Science of Strategy Institute

Though the ability to "thin slice" situations with Sun Tzu's adaptive strategy started with history's great generals, it has spread from the military to every area in which strategic thinking is critical.

The French phrase "coup d'oeil," the "power of the glance," describes the ability to immediately recognize what must be done in a dynamic, complex situation.  This phrase was used to describe Napoleon’s ability in understanding a battlefiedl. And where did Napoleon get this ability? He was the first western student of Sun Tzu. After Napoleon's success, this knowledge spread through the military world. Patton studied the work and today, the Department of the Army in the United States, through its Command and General Staff College, has directed all units to maintain libraries within their respective headquarters for the continuing education of personnel in the art of war. The Art of War is specifically mentioned by name as an example of the works to be maintained at each individual unit, and staff duty officers are obliged to prepare short papers for presentation to other officers on their readings. The book is taught at most military schools and colleges around the world.

The ideas began to spread into the Western business world in the late 1980s. As you can see from the Institute's own list of corporate customers, these ideas are popular with some of the largest and most respected organizations in the world. In many companies, Sun Tzu is required reading. As you can see from our list, even government organizations use his principles.

The work is also used in politics. Republican strategist Lee Atwater said he never traveled without a copy.

In sports, a whole series of winning coaches study Sun Tzu's principles. In American football, coaches such as Bill Belichick of the New England Patriots teams and, earlier, Bill Walsh of the great San Francisco 49er teams both used the book. In professional basketball, Phil Jackson, the coach of several championship teams, not only follows its principles but hands out copies of the book to his players. In international football (soccer) 2002 world Cup winner Brazil's manager Luiz Felipe Scolari, currently manager for the English team Chelsea, is also a serious devotee of Sun Tzu. Robbie Deans, the Australian Rugby coach uses it. An entire book has been developed, unfortunately not by us, about sports champions who follow its principles.

In the first stanza of his work, Sun Tzu says that good strategy is a matter of survival. What works, survives. His words turned out to be prophetic, since his book is one of the oldest in history. If his system didn't work, would people still be studying it after 2,500 years? In a culture littered with "gurus of the week," Sun Tzu's front-line strategy stands out as a monument to the enduring power of ideas.

Since Gary Gagliardi personally first started using these ideas in selling and did his first book for salespeople, lets start by looking at sales success.

Let us start with someone who is fairly new to sales, Scott Perry. Scott joined the private sector in 2005 after a career in the military. Despite all the books for salespeople in the marketplace, he found that he needed only one:

"I joined the private sector in 2005 as a salesman and the only book I bought was your Art of Sales/Art of War. I trained myself with your book as my only aid."

How did here do using Sun Tzu as his only guide to selling? Again, in his own words:

"I wrote 18 million dollars of new business in 2.5 yrs."

Scott has been so successful that now starting his own business of distributing ATM systems to stores without charging the traditional transaction fees. (More about how Sun Tzu inspires unconventional new businesses here.)

You may think that his success was a fluke or, perhaps that he was lucky and got into a particularly hot market. May he was impressed because it was the only book on sales that he every read.

"Joe" Schmitter had a great deal more experience when wrote us from Columbia, MO.  He found us because he was always looking for new information. He is now the top media salesperson in his market. Having read a lot of books on sales, he immediately recognized that using Sun Tzu in selling was very different, requiring some study and dedication. He describes our Sales Warrior as:

"...much more challenging than most books I have read...[It] has more than paid for itself. I hope to be able to re-read it again soon so that I can take some more time to analyze all of the info you have included.

Another sales veteran, Ken Welch, an e-compliance consultant also had been in sales his entire career. At the age of 60, his fortunes dramatically changed for the better. After going through our  Warrior Class he had more business than he could handle. He wrote us:

So here's another problem... Since implementing your principles into my business and sales processes I'm so busy I don't have time to do my lessons

His solution was simple. He his is hiring another salesperson and putting him through our warrior class training as well.

