his outlook on war, strategies and tactics, battle arrays, utilization of terrain, selection of qualified generals, and so on. He places heavy emphasis on being strategically and tactically agile when being involved in a macro-scale war. He integrates the military experiences prior to and during the mid-Warring States period (475 BC - 221 BC), with philosophy, purpose, military strategic approach, and reflections on the nature of human conflict. Sun Bin also contemplated such principal concepts as the consummate ruler, the importance of strategy and morale, and the advantages to be gained from adaptability, display, and discretion; yet these texts are clearly intended to be practical and to be used on the battlefield.

What I found interesting was that his military principles were more tactically focused than those of Sun Tzu's.

If the reader does not mind some incompleteness in its content, the mention of "Bronze-Age war chariots" and the "Chinese crossbow" snipers in a battle, this is an "above-average" book on competitive operational strategy.

Based on my analysis, Sun Bin was an extremely gifted strategist. His work gives the general reader a "thoughtful" insight into the psychological and practical workings of Sun Tzu's teachings. The general reader can appreciate from this work the subtle insights into the nature of human beings in certain crisis situations. It has been said that Sun Bin was a student of Wang Xu, another great military strategic thinker and writer from ancient China. Wang Xu is reputed to have produced one of the most sophisticated treatises on strategy, The Master of The Ghost Valley  (The Master of Demon Valley) .

I believed that the chapter "Defeating Pang Juan" can be described as the "grand" overview of Sun Bin's basic theory of strategic warfare. This generalization can be summarized with this perspective "To be victorious against the major opposition, one must possess the strong character of quietly maintaining the deceptive state of shaping and influencing the opposition by avoiding direct conflicts and confrontations until the primary weak point of their opposition is pinpointed. At that stage, he or she focuses on conquering the opposition via one major battle with great speed and precision amount of force." It is a standpoint that allows the "quietly smart and steady of this world" to succeed against the "Goliath."

The following is an outline of chapters found in Roger Ames' translation of Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare::

1. Capturing Pang Juan
2. An Audience with King Wei of Qi
3. The Questions of King Wei
4. T'ien Chi Inquiring About Battlefield Defenses
5. On Selecting the Troops
6. The Moon and Warfare
7. The Eightfold Division of Formations
8. Terrain as a Treasure
9. Preparing the Strategic Advantage
10. The Real Nature of Military
11. Carrying out the Selection of Personnel
12. Sacrifice in Battle
13. Raising and Keeping Morale High
14. Coordinating Military Assignments
15. The Five Kinds of Training Methods
16. Strengthening the Military
17. Ten Military Formations
18. Ten Questions
19. Overwhelming an Armed Infantry
20. The Position of Invader and Defender
21. The Expert Commander
22. Five Postures and Five Situations in which an Army Respects
23. Military Mistakes
24. The Rightness (yi) of the Commander
25. The Excellence (de) of the Commander
26. Fatal Weakness of the Commander
27. Fatal Mistakes of the Commander
28. Males and Females Fortifications
29. Five Considerations and Nine Objectives
30. Concentrated and Sparse Troops
31. Straightforward and Surprise Operations
32. Ten Advantages of Using Cavalry
33. Attacking the Heart and Mind
34. Fragments

Trivia
For a long time, people presumed Sunzi and Sun Bin were the same person. The household Chinese name, Sunzi, possess two different meanings. Besides referring to the great military strategist Sun Wu, it also refers to his descendant Sun Bin.

Sun Bin's perception of the consummate strategist can be described in this quote: "He who has mastered this art [of war] knows the way of heaven and earth, has the support of the populace, and is fully aware of the enemy situation. When he needs to determine his battle array, he knows how to set up the formations. He fights when there is assurance of victory. He stops fighting when there isn't. Such a commander is a general worthy of his sovereign. … For one who has really mastered the way of warfare, his enemy can do nothing to escape death."

