Art of War 5 Leadership

I read this from Art of War this morning and it reminded me of the essential elements of leadership.

"There are five dangerous faults which may affect a general: (1) Recklessness, which leads to destruction; (2) cowardice, which leads to capture; (3) a hasty temper, which can be provoked by insults; (4) a delicacy of honor which is sensitive to shame; (5) over-solicitude for his men, which exposes him to worry and trouble."


The three elements of leadership are:

1- Be: Do you have the personal attributes to be an effective leader?
2- Know: Do you know what to do? A leader without knowledge will look foolish
3- Do: You need to act, no one will respect a leader who doesn't act.

If you can follow the three elements of leadership and overcome the faults, then you can become an effective leader.

Communication The 4th Element

I continue to blog about communication because I think it is the most important part of business. There are  three aspects of communication namely:

1- What you say?
2- How you say it?
3- Body Language

While communicating with others these three components can make or break relationships.

 However, I believe there is a fourth aspect of communication.

4- Why?

         Why you said it.
         Why you said it that way.
         Why your body language was that way when you said it.

The 4th element explains your motive for communicating.  Understanding the why helps you communicate better and develops good business relationships.
Here is a quick video on understanding the motive...

Art of War 4

Continuing with my Art of War quotes


"Thus we may know that there are five essentials for victory:
(1) He will win who knows when to fight and when not to fight.
(2) He will win who knows how to handle both superior and inferior forces.
(3) He will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks.
(4) He will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared.
 (5) He will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign. "

The same strategies used in war can be implemented in Sales and Marketing.

1- Pick your battles. 
2- Prepare for every opponent the same
3- Motivate all of your people the same
4- Stay prepared wait for when the person is unprepared
5- Allow the people in the battle to make the major decisions and don't interfere.

I should have a couple more quotes to come in the future

"Cargo Cult"

So I came across the term "Cargo Cult" and I decided to research it and find out what it was....I did my wiki search and it was fascinating to read about these cults near Papua New Guinea. Basically they are tribes/cults in this area that are waiting for cargo to fall from the sky. Cargo did fall from the sky anciently when the US army would drop cargo during WW 2 in the area and the tribes would benefit greatly. The tribes would also benefit from visits of missionaries and other humanitarian aid.

These tribes believe that this "Cargo" comes from the sky and their previous ancestors and it is a spiritual manifestation. Because of this belief the tribe will erect items that will bring this cargo to them and wait. This includes airstrips, fake airplanes, and radio tower.

How many of us are a "Cargo Cult"? When we think that things will magically appear if we do things that are similar to what is necessary to produce the cargo ourselves. Instead of producing the cargo ourselves we wait for the cargo to drop from the sky.

Art of War 3

So I didn't plan on doing a lot of Art of War posts here on the blog, but I keep coming up with great quotes from the book. Here is the latest...

"He who knows when he can fight and when he cannot, will be victorious."
Sun Tzu

If you can identify your strength's, weaknesses, and readiness then you will be successful. Sometimes you need to pick your battles in your company because you have limited resources and need to select the best opportunity.

Enjoy!

Art of War Numero Dos

Here is another interesting quote from Art of War...

Hence to fight and conquer in all your battles
is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists
in breaking the enemy's resistance without fighting.

This reminds me of a political axiom which states "If you are explaining you are losing" George Will. If you need to explain things after a situation has already happened then you run the risk of not communicating properly, misunderstandings, losing credibility, and losing a client. People want to keep things simple and work with people who will simplify things and make them easy to understand.

This brings us to a second quote..I actually would credit to myself.."I would rather troubleshoot than problem solve because it is a lot less painful"

If you can go into a situation with a potential sale or client and you can create reasonable expectations and identify potential difficulties then the experience will go a lot better. When you are trying to troubleshoot the challenge will be to win your client's trust and have them believe you about potential problems.

Art of War

Sun Tzu's Art of War is quickly becoming one of my favorite books it was written in the 6th Century BC as a military strategy book. There are so many good insights on how to formulate strategy and overcome an adversary based on common sense and experience. One thing I have done lately is to see how I can apply many of the quotes into my business. One of the interesting quotes I came across is:

"If you know both yourself and your enemy, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss"

I don't think it is a good idea to think of your customers as enemies, but if you truly understand your customers needs, wants, compliments, complaints and understand them, you will be more effective.

Now the hard thing is to understand how to understand yourself and customer.