We hear a lot about how our training fills in the gaps in other forms of sales training which usually focus on the sales process. As any experienced salesperson knows, the process doesn't define the situation. One of the great values of Sun Tzu is that if gives salespeople a powerful set of competitive reflexes and an alternative mental perspective from which to see the challenges of selling.

Charlie Cook is the sales training manager for IFM Efector, Inc in Australia. After years in training people in the sales process, he wrote to us about what he saw:

One thing I've observed time and time again is that people try to force the sales process onto the situation.  

After learning about Sun Tzu's system from us, he made what he found was a uniquely valuable change to the way he does sales training:

In our training classes, I try to develop an awareness that each situation is unique, and that how you apply the process is determined by your knowledge of the current situation.  Sun Tzu's teachings plus your sales interpretation have been most helpful.

Even sales trainers who have a PH.D. in psychology like Donald J. Moine, a sales psychologist and the author of several studies about the use of psychology in sales, describes our Sales Warriorapproach as something uniquely powerful:

"..one of the most unique and well-written sales books I have seen in many years. It is full of wisdom, power, and dignity. It stands in sharp contrast to the many hype-filled books on 'sales motivation' and the wimpy 'new age' books that rail on and on against the use of power and influence in selling. [It] is a breath of fresh air in the stale, stodgy world of sales training books. I urge every sophisticated sales professional and sales manager to pick up a copy. This is one of the few books on salesmanship that will actually expand your vision of the world and of what is possible."

So, whether you are a new salesperson or an old sales pro, whether your goal is writing millions of dollars of business or simple being more successful than you have ever been before, you can get a lot using our material for training your sales reflexes.

As many of our sales success stories suggest, Sun Tzu's classical strategy doesn't only make salespeople more successful, but it dramatically helps the businesses for which they work. Of course, sales is always a major concern for business owners. Ashley Alexis is a small business owner and she reports that our training has been "helpful" saying:

".. believe it or not, sales has almost doubled!"

Paul Seth is another small business owner who has discovered that studying Sun Tzu leads to business real success over time. This success can come quickly, but it works over time as well. He wrote:

Absolutely love Sun Tzu. I only developed an interest over the last year or so but the more I read him the more he is helping. I run a recruitment company and have expanded from 7 to 35 people in the last 3 years. I am looking to expand my company to 100 employees over the next 3 years and strategy will play a key part in its viability.

However, the most interesting testimonials are from people who have used Sun Tzu ideas and our approaches to applying them to build entirely new, successful business from scratch or turn around failing business.

Allan Elder is a great example of a new business builder. In the interest of full disclosure, Allan is also a business professor at the UC Irvine and has become one of our master trainers. However, his first experience in applying Sun Tzu's methods came from using our Nine Formulas book to create a new business.

His wife is a doctor who was working at a traditional medical clinic. After reading our book, she and Allen decided to start a new type of medical clinic. They designed the entire business around Sun Tzu's concepts.  Even when Allan, as a business professor, says he didn't personally think something was a good idea," they stuck to Sun Tzu's system. The result:

"We started this business from complete scratch, nothing, nada. Now we have grown to the point where we need to bring in more physicians and the income has outshined everything else we have done in our careers."

Consider that she is a doctor and he is a professor, their financial success with Sun Tzu is impressive.

Of course, many people get great ideas for a business without studying Sun Tzu. One unusual advantage to using Sun Tzu's approach is that the resulting business is very difficult for competitors to copy, especially at first. This is because Sun Tzu approach to strategy is so different from what is usually taught as strategic thinking. As Allan describes:

"Our business model is also praised at conferences where others want to do it but are terrified to try because it is so counter intuitive it simply doesn't make sense. Yet, it works!"
 

Not only do the business owners love this approach, but their employees love it as well. Kevin Morris is a new manager from C&L Companies. He wrote to say how much he appreciated our materials. He tells us about how serious his CEO is about getting everyone in the company to develop their strategic reflexes.