Sun Bin's mentor Wang Xu was supposed to be the head of a relatively obscure Taoist school of thinking known as "Zongheng xue." This term can be translated as "the study of vertical and horizontal geographical patterns." It is a science of strategic diplomacy and statecraft that can be used in a rapidly changing world.

Summary
Sun Bin: The Art of Warfare shows Sun Bin to be both a pragmatic tactician and a philosopher. Not only does he discuss conflict and grand leadership as philosophical concepts, but also as practical matters, demonstrated by his battle-tested techniques. I can also say that this book is a metaphysical reminiscence of an ancient culture and deeply relevant to the contemporary concepts of strategy, authority, conflict, and leadership. The principles delineated from this work make it a strategy classic for all seasons. I believe this classic volume belongs in the libraries of all serious strategic readers.

Note: As a reminder to strategy novices, some of these military strategic principles can also apply to government, business, and social action.

As a reader, I also found Sun Bin's work to be a noteworthy key to understanding the physical and intellectual revolution that made such progress in the efficiency of warfare possible, though a portion of Sun Bin's work is missing. Whatever remains is still valuable to the reader. To some of my "overachieving" associates, Sun Bin is an inspirational character that rose from adversity to success with his tenacity and insightful wisdom.

Updated note

Click here for a more thorough reading on the practical application of the principles from Sun Bin's Military Methods.

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Assessing Tesla Motors (2)

All That Glitter is Not Gold

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Alpha Situation

• Tesla Motors is marketing a car that caters to the upper middle class.. Can they market cars that appeal to the masses?
• Some of our associates believed that this company might follow the route of Tucker Car Corporation and De Lorean Motor Corporation. If it does not generate a consistent stream of profit within five years, they expected Tesla to go into the abyss in silence.
• Two weeks after the IPO, who is ahead and who is behind?
• Does Tesla's vision matches the reality?

Benefits

• The possible patented battery technology
• Currently possesses an alliance w/ Toyota
• Secured an assortment of financial benefits with the U.S. government

Challenges

• Will Tesla have the professional and technical capability to manufacture a car to the masses?
• Will the masses accept an electric car as the norm for long range traveling?
• What are the possibilities that the battery price rises?
• Recharging the battery only increases the price of electric use.?
• What are the possibilities of the battery polluting the environment?
• What are the possibility of a newer car battery technology breakthrough that improves the traveling range of an electric car?
• What is the probable possibility of another car competitor learning more about their battery technology and improving it within 12-20 months.
• What is the long range possibility of Tesla becomes a part of Toyota?

Drawbacks

• Tesla's management team currently lacks the strategic experience of running an auto company from ground up, their operating costs will escalate.

Efficiency/Flexibility

• They will be learning how to efficiently manufacture cars from Toyota.
• If the Tesla's battery technology is the alpha technology for this moment, They have the option to sell their patented battery technology to their competitors and other industries.

Assessing Tesla Motors (1)

Strategy professionals usually assess a situation with a list of various strategic checkpoints. Some of our favorite checkpoints are: the competitive positioning of one's bearings, the advantage, the illusions and the reality.

Sometimes we focused on the challenge/achievement factor, the complexity factor, the risk factor (rewards/consequences) and the uncertainty factor.

We do not know how Tesla assessed their chances of succeeding.

When assessing, we usually connect a set of tangible numbers to each specifics behind the risk. We usually operate on the Compass Rule that the quantity of quality information determines the state of risk and the height of uncertainty is proportional to the amount of volatility.

The Generalities for Implementing a Military Offensive Siege

Our consulting group and some of our friends are "big" fans of historical movies with good strategic military scenarios. One movie that we found interesting is a 2008 Chinese movie "Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon."

Without getting into the specifics of this film, there was a scene where Zhuge Liang, (the military advisor of the Shu's empire) instructed Zhao Yun and his army of 999 solders on how to attack the Cao Cao's (the Wei empire) army of 10,000 solders.

Zhuge Liang presented the "big picture" that the enemy's troops had the advantage of the numbers and were preparing to attack Zhao's location, the next day. The wild card factor was that they were quite tired after a long march.

