Comparing: Incentives
The Art of War 6:1:5-11
This article continues our project explaining each line of Sun Tzu’s work. The English and Chinese are from my award-winning translation, The Art of War and The Ancient Chinese Revealed. Start here for the book’s opening lines.
A discussion of incentives ends this first Section of Chapter 6 of The Art of War. This chapter is about “weakness” and “strength,” which Sun Tzu describes as “emptiness” and “fullness.” The previous article, discussing this section’s beginning lines, was about empty and full Ground. These next two stanza’s take a very different direction. They are about using the power of “emptiness” and “fullness” to direct the actions of others. Today, we call this the use of incentives.
Today, most discussions of incentives occur within the narrow confines of the workplace and motivating employees. In modern psychology, this is called the Incentive Theory of Motivation. This theory emphasizes external forces affecting individual behavior as opposed to internal goals. Sun Tzu’s view couples external and internal motivation. Without internal goals, we could create no external incentives. External incentives only work if the help or hinder people’s progress toward their individual internal goals. We can use those internal goals to motivate others toward action that we desire even when their goals are different than our own.
We are influenced by positive incentives to act. Negative incentives influence us not to act. These incentives can come from the environment, the Ground and the Climate, but they can also come from human action, Leaders and Methods.
The Use of Positive Incentives
Sun Tzu starts with the use of positive incentives.
(In the quotations below, we summarize each Chinese character as a single English word shown in < > brackets. A sentence from my English translation follows.)
<Can> <cause> <enemy> <men> <self> <arrive> <is>,
You can make the enemy come to you.
Notice the use of the Chinese character, <self> here. The fullness and emptiness of incentives has nothing to do with “forcing” others to do anything. We are not expending our own energy to move them. Instead, we are leveraging their self-interest to motivate them.
Historically, this line was interpreted in terms of luring “enemies” into a trap, and it certainly offers that strategy. However, in the broader view of Sun Tzu’s methods, it can also be understood as winning a current opponent as a supporter. “Winning without conflict” requires discouraging opponents and encouraging supporters. The idea goes back to some of the first lines of The Art of War about creating shared missions.
Sun Tzu goes on:
<Benefit> <it> <also>;
Offer him an advantage.
A <benefit> is a positive incentive, but not all incentives are created equal. To get us to act, incentives must excite our emotions. The rewards that we personally find exciting might not be enough to inspire others to take action. This is where we must consider the range of Missions that motivate others. Psychological, social, and personal factors can all play a role in what incentives others find exciting. To use incentives, we must get inside the Missions of others.
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In this context of incentives, we might call “fullness” rewards and “emptiness” punishments, but that is not how Sun Tzu sees them. A “benefit” or an “advantage” can be either emptiness or fullness, but it is always one or the other. We might not see half of the potential incentives if we think on only one side of these complementary opposites. While we think of a positive incentive as offering some type of “fullness reward,” for example, a monetary one. We must remember that opportunities are more commonly an opening, an emptiness. A better incentive can be, for example, offering others positions in our organizations or a role leading an alliance..
The Use of Negative Incentives
<Can> <cause> <enemy> <men> <not> <gain> <arrive> <is>,
You can make the enemy avoid coming to you.
This is the statement of the other half of our strategic goals: discouraging opposition. If someone is not going to support us, we want them to at least ignore us. this is the purpose of negative incentives. They tend to inhibit people from acting in a certain way.
Misfortune> <it> <also>.
Threaten him with danger.
We must think of ways to reduce any rewards associated with opposing us. “Risk” is a better word than “danger.” Some might oppose those they see as “dangerous” to remove the threat. However, being seen as weak and harmless can also invite attacks. We want to be viewed as having enough “fullness” to defend our positions, but not in a way that threatens the positions of others. This is why we move into openings rather than take over the territories of others.
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Using the Climate
The last stanza of this section brings in the importance of Mission and Climate. These lines recognize that everyone’s internal motivation changes with the passage of time. Over time, fullness gives way to emptiness for any living system. The passage of time alone often shifts the balance of fullness and emptiness
<Make> <enemy> <relaxed> <can> <weary> <it>,
When the enemy is fresh, you can tire him.
We don’t have to do anything to tire people other than let Climate do its work. "<Relaxed> should be heard more as “rested.” We all wake up rested. As the day goes on, we all eventually get tired. In terms of rest, in the morning, we are full. In the evening, we are running on empty. This change in full/empty states affects everyone’s motivations. They will be easier to win as supporters in the morning. They will be easier to discourage as opponents in the evening.
<Satisfied> <can> <starve> <it>,
When he is well fed, you can starve him.
We are motivated by food when we are hungry. Notice, this is the opposite effect of rest. The fullness of rest creates a positive motivation. The emptiness of hunger creates a negative one. The power of time works against fullness, but it works for emptiness. To identify what will motivates someone else at any given time, we must think about what they need and about whether or not time is working to empty or fill them. Time doesn’t fill them on their own, but they can use time to fill their needs. All resources are used up over time. Most efforts should build up resources. To win someone’s support, we just need to offer them the needed resource at the right time.
<Peaceful> <can> <move> <it>.
When he is relaxed, you can move him.
We don’t have to threaten people to move them. Not threatening them can work even better. We all must move over time. The changes of Climate will erode all our strategic positions, emptying them. Offer people assistance in moving them forward can be a much more powerful motivator than threats.