I now have a new management position with a young progressive company, and the CEO of the company lives and breathes this book.  He just implemented a plan for us to once a month write a report based upon (5) principles from this book."

As we explain in our science section, the method of training employees in Sun Tzu ideas is called constructing mental scenarios. One of the reason Sun Tzu's models are so valuable in business is that they give people a common language and framework for thinking through various competitive situations.

Experience, well-education managers also find this system power.  Ratinder Paul Singh Ahuja is a Ph.D. and is the Chief Technical Officer (CTO) at Reconnex Corp. He realizes that strategic planning only goes so far. He finds the vocabulary  invaluable, writing to us:

"I've studied many books on the various translations of Art of War.  Your set is the best as it arms us with the vocabulary of strategy and a way to understand what is happening in a chaotic world around us.  Its daily reading for me now!  Any free time I have I spend on your [StrategySchool] material. I wish I had come across your books earlier. One of my goals is (as is articulated in your material) to make my reactions to changing environments fast and accurate."

In a lot of cases, business owners write us to explain how these ideas give them a completely new perspective on their business. As with Mike Whitehouse who describes it this way:

"..it is as though Gary has come up to me and said “hey you use binoculars this way round”! WOW! I can now see the whole business environment, and life’s stuff in a totally new perspective!"

Kobe Zimmerman, runs a foreclosure business called InlandHELP who completely learned that by using Sun Tzu's approach he could completely turn around his business. He says that before he was "getting eaten alive." Why? In his own words:

"Without getting into to much detail, I was blind as to my position. By not asking questions, I was not seeing the terrain for what it was, and after weeks and even months of hard work, I was losing deals."

After learning Sun Tzu's lessons about developing position awareness, he started acting differently and just as quickly, his entire business turned around. Again, in his own words:

"After getting a clear picture of both my and the homeowners' positions within the environment and also considering and preparing for how these positions will change with time, I can decide if all 5 elements are aligned for probable success. I can’t thank you enough. This is perfect for my company, and, well…I am speechless!"

Which seems like a good place to end this article.

Nothing is more gratifying that getting a message from a customer that starts out:

"Just wanted to tell you how much your books have changed my life."

This particular message came from Ossy Herdandez. Ossy was familiar with Sun Tzu's work before discovering adaptations. His message goes on to say:

"I have in my collection many different translations of Sun Tzu's work on different subjects and comparing them to yours is like 'balancing a silver coin with a gold coin.' No contest. The book that changed all this was your book on career building.

We hear from a lot of people who have found our training in Sun Tzu's methods invaluable in their career. We hear from all types of people at all stages of their career. We hear from kids just starting out and university professors. We hear from doctors, lawyers, and from people just trying to find their way. They have all discovered the same lesson: they make better decisions when they start using Sun Tzu's methods.

For Lorenz Dulfo who was just coming out of school, had the same problems that a lot of young people have adjusting to the workplace. He wrote us:

"I recently got my very first job... I was totally overwhelmed by the totally different environment of the corporate world as opposed to the country club atmosphere of my college days. I was failing, making mistakes at every turn."

Lorenz found us and enrolled on our on-line Warrior Class lessons in decision-making. He found that they made all the difference:

"Now, I am able to enjoy work and life more because slowly I am trying to change the way i think..."

These difference isn't only something that you feel. It is something others notice as well. People are continually surprised by what a difference even a little knowledge of classical strategy makes. Another student of ours, Edward Forgacs, who is still in school while working writes:

"After reading and implementing just a few of Sun Tzu’s suggestions I have already noticed an improvement, and so have my teachers, employer, etc. I did not realize that The Art of War would have such a significant impact on my life. Thank you so much!"

This instant transformation doesn't only affect people at the beginning of their career. Gerald Verno already was already in management when he found our work teaching strategic awareness. He also seemed surprise at how much difference it made:

"I picked up a copy of your book 'The Art of Management' and began applying it to my career. The rewards were instantaneous...It has helped in many situations!!!"

