Sun Tzu

Source From: The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition Date: 2008

Sun Tzu , fl. c.500-320. BC, name used by the unknown Chinese authors of the sophisticated treatise on philosophy, logistics, espionage , and strategy and tactics known as The Art of War. It includes many commentaries by later Chinese philosophers.

The core text was probably written by one person during a time of expanding feudal conflicts, but the exact century is uncertain. Most authorities now support a date early in the Warring States period (c.453-221 BC). This work has deeply influenced Chinese, Vietnamese, and Japanese military thinking and has enjoyed growing popularity among businessmen. It stresses the unpredictability of battle, the importance of deception and surprise, the close relationship between politics and military policy, and the high costs of war. The futility of seeking hard and fast rules and the subtle paradoxes of success are major themes. The best battle, Sun Tzu says, is the battle that is won without being fought. See guerrilla warfare .

Bibliography: See The Art of War (tr. by S. B. Griffith, 1971).

Strategic Creativity

Sun Tzu's Art of War states, "Therefore, when I have won a victory I do not repeat my tactics but respond to circumstances in an infinite variety of ways." This quote aptly points out the need to be creative when developing strategies and tactics.

One example of creativity was that of Wheaties. During Superbowl XXXI in 1997 the Wheaties marketing team carried two boxes of Wheaties to the game; one representing the New England Patriots winning and the other the Green Bay Packers being victorious. As the game progressed, it became clear that the Green Bay Packers would beat the Patriots. With this in mind the Wheaties team went up to the broadcast booth, taking their box with Packer star quarterback Brett Favre's picture on it. The announcers, thinking it would be a great prop, took the box and showed it to the huge worldwide audience. By doing so they gave Wheaties millions of dollars of free advertising.

The major pharmaceutical company Johnson & Johnson has also displayed great creativity in marketing. Knowing that most people would not be drawn to their web site to learn about their medicines on a regular basis, J&J decided that perhaps events could help them create awareness for their products. With this thinking J&J runs banner ads for their headache reliever on e-broker sites whenever the markets drop significantly. Thus they reach consumers when those people are most interested in their products.

Consultants often point to the Gillette razor business model as an example of creativity. What most people don't know is how long ago that business model was developed and what the catalyst was behind it. All the way back in 1895 King Camp Gillette (yes, that was his real name) took his inspiration from a former employee who had made millions selling disposable bottle-tops. Using the idea that disposable razor heads, like disposable bottle-tops, were something that would need constant replacement, Gillette received a patent for his invention in 1901 and had sold 12 million blades by 1903. That same business model still works a century later.

Creativity is not something that belongs only to a few people who are born with it. John Kao, a well-known author of books on creativity (such as "Jamming") supports this view, stating, "Creativity must go beyond generation of new ideas; it must become an ongoing process." Roger von Oech, author of "A Whack on the Side of the Head" and many other books on creativity provides many exercises one can do foster it. Examples include being illogical, breaking the rules, and dealing with ambiguity. With these and other exercises one can be more creative and thus be more competitive.
As Sun Tzu said, "The flavors are only five in number but their blends are so various one cannot taste them all."

Turning Strengths Into Weaknesses

A key tenet of Sun Tzu's strategic philosophy is to attack the opposing side's weaknesses. "Now an army may be likened to water, for just as flowing water avoid the heights and hastens to the lowlands, so an army avoids strength and strikes weakness."
However, sometimes competitors seem invincible and few weaknesses are discernible. So another approach is to find ways to turn their strengths into weaknesses. For example, Coca-Cola's strength in the soft drink market was that it was the classic cola. With its long history as the favorite American drink, supported by decades of advertising, its position seemed unassailable. So Pepsi needed to find an approach that would work. It did so by turning Coke's strength into a weakness by coming out with the "Pepsi Generation" theme. This approach positioned Pepsi as the drink for the next generation of cola-drinkers, the youth market. It also positioned Coke as the drink for the older (and by implication, the old-fashioned) generation. With America's love affair with everything young Pepsi turned Coke's reputation as America's traditional drink from a strength to a weakness.

If you’ve ever felt that business is like war, a new business book based on the teachings of an ancient Chinese warrior has much to offer”
– Entrepreneur Magazine

To hand down the wisdom he had gained from years of battles, more than two millennia ago the famous Chinese general Sun Tzu wrote the classic work on military strategy, The Art of War . Because business, like warfare, is dynamic, fast-paced, and requires an effective and efficient use of scarce resources, modern executives have found value in Sun Tzu's teachings. But The Art of War is arranged for the military leader and not the CEO, so making connections between ancient warfare and today's corporate world is not always easy. Now, in Sun Tzu and the Art of Business , Mark R. McNeilly shows how Sun Tzu's strategic principles can be successfully applied to modern business situations.