The Art of War: E-Book Pages 1-20

Notes/Excerpts:

• Laying Plans
  • the commander stands for the virtues of wisdom, sincerity, benevelonce, courage and strictness
  • all warefare is based upon deception
• Waging War
  • when you engage in actual fighting, if victory is ling in coming, the men’s weapons will grow dull and their ardor will be damped. If you lay siege to a town, you will exhaust your strength
    • now when your weapons are dulled, your ardor damped, your strength exhausted and your treasure spent, other chieftains will spring up to take advantage of your extremity. Then no man, however wise, will be able to avert the consequences that must ensue
  • wise general make point of foraging on the enemy
  • the leader of armies is the arbiter of the people’s fate, the man on whom it depends weather the nation shall be i peace or in peril
• Attack by Stratagem
  • the skillful leader subdues the enemy’s troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field
  • the general is the bulwark of the state; if the bulwark is complete at all points, the state will be strong; if the bulwark is defective, the state will be weak
  • there are five essentials for victory:
    • he will win who knows when to fight and when  not to fight
    • he will win who know how to handle both superior and inferior forces
    • he will win whose army is animated by the same spirit throughout all its ranks
    • he will win who, prepared himself, waits to take the enemy unprepared
    • he will win who has military capacity and is not interfered with by the sovereign
  • if you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not to fear the result of hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a deafeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, your will succumb in every battle

Dan Pink – The Puzzle of Motivation

Notes:

• didn’t do well in law school 😉
• about rethinking how we run our businesses
• “the candle problem” by Karl Duncker
  • key is to overcome “functional fixedness”
• contingent motivators -> if you do this, then you get that, only work in some circumstances
  • but for a lot of tasks they don’t, and even do harm
    • there is a mismatch between what science knows and what business does
  • if then rewards work very well for very easy tasks -> simple set of rules, clear destination
  • but for candle problems in any field often the if then rewards do not work
    • in other words, if the problem is mechanical in nature, these rewards work well
      • if they require even slight rudimentary skills, they often don’t
• new approach of motivation should focus more on intrinsic motivators
  • this could include
    • autonomy
      • urge to direct our own lives
    • mastery
      • desire to get better and better at something
    • purpose
      • doing something larger than ourselves
• we invented management in the 20th century
  • doesn’t mean it is going to work forever
• tip: paying people fairly so that the issue of money is of the table so that they can focus on something else  + than give them autonomy; example
  • google: work on what you want (20% time a day)
  • atlassian in australia: work on what you want for one day -> FEDEX days (deliver something over night)
  • Example: encarta from Microsoft -> failed (with all right incentives)
    • Example: wikipedia -> great success

Simon Sinek – How Great Leaders Inspire Action

Notes:

• Why is Apple so innovative? Why did Martin Luther King lead the civil rights movement? Why did the Wright Brothers accomplish man flight?
  • they think and communicate the same way -> the Golden Circle:
    • why, how, what but depends on with what you start -> either with what or with what
      • inspired leaders/organizations start with why and market their products that way/write their marketing messages that way
      • People don’t buy what you do but why you do it
        • Personal note: the what you do might/will change in the future but the why will be/should be more stable throughout time because it defines what you are but not what you sell/produce
      • all grounded in biology:
        • brain broken into three major components
          • neocortex = what -> rational and analytical thinking
          • limbic brain = how/why -> feelings, human behavior + decision-making, has NO capacity for language
    • law of diffusion of innovation:
      • 2.5% = innovators, 13,5% = early adopters, 34% early majority, 34% late majority, rest
        • if you want market success need to reach tipping point of 15-18% of market penetration
          • early majority wont try anything until someone has tried it first
    • what you do proves what you believe and hence why you do it
    • Martin Luther King: I have a dream -> not, I have a plan
      • those who lead in spire us