The Answer (1)

Q: So, do you know what specifics constitute one competitor to be one or two moves ahead or behind their competition?

A: The answer is in the Sunzi's  Art of War
" ... If I know my team can attack, but do not know the competition cannot be attacked, it is only halfway to victory. If I know the competition can be attacked, but do not realize our team cannot attack, it is only halfway to victory. Knowing that the competition can be attacked, and knowing that our army can attack, but not knowing the terrain is not suitable for combat, is only halfway to victory. Thus one who truly knows the army will never be deluded when he moves, never be impoverished when initiating an action.

Thus it is said if you know them and know yourself, your victory will not be imperiled. If you know Heaven and Earth, your victory can be complete. ... " 

- Paraphrased from Sun Tzu's Art of War 10 (Sawyer's translation)

This is one's approach for staying one to two steps ahead of the competition. 

Compass Rule

If you are able to anticipate two steps ahead of your customers and/or your competition, implement a move that offers a half step advantage.

New Question:

Why would any successful strategist make a strategic move that offers the advantage of being an half step ahead?  

Ask your local Art of War (AoW) strategy expert if he or she knows the answer.  If you look at your copy of the Seven Strategy Classics and the other arcane classics, you might get the right answer. 

Side Notes

Scene from White Vengeance

Applying the essence of the strategy classics to real life is the "grand" holy grail of the strategy game.  Combining it with the metaphor of Weiqi (Go) is one of the many goals of some competitively-driven strategists    ...  (There is a psychological flaw to this perspective.  Do you know what it is?) Those who have seen the White Vengeance movie and are quite detail-driven, can identify certain strategic and tactical concepts that were being tactfully applied throughout the story.   

A Side Project Postponed
Many years ago, a project team member wrote an essay that depicts the parallels and the non-parallels between weiqi and the Art of War.  ... Due to the constant piracy of researched material, he decided not to publish it.  ...  When there is time, we might post various bits and pieces of this essay on our blog.   ...  

Fwiw, the weiqi metaphor is constantly used by the various Asian companies. 

The Jiang Tai Gong's View
In China, Jiang Tai Gong book "Six Secret Teachings" is considered to be the "go-to" book for the Big Picture strategic thinkers and operational implementers.

This manuscript emphasizes "the importance of protecting one's advantage" regardless of the situation.

King Wen asked Tai Gong:"How does one preserve the state's territory?"

Tai Gong said: "Do not estrange your relatives. Do not neglect the masses. Be concillatory and solicitous towards nearby states and control all that is under you. Do not loan the authority of state to other men. If you loan the authority of state to other men, then you will lose your authority. Do not hurt those of lower position to benefit those of higher position. Do not abandon the fundamental to save those that are inconsequential.

When the sun is at midday, you should dry things. If you grasp a knife, you must cut. If you hold an axe, you must attack."

"If at the height of the day, you do not dry things in the sun, this is termed losing the opportunity.

If you grasp a knife but do not cut anything, you will lose the moment for profits. If you hold an axe and do not attack, enemies will attack instead."

"If trickling streams are not blocked, they will become great rivers. If you do not extinguish the smallest flames, there is nothing much you can do when it turns into great flames.

If you do not eliminate the two-leaf sapling, you might have to use the axe to remove it in future." "For this reason, the ruler must focus on developing wealth within his state. Without material wealth, he has nothing with which to spread beneficence or to bring his relatives together.

If he estranges his relatives it will be harmful. If he loses the common people, he will be defeated. "

"Do not loan sharp weapons to other men. If you loan sharp weapons to other men, you will be hurt by them and will not live out your allotted span of years."

King Wen said:"What do you mean by benevolence and righteousness?"

Tai Gong replied: "Respect the common people, unite your relatives. If you respect the common people, they will be in harmony. And if you unite your relatives, they will be happy. This is the way to implement the essential cords of benevolence and righteousness."

"Do not allow other men to snatch away your awesomeness.Rely on your wisdom, follow the norm. Those that submit and accord with you, treat them generously and virtuously. Those that oppose you, break with force. If you respect the people and trust, the state will be peaceful and populace submissive." - T’ai Kung Liu-t’ao (Six Secret Teachings)

More on this topic can be found in the Seven Military Classics of Ancient China.

