Comparing: What Makes Competition Easy

Art of War 4:3.12-

(Note: This article is a part of a project explaining the deeper meaning of Sun Tzu’s classic work on strategy. See this article for the beginning of this project.)

These verses are the last four three stanza’s in the third section of Chapter Four on positioning. The prior section of this chapter was about finding easy opportunities to advance. This section explains what an easy victory does and doesn’t require.

In the quotations from The Art of War below, we show the Chinese character-to-word transliteration first, in less greater and than brackets < >. It is follow by my English translation. My advices is to focus on the Chinese transliteration. My English translation is too much of a simplification.

Lessons from History

This stanza starts in a familiar way, a line used fifteen time by Sun Tzu, but this verse takes the idea in a different and very valuable direction.

<Ancient> <of> <good> <battle> <is,>
Learn from the history of successful battles.
<Victory> <to> <easy> <victory> <is> <also;>
Victory goes to those who make winning easy.

Though Sun Tzu doesn’t see direct head-to-head contests, that is comparisons, as the easiest way to succeed, we can always learn from comparisons. He starts by saying that an easy competitive victory is still a victory, that is, it advances our position. We make success easy by correctly positioning ourselves. We win better positions by having position that make it easy. Which is the chicken and which is the egg?

Our existing positions come first. We always start where we are. The Art of War described earlier in this chapter how to use new positions. Future position are something we control. One of the main things we look for are positions that make further advances easier. This is something we can control because we choose the ground and where to move our positions. When we look for opportunities, that is, openings, we look for ones that make future progress easier rather than harder.

The rest of this article describes how we make make progress easy based upon what we see in direct competition, that is, head-to-head comparisons. It focuses especially on avoiding the ways in which our thinking makes progress more difficult. For Sun Tzu, the psychology of our strategy must be tailored to those who can reward us in the ways that really matter, that is the psychology of how we are compared to others.

The Lesson from Contests

<Make> <good> <battle> <is> <of> <victory> <also,>
A good battle is one that you will obviously win.
<Without> <intelligence> <name,>
It doesn’t take intelligence to win a reputation.
<Without> <bravery> <achievement.>
It doesn’t take courage to achieve success.

We win direct contexts by focus on what gets compared during them. The comparison differs depending on the type of contest. A boxing match compares something very different than a beauty contest. A pie-baking competition compare very different things that a pie-eating contest. From these contests, we learn how people compare similar things outside of a contest, hiring a bouncer, an advertising model, a baker, or—um—whatever job that values the ability to eat a lot in a short about of time.