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Where
Planning Works
Where Adaptability Is Needed
Why
Adaptive Strategy Works
Competition and Production
Competition and Production
 In
our lives, we
must be both productive and competitive.
Production and competition work together. Our ability to produce makes the most of
the resources you control. External competition makes the most of your
production in the marketplaces
that you
cannot control. While internal planning requires more planning, external
competition requires better decision-making reflexes.
2,500 years ago, Sun Tzu described these two opposite but complementary
parts of live. The nation, run by the ruler and his
administrators, was the productive half. The army, run by a general and his
commanders, was its competitive counterpart. Survival depends on both
components working together, understanding each other's role, and realize
that they each work under very different rules. Managing production is very
different than managing competition.
The secret is knowing when to use the methods of production (linear thinking,
process planning, problems solving by division) and when to use the methods of
competition (adaptive thinking, expert decision-making, and problems solving by
innovation). We go into this in more detail in discussing our training, but the
chart below offers a quick summary of the differences .
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The Critical Differences |
| Competition |
Production |
| Exploring and experimenting |
Designing and organizing |
| Adaptive thinking |
Linear thinking. |
| Networked
relationships |
Hierarchical
structure |
| External, chaotic environments |
Internal, controlled environments |
| People competing |
People cooperating |
| Most people
making key decisions |
Most people
following procedures |
| Anonymous,
unattained resources |
Known, available resources |
| Event-based responses |
Predetermined steps |
| Factors details into larger picture |
Breaks processes into finer details |
| Unique, custom solutions |
Duplicate, standard products |
| Adjusts to environment as a whole |
Controls part of environment |
| General improvement in position |
Well-specified end result |
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Productive and competitive methods create the resources for
each other in a constant cycle. The better our competitive skills, the more
resources we capture to use productively. The better our production, the more
resource we produce for use in external competition. Competition and production
are closely tied to each other, but they require different skill sets. In the
science of strategy, they are defined as "complementary opposites." Both are
necessary. They work together. But you must understand how they are different.
The problem in recent decades is that our knowledge of
production and training in linear thinking have greatly overshadowed our competitive
skills and we receive. Fortunately, there is a growing interest in the types of strategic
skills that people need on the front lines of competition. Fortunately, we have
the classical strategy of
Sun Tzu to guide us in building our competitive perspective and sharpening our
decision-making reflexes.
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