Compass View

• Never allow your competition to use your strategic advantage against you.

A Movie Suggestion for the Desktop Strategist

If you are searching for a movie where the strategic concepts and tactical principles of Sunzi, Jiang Tai Gong and Wuzi are featured in an understated way, check out White Vengeance .  


The historical role of Zhang Liang  was also featured in this movie. 


Some of the script's historical content were slightly incorrect.  The English subtitles could have been better.  But, who cares?  ...  It was produced to entertain the mind.  ... If you are a hard core strategist who enjoys the process of subtle mindgaming (that is between the two chief strategists of the two protagonists),  we believed that this movie will meet your standard.


Side note 
Some of our project team members reminded us that the metaphor of weiqi (Go) was also featured throughout the storyline. 


Those who are proficient in the understanding of the Art of War (AoW) and the game of Weiqi, will see the obvious connectivity between those two metaphors. They will understand some of the basics for reading the Big Tangible Picture (BTP).

Our Compass Toolbox

Following is an abridged list of the various tools that we have used for our myriad of strategic development activities:

• a compass;

• a chronograph;

• a scripting kit (The Compass Script);

• a mindmap;

• a weiqi (Go) game set;

• a chess game set;

• a whiteboard; and 

• Our Compass Process. 

Summary
A strategist who succeeds with a geometric strategic process and a set of basic tools, usually becomes more effectively with the latest high-tech information systems. ... Those who connect to the Big Tangible Picture (BTP) regardless of their tool set, will possess a slight advantage for a minimum timeline.

Q: What tools are currently sitting inside of your toolbox?

Side note #1: Our strategic process model is based on a hierarchical order of specific principles from the Seven Strategy Classics, Military Methods and other unique strategic essays. 

The Three Questions of the Day

wikimedia.org

Q:  What are the keys to integrating the principles from the Chinese eight military (strategy) classics, the strategies of Go (weiqi)  and the theory of optimization? 


Q:  Are you able to integrate the principles from the Chinese eight military (strategy) classics, the strategies of Go (weiqi)  and the theory of optimization into one neat strategic framework?


Q:  What situation influences a strategist to apply this unique process?

The Two Questions of the Day

What specific strategic situation enables one to predict a minimum of two moves ahead of their competition?

What specific strategic situation enables one to implement a strategic move that offers a "half step" advantage?

Hint: The answer could be in your copy of the Seven Military Classics of Ancient China.

By recognizing the patterns within the situation and the connecting of the dots, one has a better chance to secure the strategic power.

The Question of the Day

For the hardcore strategists, are you able to connect the AoW principles to the conceptual framework of Weiqi and the situational framework of the 36 stratagems?

When one can do that, he/she can see the possibility of utilizing their Big Tangible Picture (BTP) in an effective mode.

The Question of the Day

Do you know how to connect the Art of War principles to the game of Go (weiqi)?

Ask your "local" Sunzi reader/expert if he/she knows how to do it.

If you want to learn how to strategize and operate in a multi-front situation, we recommended that you learn how to play this game. While it takes eight to ten minutes to learn the basics, you would need a lifetime to master the scheme.

So, do you have the time to learn the game and master it?

For advanced strategic thinkers, there is a way to apply the 36 Stratagems to the game of GO. Whether he or she has the time to learn it, is a different story.

Competing in the Global Economy: Stopping the Pacesetter

The Economist

So how does one stop a pacesetter who is quite ahead of the game?

"If one is behind, use the yin tactics.

If one is ahead, use the yang tactics. "

- The Seven Military Classics of Ancient China

In terms of weiqi (GO), this pacesetter is more than a few stones ahead of their competition. The configuration behind their macro approach can be found in this basic list of weiqi (Go) strategies.

By understanding the metaphor that the Pacesetter is using, these competitors could be able to determine how he makes his decisions.

(wikimedia.org)

Before an underdog competes against the favored, he or she must understand the configuration of their Big Tangible Picture (BTP).

Following is a generalized list of those things that one must focus on:

• the informational flow of one's grand terrain and beyond;
• the influence of the chief decision makers;
• the belief of the chief decision makers; and
• the judgement of the chief decision makers.

In your case, do you know the configuration?

