One of the important characteristics the warrior had to posses according to Sun Tzu was the ability to be deceptive. Not many troop commanders realized and viewed the war from this angle. Not many viewed the war as the art, where all possible maneuvers had to be analyzed and used wisely by the general.
Many business people, managers in particular, in present world use “The Art of War” as a guide for successful and effective business management. Each one of Sun Tzu’s rules and principles are widely used and applied in all levels of business, regardless of the size and the field of action of the organization.
Nowadays, with the globalization taking place and the development of new technologies, business world becomes more and more competitive. Managers become generals of the troops and markets become battle fields. It is now the manager’s responsibility to make the company survive and succeed in the competitive conditions, and also, to stay at the leading positions.
Sun Tzu’s main principle was to fight not with the worriers but with the strategies implementation. Secure resources and the use of them as effectively as possible was his principle idea. Many examples of different corporations who follow this idea today can be listed here. In general almost every company, that has been in the leading position in the market for some time can be given as an example, as without understanding and following all the Sun Tzu’s rules of war none of the companies would survive in the modern business environment. The company without a strategy is nothing. No matter how good her products are, without proper management and the wise plan on how to conquer the market the company collapses.
The strategy as Sun Tzu described it had to be deceptive. It is true in many cases in business. One of the western companies, which experienced financial crisis and the information about company’s losses spread widely so the competitors were taking over their market pie, applied the Sun Tzu’s theory of deception in the battlefield. The leader of the company bought an extremely expensive picture, the cost was about $7 mln, which the company couldn’t afford at that time. He put the picture in the hallway where everyone could see it. Company managers were shocked about the purchase of their leader. But as a wise leader, he actually had a plan in his head and it was just part of his strategy. Meanwhile, the clients of the company were leaving it for its competitors. So, the leader invited one of the biggest clients of theirs. When the client saw such an expensive picture on the wall, and when the company’s leader commented that it was not a big deal for them, and that the company purchased it just for their employees to be view, the client thought the company was really doing well, and the talks about the crisis were nothing more than gossip. This is how the implementation of Sun Tzu’s ideas of the deceptive strategy by the wise leader helped the company to win its battle without direct confrontation with competitors.
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Sharon White is a 5-years experienced freelance writer and a manager of Dissertation Writing support team. There you can get custom term paper tips and view essay samples.
