Vulnerability to Firestorms

"When we were children, we used to think that when we were grown-up we would no longer be vulnerable. But to grow up is to accept vulnerability... To be alive is to be vulnerable." Madeleine L'Engle

A few weeks ago, my wife and I drove through a remote, forested area in northern California. Dead trees littered the forest floor, not because the trees were unhealthy, but because no one was cleaning up the deadfalls. It looked totally different than the managed forests of California that I explored hiking when I was young. This forest was just awaiting a lightning strike to create a raging firestorm.

This, of course, led me back to my recent topic of vulnerability (see this earlier article). Though the vulnerabilities of forests are technically different than the vulnerabilities in competitive environments, the lessons are the same. A firestorm is not bad luck, but bad management of our positions. Given that the environment is always more powerful than we are, what does good management of a our competitive ground depend upon?