The Process

The initial steps are:

• Knowing the truth of one's Big Tangible Picture is the first step; and
• Perceiving the hard and soft circumstances that lie within it.

Utilization of those two steps usually improves the possibility of prevailing over the competition.

The ideal process is to implement a strategic solution that requires no obvious effort.

Notes from the Compass Desk

Unlike what the amateurs preached to the masses, the favored does not walk around with a copy of the Art of War in their hand. They lead by example through the action of internalizing their understanding of the various strategic classics by operating beyond its format. It has been rumored that these chief decision makers followed the strategic views of Jiang Tai Gong and Wuzi's. Some of our associates preferred to carry a copy of WSJ or NYT.

To play against the favored, one must quietly "talk the walk" and "walk the talk. "

Read the Big Tangible Picture before deciding. Focus on making a progression of good decisions. So, good things will happen.

So how does the favored internalizes the strategic principles? We would only presumed that they usually talk about it with their respected peers and practice this arcane skill in their close quarters. It is rarely spoken out in the public.

Defining the Macro Compass Rules

From the game of Go, one learns that there is a set of universal rules that cross the various competitive arenas. If one spends some time, playing this game and becomes mindfully aware of the many events around him or her. One becomes more alert to the Big Tangible Picture (BTP) that is around him or her.

1. The Dao is Everything.

There is a way (or an order) in every activity or setting. Knowing the macro sequence (and the micro connections) between each realm, usually offered one's the insight of what is the way.

2. The Sequence is Everything

For every way there are many sequences. Understanding the macro order (and the micro orders) within each sequence. One learns how it works

3. The Timing is Everything

Once the Dao and the sequence have been comprehended, one's must be able to time their actions to the situation.  Getting the feeling of timing is about cultivating one's sense of awareness.

How do these three rules fit into the topic of strategic assessment process? Knowing how things work and how it connects to other things, usually enable anyone to properly assess the Big Tangible Picture. The challenge is to take the time and the effort to do it properly.

Your Game

How do you plan your strategy? Have you ever assessed your target and its surroundings?

In any relevant competitive analysis checklist, the professionals usually focus on the following points: the extensiveness of their competition; their size; their strength; their location; their capabilities and the intentions of the target.

Do you do that?

Most people preferred not to operate with this amount of details. It usually confuses them. They preferred to teach and preach the art of inspiring leadership and hoped that things will work itself out regardless of their situation.

The Simplicity of Our Process

Know the Dao. Understand the sequence. Pinpoint the timing points. Only then one can successfully assesses anything. That is all one has to do.

Does your project team performed the above steps?

Assessing Robert James Fischer

source: Wikipedia.org

(minor update on o1.21.16)

Someone sent us a note on HBO's documentary on Robert James Fischer (aka Bobby Fischer) and asked us to assess his chess playing style.

Abstract
We spent some time studying some of Fischer's key games and also talked to a few advanced chess players.

Following is an abridged list of questions that we have focused on:

1. What was Fischer's approach for pursuing the path of least resistance?
2. What were Fischer's favorite and least -favorite game situations?
3. What were Fischer's competitive habits and tendencies?
4. Was Fischer always decisive in his implementation?
5. How did Fischer shaped and staged his game and the competition's own game before the actual game begins?

After a week of research and analysis, we concluded this mini-project with a quick summation on Bobby Fischer's chess playing style.

Side note: Our current set of priorities prevented us from performing a very deep analysis of Fischer's process of chess playing.

Always Play to Win

When playing white, Fischer has always played aggressively by controlling the center. It presented him the one move advantage. The one move advantage enabled him to set the pace of the game. Forcing his opponent to becoming reactive.

His next strategic step was to target his attention toward the location of the challenger's king. Strategically, his grand objective was to force the challenger to play catch up throughout the game.

As black, Fischer chose aggressive defenses. By constantly matching the opposition's moves with an incremental set of counter-offensive moves, the weaker opposition would somehow err. Early control of the tempo and the space of the game board allowed him to frequently forced the opposition into playing his game.

The Opening Game: Seize the Center

Fischer have always played chess openings that enabled him to immediately target the control of the center. As white, he usually played e4 as his first move. It frequently limited the opposition to a lower number of defensive openings and options. In some instances, the competition were not prepared to play these openings or new variations within those openings.