Another fan of our Management Warrior work is Bohdan Chac. He was particular impressed by the techniques it offered for winning without conflict. He now finds it invaluable in helping him deal with the internal politics of his organization He writes: 

"My favorite chapter was 7 'internal politics'. It is amazing how much of my time (well paid) was spent on it [internal politics] and that in reality it was all wasted. ...As you move up the corporate ladder, you are forced to play more and more politics, and for an entrepreneur like myself it is the hardest part cause I feel like its all a wasted time."

That idea is echoed by Amit Gupta, who also had a problem with internal politics. He discovered that he had to change his strategic reflexes in order to avoid them. He writes again about our Management Warrior book:

"I really feel that this book came at the right time. I was kind of trying to find a way to better my position in corporate world. I am not too good a politician and found myself trapped into corporate politics for no good reason. After understanding the difference between planning and strategy, I was able to find out where I was wrong."

As we have heard again and again, no matter how far along you are in your career, mastering Sun Tzu's methods can help you in your career. This is true even if you are already a university science professor at Harvard like Sam Guo. He writes us:

"This is a wonderful book, which tells people of how to succeed in their career. For me it provides tips of how to become a great professor in science."

Nor do you have to be in the business world. Ron Hatfield was a former prosecutor who went into the public sector focusing on public safety and victim programs who felt he had "been at war for the past twenty years." Contrasting his work as a prosecutor with working in the public sector, he writes:

"...I didn't know who the "enemy" was. As a prosecutor, it was pretty easy - the defendant and his/her attorney. However, I wasn't supposed to be at war with my prospective client, but it very often seemed that I was."

Once again, as we hear so often, we were able to help him understand his position for the first time in year almost instantly.

"The first pages of this book really brought into clarity who my enemy was, and it made all the sense in the world!"

Of course, our work isn't just about providing understanding, it is about retraining people's automatic responses to situations. The stories that customers tell us often perfectly illustrate how differently they behave. Dan (who asked us not to use his last name), another student of our Warrior Class Lessons, tells the story about how he was backstabbed by a coworker during a meeting. At first, he felt his old anger, but then something different happened:

"After work I was walking to the car, plotting my revenge, when I came to my senses. My first thought was profit."

He found himself comparing the relative positions of the man who backstabbed him and himself.  He quickly realized that his success in his career had nothing to do with getting into battles with this particular person. He goes on to say:

"Normally I would have lain awake all night thinking about what [he] did and what my response should be, but once I thought about the terrain, our relative positions, and the position I am trying to move into I was completely calm about the whole incident...what he did can only hurt me if I let it distract me from pursuing success on my terms. I really appreciate what I have learned from your books. I wish more people would read them."

Without developing your strategic reflexes, the science tells us that you cannot help but react emotionally. Training yourself to recognize strategic situations  not only improves your career, but it can improve the way the world works.

The range of people who find benefits in the our training is amazing. Our methods work whether you have studied Sun Tzu for years or are just discovering his work. They work for experienced professionals and for kids.  You may have studied strategy for years or never thought you needed to use strategy, and you will find what we teach immediately useful.

It is the brilliance of Sun Tzu's brilliant work, and how we teach it. While most translations obscure the meaning of Sun Tzu's original formulas, our work is aimed at helping people understand what cannot be translated.

For example, a reader from a mathematics department at a university in Thailand writes us that he had read many versions of Sun Tzu in both English and Thai and dreamed of understanding its deeper meaning, but that he thought it was "hopeless" because he couldn't read the ancient Chinese. After discovering our work, he wrote us:

Your book The Art of War plus The Ancient Chinese Revealed and [your] many internet sites now make my dream alive...It is very original and opens my eyes..."

Similarly, those with a great deal of experience in the both Chinese and strategy write us praising our work.

