Table of Contents
1. King Safety First
The short castle is one of the commonest moves. The King is put to the corner and the rook is brought towards the center.
Business: The king, the founder, and the owner must be in the corner, away from the attack, and let the third in command take center stage.
Example:
Zuckerberg was at the center of Meta, and it is going down the Niagra.
2. Don’t Leave a Back Rank Weakness
Often one of the most preferred moves after castle(short) is creating a space for the king to go to the front when attacked.
Business: When the top(product or personnel) is attacked, progress them to the front.
Example:
Nokia went out of business because they had no plans for their hardy mobile to get to the center.3. Always develop your minor pieces first. (knights, Bishops)
Business: Always start with small products, or 4th rank personnel and get them to market. When the major pieces are developed early, they might be attacked which gives your opponent momentum.
Example
Lyfas ECG was placed in the market before we brought out the Lyfas diagnostic application.4. Never bring out your queen early.
The opponent can attack the queen and harass it while getting their development.
Business: The product with which you want to attack the market must not be brought out too soon. Your key business plan, personnel, and the product must never be in the market before the minor pieces are well developed.
Example
Google brought Adsense, their revenue horse much later after the search was well developed.5. Minor Pieces are not of equal weight, Bishops have higher weight than Knights.
Business: A night is a smart guy, who can walk in L and not straight, but they often walk short and takes many moves to cover the board/market. A bishop is specialized and can cover the entire board, but only in a domain(black or white). Choose a specialist for the end game over the smart-guy.
Example
Zuck eliminated Sean Parker and went with Peter Theil before facebook could take the next leap.6. Connect your Rooks
Rook is the only piece after the queen with which you can checkmate the opponent. Anyone other than the queen can finish the game hunt in pairs.
Business: Rooks represent the high-integrity straightforward multi-disciplinary features or personnel who can go long, short, but straight. A team of two of top players and/or two connected tech/features is needed to win. One may remain at the end, but you need the pair.Example
Google won the market with Android+Paystore, Apple with iPhone+App Store, and Microsoft with Windows+Office won the market.7. Reply to a king-side attack with fight-for-center.
Business: When the king(product or founder) is attacked, reply with a centralized attack on the market.
Example
When Musk was attacked by the media continuously, Tesla started killing the competition.Conclusion
Cheap gambits, tricks, and ticks work at the amateur level, at the top, it is theory, practice, preparation, memory, and calculation.
Business, just like chess is a game of practice and theory. If you want to compete against the grandmasters of the business, you need to study business history, culture, people, bloodline, behavior, and habits over thousands of years and memorize them.
You need to study psychology, social science, neuroscience, finance, economics, behavioral science, and market dynamics. Then you need to study business case studies, thousands of them. And you need to keep it in your memory.
Just like chess, business is a game of calculation, but fundamentally rules are similar, and pawns and pieces are similar. Any calculation takes away significant brain energy and time. No one is smart enough to go beyond 8-16 moves of forward calculation when the market is fluid(that is both you and your opponent have multiple choices).
Not only do you need to memorize the moves, but you need to practice them in the market. You need to experiment and use the memorized moves and read the calculation.
Just like chess, business is also a fight for the center. If you are not attacking the center(the core and the fundamentals) you will be eventually defeated.
Focus on one, go all out, work hard, market share etc are all bs. There is only one winner.