When playing against black e5, Fischer usually chose the aggressive Ruy Lopez opening. He occasionally surprised the challenger by playing the King Gambit and some of the various non-white king pawn openings (i.e., the English Opening, the Larson-Nimzovitch Attack, some variations of the King Indian Attack, etc.)

Assessing Fischer's Game Playing by Analyzing the Patterns and the Variations

Fischer has always played chess openings that were indirectly connected by certain patterns and variations.

His opening choices sometimes utilized the financhetto type of attack (i.e., the King Indian Attack, the English Opening with the King Indian Attack variation, the King's Indian-Grunfeld complex against the White's queen pawn opening, etc.)

As black, Fischer has never competitively played the Sicilian Dragon and the French Defense.These openings contradicted his philosophy of constantly attacking the opposition and being one tempo ahead of the opposition. From personal experience, it is never fun to play from a cramped position while being one tempo behind. 

Lesson: Always be ahead in time and space.

This unique level of specialization allowed him to quickly implement his mode of attack.

Another strategic habit of Fischer was to play the various theoretical variations that were only predictable to him. It usually lead to the innumerable quantity of chess positions that he was proficient at.  It also lead to him having the strategic advantage of tempo and territory.

 The quality of the game competition also determined his choice of chess openings.

A Few Specific Tendencies
In the opening stage of any tournament games, Fischer  has never played the same chess variation twice until his 1972 championship match against Boris Spassky.

His choice of openings and tactical variation enabled him to secure the advantage of time and space. This forced his competition to play reactive defense.

The BC4 Option

We have also noticed his tendency (as white) to use some variations of the Bc4 tactic to attack the competitor who regularly castled to the king's side of the board. (The end point of this intent was to target the F7 pawn, ...) Historically, Fischer implemented variations of this tactic in some of his other games (i.e., Ruy Lopez-based openings and games against the Sicilian defense and the Caro-Kann defense, etc., . ...)   This repeated tactic has always influenced his opponent to play "catch up" defense.

Securing the Advantage in the Open  Game

In open positional games, the exploitation of his bishops was always in play. ... He was also a master of integrating the rook, the bishop and the pawns as a pressing influence in certain endgame situations.

Playing the Middle Game

In planning, never a useless move. In strategy, no step is in vain, - Chen Hao

Whenever the initiative of being one move ahead and the control of territory were established, Fisher usually executed offensive moves that displayed the perspective of "multiple threats" while creating (or exploiting) new tactical imbalance scenarios against his opponents. This type of pressure usually influenced the opposition into a passive state or a poorly made decision. He also effectively integrated the concept of technical mismatching and the concept of positional mismatching for certain strategic positions.

This level of strategic power gave Fischer a setting of concealed predictability. It also limited his opponent to a certain number of options.

Ruminations From the Compass Desk

During our research, we began to appreciate his brilliance. Bobby Fischer had the gift of focusing on the objective while quietly minding the rest of his settings. ... While others were deciding on what was the current move, he has already anticipated the opposition's next move and began to focus on the next set of moves.

Regardless of his alleged acts of paranoia and madness, Fischer was a strategic genius in his own metaphor. He seized his opportunity cycle and made the most of it. ... Like most brilliant people, Fischer never saw the conclusion of his own cycle especially when the starting cycle of a larger variable has concluded it.

Interestingly, we have seen that some of the most serious strategic chess players have occasionally ventured onto the game of Go (weiqi) and rarely leave that game.

The Compass Principle: 
Mastering a board game does not mean that one can master the game of life.

Final Thoughts

In the information economy, each and every business competitor has a set of individual tendencies. By properly assessing the strategic foundation and their utilization of their strategic power, one could neutralize the potency of their targeted competitor with a balance of finesse and force.

It is quite significant for one to understand that the defining the overall goal would always sound more simpler than the planning and the implementation of the approach. There are always more people who enjoyed the process of improvising than the process of planning and preparing for the on-coming situation.

Knowing the projected outcome of anything is for the amateurish observers. They strived on knowing the rules and the simplified comprehension of a situation while the successful strategists preferred to focus some of their time and their effort on comprehending the strategic reasoning and the process of the targeted competitor.