His strategic solution was consisted of the following sequence:

1. Attack the opposition first;
2. Use a platoon of 20 highly-skilled cavalry solders to initialize the first assault at the start of a new climatic change;
3. Cut down the enemy's flag as a signal for another attack (from a different angle);
4. Use a timing-based, multi-threading approach to attack the opposition from different angles; (side note: This "Chain Strategem" approach is straight from the Zhuge Liang's Thirty-Six Strategems Playbook. ); and
5. Maintain the strategic leverage through an onslaught of rapid motion during the flow of chaos.

Zhuge Liang predicted that the rain was coming at the start of midnight and that it would be perfect for . a raid. Zhao Yun and his troops decided to take the risk of implementing a surprise attack under the guise of a storm.

Following is a video that displayed the outcome of that strategy:

The ideal offensive assault usually have the elements of surprise, momentum and timing. It must be able to disrupt the initial momentum of the opposition with quickness, power and extreme prejudice . In most cases, the opposition's spirit would be devastated . ...

Side note: One must also remember that the execution of any plan is rarely 100% perfect. The success of any plan is depended greatly on many factors. When executing a plan, the amateur professionals occasionally strive for perfection. The successful professionals usually sets the standards of perfection while emphasizing on the practice of approximation. We will discuss more about this topic at a later time.

From watching this movie, one learns the following significant strategic points:

• The importance of knowing the configuration of the terrain, the number of people within your opposition and the physical state of the opposition (via. concealed intelligence gathering);
• The importance of searching for one significant strategic move (matching the approach, the resources and the team’s experience to the current circumstance) in order to finish a project;
• The importance of understanding that the scarcity of time and resources sometimes forces the underdog to sacrifice some things in order to achieve their higher objective;
• The importance of using the extremity of a situation to challenge the troops to "up their game."
• The best defense is a good offense;
• The approach of launching a surprise assault at the start of a new climatic change;
• The multi-pronged approach for shocking and awing the competition does work. if applied correctly;
• The use of the outcome of a relevant milestone as a signal to start another tactical ops; and
• The importance of maintaining the strategic power regardless of the change ("bian quan").

These above fundamentals are described in the "Sunzi's The Art of War" essay and other "Chinese strategic classics."

Whether one is running a marketing venture or a political campaign, one must need a good understanding of relevant strategic and tactical principles in order to succeed.

The next important point is having a strategic process that organizes your priorities, your approaches and your contingencies from a "top down" perspective. This unique strategic overview enables the reader to see everything in terms of the cycles, the terrain, the leadership, and the operational logistics. ... Does your company have a tool like that?

Following are some questions for you to think about:

• What is your definition of the big picture?
• Does the criteria of your "big" projects matches the current and the future state of the global big picture (Big Tangible Picture)?
• Does your team have the skill for organizing your "big" projects?
• Are the specifics of your strategic planning process based on your current strategic assessment?
• Are you still collecting and assessing data while you are planning or implementing your project?
• Does your plan connects to the bigger picture?

Another Day in the Global Economy

The following story is a good example of assess, position and implement.

These scammers assessed the global terrain until they were able to determine their competitive position within the entire configuration of the global terrain (from the bank to the various cyber offices). They positioned themselves by building a plan that focused on the prioritization of the various profit opportunities and the best timing points. These criminals implemented their plan through various cyber means. This enabled them to create illusions while concealing the reality.

In summary, this scam was very well-thought out and executed.

Interestingly, the crime reminded one of our associates of a 2008 crime movie named Chaos.

... Dekker finds from surveillance cameras in the assaulted bank that a director's computer had been used by the robbers. It turns out that they installed a virus to transfer one billion dollars to their accounts (less than 100 dollars from over 10 million accounts, so as not to rouse suspicions); this had not yet been noticed up till this point because one of the cameras (which are supposed to be focused at a fixed angle) is momentarily tilted down a little bit, which is visibly noticed during playback of the tapes. The author of the virus is identified as a programmer with criminal record, who is found dead at his home. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_(2006_film)