Time and again, McNeilly stresses (as does Sun Tzu) the absolute importance of personal character. Respect and trust are earned, not conferred by title or decree. It remains for leaders to formulate the correct strategies as well as those tactics needed to implement them. It remains for leaders to allocate resources only where they will achieve the greatest possible success at the lowest acceptable cost. Whether the competition is on a battlefield or in a marketplace, the six principles discussed by McNeilly are appropriate to whatever strategy or strategies may be needed. Historically, the most successful armies and the most successful companies have shared much in common: meticulous preparation, superb timing, speed, maximum use of resources where they will have the greatest impact, sufficient intelligence on opponents, mobility, flexibility, and (above all) resolve.
In Sun Tzu and the Art of Business , McNeilly provides a brilliant analysis of six specific principles (first set to writing almost 2,500 years ago) which, he correctly suggests, will enable all manner of organizations to formulate appropriate strategies for the New Millennium. This is a solid, eloquent, sharply-focused book. Unlike so many other authors who force analogies between war and business, McNeilly respects the basic (indeed obvious) differences between them while explaining how certain principles are relevant to both.
Most military strategists agree that Sun Tzu's The Art of War (circa 400 B.C.) is essential reading. Since around 1960, many business strategists have felt the same way, through seeing his discussion of war as a metaphor for business competition. Since Sun Tzu did not write about business directly, this has made The Art of War a little less than fully accessible to many business people. This book presents a very successful rewriting of Sun Tzu's classic to make it more "about business" while keeping a military connection. This book also contains a full translation of The Art of War by Samuel B. Griffith so you can compare this reinterpreted material to the original. I found that comparison especially useful.
The author has developed six principles for managers from Sun Tzu's concepts:
(1) Capture your market without destroying it or its profitability.
(2) Attack competitors where and when they least expect it and are most vulnerable.
(3) Make the best use of market information to develop advantages.
(4) Move faster than your competitor to create maximum confusion and delay in response.
(5) Pick strategies that will encourage your competitors to respond in ways favorable to you.
(6) Emphasize leadership built upon good character.
The author then goes a step further and proposes six implementation steps for employing these principles. I thought that these steps were especially valuable because some of them expand upon the principles in new ways that make them more business related:
(1) "Prioritize markets and determine competitor focus"
(2) "Develop attacks against competitor's weaknesses"
(3) "War game and plan for surprises"
(4) "Integrate best attacks to unbalance your competitor"
(5) "Ready your attacks and release them"
(6) "Reinforce success, starve failure"
The book is greatly improved by the many examples in it. The best military ones relate to Operation Desert Storm (discussed in much interesting detail) and the two world wars. The business examples are also good, but not as good as the military ones. The business examples seem to lack a full understanding, and some chapters are noticeably lacking in successful business examples (such as chapter 1). The business examples were best in chapters 2 (Wal-mart, CNN, MTV, and Southwest Airlines), 4 (Southwest Airlines), 5 (Hewlett-Packard's patents and FedEx's magazine for office assistants), and 6 (Herb Kelleher at Southwest Airlines). Southwest Airlines is the obvious role model in this book for what a company should be doing.
I thought that chapters 6 (on character-based leadership) and 5 (on shaping your opponent) were outstanding.
The author has some places where his writing is outstanding, as well. For example in chapter 1 he says, "In business, you should follow the philosophy of Go rather than chess. You should seek to control the most market territory with the smallest investment, not to destroy your competitor and your company with endless fighting." In chapter 6, he shows this same quality in a list of leadership characteristics such as "Build your character, not just your image," "Lead with actions, not just words," "Motivate emotionally, not just materially," and "Share employee's trials, not just their triumphs."
I reread Sun Tzu's original material after reading the reinterpreation, and found that the new examples and analogies in this book added richness to my understanding of that original text. I strongly encourage you to do the same, whether or not you have ever read Sun Tzu before.
After you have finished enjoying this fine book and applying its lessons, I suggest that you consider this same perspective in terms of accomplishing something for a nonprofit organization that you volunteer for. You may be able to accomplish much more good as a result.
Look for the unguarded way to find more health, happiness, peace, and prosperity!
However this author does seem to inform you with some information it doesn't seem to give you as much as you may hope for. At the time that I read this book it was the first on the subject of Sun Tzu's book "The Art of War" or any business book for that matter. So if you in fact know nothing then you will learn something from this book. I felt frustrated throughout the book when he would continually make references to "a well known company." McNeilly would pick out events of war to support his ideas; however, the way he would pick small examples with such little detail he would lead to you believe that these strategies being successful in war are isolated events. If I was a war historian maybe I would be able to dig through my knowledge of events to see if they were in fact successful throughout history or not.
On another note about the "well known companies," he would use these as support for his arguments/theories on how to apply them in business. He would say how the companies did this and that, and brought about certain results. I was left so frustrated because I wanted DETAILS! I wanted to know who these companies were and see for myself what happened and what significance it had to the company.
In the end he left me with a feeling that he was just excited to yell out the word war with business. Like I said, its not bad if you know nothing. You should read more after this, that is if you can handle dry reading. This books' greatest angle would be that it wasn't boring for me at all.