We will post an item on the strategic distinction between weiqi (Go) strategists and chess strategists In a future post .

Side Notes: The Compass Thoughts

Q: What is your approach to assessing your competition?

Q: What aspect of the competition's strategic foundation do you focus on?

Q: Are you able to transfer your assessment to your strategic plan?

# # #

A Macro Approach of Strategic Implementation (1)

About three to five years ago, we heard about a major dilemma where a grand organization (Competitor A) was being outmaneuvered in the global marketplace by an upstart rival (Competitor B). This upstart was utilizing a combinational approach of the various strategic principles (from the Art of War and other strategic classics) and the "GO (weiqi) game" approach of encircling their opposition in their various business ventures.

Macro economic numbers tell us that the winning streak  of the Competitor B has been extended. We presumed that they are continually using this unique strategic approach.

We will comment on this topic later next year.

The Dao of Strategy: Making Decisions

What principles of Go (weiqi) can one apply to their business strategy approach?

Following are some of our favorite re-paraphrased principles:

• Recognizing the configuration of the terrain, the state of the situation and the competitors within it;
• Comprehending the configuration of informational flow that occurs in one's grand terrain;
• Knowing the reasons behind the direct and indirect influences within the grand terrain; and
• Realizing who is adjusting, who is standing their ground and their reasons behind it.

The strategic advantage is knowing the current actions within the terrain, the process behind it and the rationale behind it.

With the proper assessment, you can make the easy decisions for maximizing your profits and minimizing your costs.

#

Humans No Match for Go Bot Overlords
By Brandon Keim

For the last two decades, human cognitive superiority had a distinctive sound: the soft click of stones placed on a wooden Go board. But once again, artificial intelligence is asserting its domination over gray matter.

Just a few years ago, the best Go programs were routinely beaten by skilled children, even when given a head start.Artificial intelligence researchers routinely said that computers capable of beating our best were literally unthinkable. And so it was. Until now.

"It's a silly human conceit that such a domain would exist, that there's something only we can figure out with our wetware brains," said David Doshay, a University of California at Santa Cruz computer scientist. "Because at the same time, another set of humans is just as busily saying, 'Yes, but we can knock this problem into another domain, and solve it using these machines.'"

In February, at the Taiwan Open — Go's popularity in East Asia roughly compares to America's enthusiasm for golf — a program called MoGo beat two professionals. At an exhibition in Chicago, the Many Faces program beat another pro. The programs still had a head start, but the trend is clear.

Arrayed by opposing players trying to capture space on its lined 19x19 grid, the black and white Go stones can end a game in 10171 possible ways — about 1081 times more configurations than there are elementary particles in the known universe.

Faced with such extraordinary complexity, our brains somehow find a path, navigating the possibilities using mechanisms only dimly understood by science. Both of the programs that have recently defeated humans used variations on mathematical techniques originally developed by Manhattan Project physicists to coax order from pure randomness.

Called the Monte Carlo method, it has driven computer programs to defeat ranking human players six times in the last year. That's a far cry from chess, the previous benchmark of human cognitive prowess, in which Deep Blue played Garry Kasparov to a panicked defeat in 1997, and Deep Fritz trounced Vladimir Kramnik in 2006. To continue the golf analogy, computer Go programs beat the equivalents of Chris Couch rather than Tiger Woods, and had a multi-stroke handicap. But even six victories was inconceivable not too long ago, and programmers say it won't be long before computer domination is complete.

There is, however, an asterisk to the programs' triumphs. Compared to the probabilistic foresight of our own efficiently configured biological processor — sporting 1015 neural connections, capable of 1016 calculations per second, times two — computer Go programs are inelegant. They rely on what Deep Blue designer Feng-Hsiung Hsu called the "substitution of search for judgment." They crunch numbers.

"People hoped that if we had a strong Go program, it would teach us how our minds work. But that's not the case," said Bob Hearn, a Dartmouth College artificial intelligence programmer. "We just threw brute force at a program we thought required intellect."

If only we knew what our own brains were doing.

Inasmuch as human Go prowess is understood, it's explained in terms of pattern recognition and intuition. "When there are groups of stones arranged in certain ways, you can build visual analogies that work very well. You can think, 'This configuration radiates influence to that part of the board' — and it turns out it's a useful concept," said Hearn. "The revolutionary people in the field have an intuitive sense, and can look at things completely differently from other people."

