The ultimate skill in troop deployment is to make sure you don’t have a fixed or constant formation and disposition. Without verifiable formations, even the most undercover and observant spy will not be able to probe and understand, and the wisest strategist will not be able to uncover your plans or conspire against you. The victory gained as a result of adapting to the enemy’s circumstances will never be understood by the troops. Everyone can know the formation I used to ensure victory. However, no one will know the ways, the methods and the reasons behind how I managed to create that victory. Therefore, the victory obtained in each battle occurs because the strategies and tactics are never repeated. Rather, they should vary according to circumstances, with endless possibilities. Chapter Six, Sun Tzu The Art of War.

From the previous sentence we can extract an extremely valuable business lesson. Let’s divide the sections into parts and analyze them individually to have a good understanding of the lesson.

BUSINESS APPLICATION

From the first two sentences, we can interpret it as that a business owner should not provide any degree of certainty to his rivals. As I mentioned in my article Sun Tzu Art of War: Getting Ahead of Opponent Strategies, the part about preventive strategies, I have already mentioned that you can use the past reaction or strategies that your competitors have used as a guide to formulate your preventive strategy. But keep in mind that what I say here can also be used by your rival. So do you have a fixed way of handling situations or a fixed time to have promotions, etc.?

These ways of doing business can provide relatively easy for your rivals to formulate their preventive strategy. So do your best to create so much uncertainty under your control, so that your enemy incurs high costs and also slows down your formulation process, as illustrated in the second sentence, if there is no certainty, you would leave your competitors’ spy useless and his wisest strategist is unable to discover his plans. Another important point to keep in mind is when it creates uncertainty; keep in mind that it does not disturb your customers.

Let’s look at the last part of the paragraph.

“Everyone can know the formation that I used to ensure the victory. However, no one will know the ways, the methods and the reasons behind how I managed to create that victory. Therefore, the victory obtained in each battle occurs because the strategies and Tactics are never repeated. Rather, they should vary according to circumstances, with infinite possibilities. ”

Humans have such a tendency that once you find something that works for you, you tend to stick with it and use it over and over again. But in business, you can’t do that. You have to keep formulating new strategies and tactics, because your rivals will learn from past interactions with you and will formulate their counterattack strategy to get a victory over you. If you keep using the same strategy with them, sooner or later they will overtake you and beat you. So your strategy, whether for marketing, Research and Development and other areas of your business, you have to be like what Sun Zi said, vary them according to the circumstances and strategies with infinite possibilities.