Dick Buxton started studying Mandarin at the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, CA in 1968. He was stationed throughout Asia while he was in the Navy. After getting out, he got his masters in Oriental Studies with a concentration in Chinese history, studying Chinese at the National Taiwan University and working as a China analyst for the intelligence community. He found our books at the Spy Museum in Washington, D.C. and wrote to complement us saying:

"Having had my scholastic head in modern China, I never really read the original Chinese version, and only referred to it now and again whenever Mao’s Chinese Revolution came up or I had a need to refer to Mao’s tactics in the countryside prior to 1949. When I saw your book the other day, I just had to pick it up. I’ve been reading it nightly – the Chinese and the English – and it has renewed my interest in studying Chinese again."

At the opposite end of the spectrum are the parents that we hear from who find these ideas so simple that they are teaching them to their kids. For example, Dave Harper writes:

found your work especially helpful because it conveys, in readily understood terms, the principles in The Art of War - such as positioning, leverage, etc. One book in particular of yours, the Warrior Class: 306 Lessons in Strategy, is most helpful...Would you believe my eldest children (aged 5,6,8) quiz each other from the Warrior Class?...thank you once again for the excellent work you are doing."

Nor is Dave alone in finding this ideas so easy that children can appreciate them. Ossy Hernadez was one of those people who had collected many versions of Sun Tzu's The Art of War, but who said that he really didn't understand the work until he got our version for career building. He said:

"The intro on that book alone --the 5 element diagram, 4 skills which none of the other books speak of--helped me realize that there was more to The Art of War. My daughter already understands the 4 basic skills that are needed to survive in this competitive world. And she's only 7! She already has her sights on being president one day. Again, thank you very much."

We hear from many people who found that other versions of Sun Tzu's work obscured its meaning. For example,   Edwin Fuentes writes:

"As I read through your translation, I felt that I understood his [Sun Tzu's] work better and felt that other versions include too many excerpts from other people and confuse the reader more, making the reader not understand Tzu's original work for what it is."

A lot of people also write us to say how valuable they find our methods of diagramming Sun Tzu's ideas. Dennis Cobb was serving a fellowship that required a great deal of travel, bringing him to Beijing, where he purchased a number of books on Sun Tzu. He writes us:

I find myself engrossed in digesting your take on this classic. I have greatly enjoyed your take on Sun's work, and quite like the diagrammatic method. It reinforces the duality of every aspect of competition in a way that stays sharp when involved competitive situations...Keep up the good work!"

Jeff S. agrees, having also spent some time studying Sun Tzu. He says:

"Your book [Amazing Secrets] is awesome. I've been studying AOW for around two years and your translation, commentary and especially the diagrams really help explain the concepts."

Or course, our interest is not just in explaining Sun Tzu, but in using it to help people with their lives. We are trying to bring something totally new to this "self-help" category. 

Bill Kopps who has a background of helping develop self-help books agrees. Working in psychological analysis and clinical psychology, he has reviewed several self-help systems and worked with those developing self-help books. However, he has generally soured on these books writing us:

"I tend to not look at them anymore because after a person has read a few they become redundant."

Then he goes on to say:

"But for some reason your course stuck out as seeming different...I wrote this email because I think your self help approach adds to the self help books and self help systems found today.  It is a new and novel approach. I would also like to express my thanks for the good job done on the audio and written form of 'The Art of War.'"

James Mirabel is a business person in Corpus Christi, Texas, and a student of our Warrior Class Lessons. He sums it up nicely:

"...Sun Tzu's Art of War keeps the science of Strategy simple so that even the average lay person can apply his principals to their everyday life. Sun Tzu's Strategy is easy to understand and with practice can change a persons life & way of thinking to give them a competitive edge in any situation...The one major change that really sticks out to me is how I now analyze every situation and relate the principals of the art of war to every completive situation. It is starting to become automatic."

Can we help you understand what you could be doing better in your life? The best way to find out is to start now.