There’s a great importance for you to understand the basics of strategy; how people use it to obtain power and how to avoid becoming a pawn in the midst of a well thought out plan . The most successful business people use their strategic ability to achieve the maximum results, while the boldest, most daring criminals use strategy to guide their marks through elaborate cons schemes.
This article will provide you with a short, but necessary introductory-level briefing on strategy.
STRATEGY
strat-e-gy, -noun: a plan, method, and/or series of maneuvers for obtaining an advantage for acquiring a specific goal or result.
To better understand the word “Strategy”, it’s important to also understand the word “Tactic”.
tac-tic, -noun: a course of action(s), procedure(s), and/or individual maneuvers for promoting a desired end or result.
In Summary, strategies help you to forecast future outcomes, and tactics are the actions you take to reach outcomes.
Example of Strategy
To help this all make better sense, here’s an example of the relationship between “strategies” and “tactics”:
Scenario: game of chess
Goal: capture the queen
Strategy: Apply pressure to cause frustration, leading your opponent to make mistakes, allowing you to advance with ease.
Tactic: Utilize Double Threat movements. Double Threat is any move you make that presents your opponent with two problems at the same time. Since each player can make just one move per turn, your opponent only has time to address one of the threats you have made. On the next turn you execute the other one. Maybe your first move checks his king and attacks other pieces at the same time; or maybe you threaten one of his pieces and are building a threat of checkmate elsewhere.
Tactics (continued): Under a strategy, in most cases, there are multiple tactics executed. The example above would be one tactic to apply pressure to cause frustration. Another Tactical maneuver could be the display of one’s emotions while making moves. If you play poker, or ever seen it played on TV you might have noticed that it’s a huge game of psychology. One who can mask their emotions or even tort their emotions to read differently can gain a psychological advantage, leading to an emotion of insecurity to your opponent.
“All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved”. -Sun Tzu, The Art of War
Origins of the word “Strategy“
The word “strategy” derives from the Greek word strategos; which derives from two words:
- Stratos – meaning army
- Ago – ancient Greek word for leading, guiding and moving; generalship.
The word “strategy” was originated in military warfare and described how a general sought to advance forward in a war. An example of a general’s strategy could be to employ war methods such as Guerrilla Warfare (utilization of speed and mobility) to disassemble an opponent. An example of a tactic would be the command of light weight weaponry and utilization of jeeps, allowing for high mobility.
Everyone uses strategy to a certain degree – by nature it’s a simple concept naturally used by humans. Here’s the catch…it’s those who learn how to master the complex nature of a well thought out strategy, that are most successful.
We see the impacts of [mostly bad] strategy plays on reality TV shows where individuals build allies without trying create too many enemies along their journey. This is a simple mimicking of the real life strategy game – building a network of supporters to help advance your position. A common problem in this type of play is that if you are not crafty with your execution and others become aware of your dealings, you build an equal amount of enemies, which can obliterate your strategy.
This article barely grazed the surface of the deep complexities surrounding the word “strategy”. As I stated in the beginning, this is simply a introductory-level briefing on the basics behind what strategy is.
IMPORTANT NOTE
This was the first article ever posted on HustlersNotebook.com!!!
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