Image-based neuroscience supports this explanation, albeit vaguely. When researchers led by University of Minnesota cognitive neuroscientist Michael Atherton scanned the brains of people playing chess and compared them to Go-playing brains, he found heightened activation in the Go players' parietal lobes, a region responsible for processing spatial relationships. But these observations, said Atherton, were rudimentary. "The higher-level stuff, we didn't figure out," he said.

In a more recent brain-scanning study, Japanese researchers compared professional and amateur Go players as they contemplated opening- and end-stage moves. Both displayed parietal lobe activity. During the end stages, however, professionals had extremely high activity in their precuneus and cerebellum regions, where the brain integrates a sense of space with our bodies and motions.

Put another way, professionals fuse their consciousness into the decision tree of the game.
Go players have an ability "to think creatively and prune the search tree in an aesthetic sense," said Atherton. "They have a feel for the game."
Artificial intelligence researchers historically tried to harness this pattern-based approach, however poorly understood, to their Go programs. It wasn't easy. "When I've talked to Go professionals about how they come to their decisions, it's been difficult for them to describe why a move is right," said Doshay at UCSC, who designed a Go computer program called SlugGo. "Go is a game of living things, and you talk about it that way, as if the patterns might be alive."

But if turning cryptic statements from Go masters into working algorithms for determining the statistical health of game patterns was impossible, there didn't seem to be any other way of doing it. "It was possible to sidestep the cognitive issues by throwing brute force at chess," said Hearn, "but not at Go."

Compared to the challenge posed to a Go program, Deep Blue's computations — possible moves in response to a move, carried 12 cycles into the future — are back-of-the-napkin scribblings. "If you look at the game trees, there's about 30 possible moves you can make from a typical position. In Go, it's about 300. Right away, you get exponential scaling," said Hearn.

With every anticipated move, the possibilities continue to scale exponentially — and unlike chess, where captured pieces are counted immediately, Go territory can switch hands until the game's end. Running a few branchesdown the tree is useless: take one step, and it needs to be pursued, exponential scale by scale, until the game end.

According to Doshay, the number of Go's end-states — 10171 — is almost inconceivably smaller than the 101100 different ways of getting there. Without patterns to eliminate whole swaths of choices from the outset, computers simply can't cope with it, at least not within time frames contained by the universe's remaining existence. But to Doshay, guiding computers with human-rules patterns was wrong from the beginning.

"If you want computers to do something well, you concentrate on the ways computers do things well," he said."Computers can generate enormous quantities of random numbers very rapidly."

Enter the Monte Carlo method, named by its Manhattan Project pioneers for the casinos where they gambled. It consists of random simulations repeated again and again until patterns and probabilities emerge: the characteristics of an atomic bomb explosion, phase states in quantum fields, the outcome of a Go game. Programs like MoGO and Many Faces simulate random games from start to finish, over and over and over again, with no concern for figuring out which of any given move is best.

/// There are always people who become totally obsessed with the technicalities of the game and forget their grand purpose in life.

"At first, I was dismissive," said Hearn. "I didn't think there was anything to be gained from random playouts." But the programmers had one extra trick: they crunched the accumulated statistics, too. Once a few million random games are modeled, probabilities take form. Thus informed, the programs devote extra processing power to promising branches, and less power to less-promising alternatives.

The resulting game style looks human, but aside from a few rough human heuristics, the patterns articulated by our intuitions are unnecessary.

"The surprising, mysterious thing to me is that these algorithms work at all," said Hearn. "It's very puzzling."

Puzzling it might be, but the game is almost over. Hearn and others say that, having started to beat human professionals, Monte Carlo-based programs will only get better. They'll incorporate the results of earlier games to their heuristic arsenal, and within a few years — a couple decades at the most — be able to beat our best.

What is the larger significance of this? When computers finally triumphed at chess, the world was shocked. To some, it seemed that human cognition was less special than before. But to others, the competition is an illusion.

After all, behind every machine is the hand that made it.

"There's a strong tendency in humans to have a conceit about how far we've advanced," said Doshay. "But we've only really started programming computers."
Original article: http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/03/gobrain.html