The Way of Go
8 Ancient Strategy Secrets for Success in Business and Life
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- $15.99
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- $15.99
Publisher Description
For centuries, business, political, and military leaders throughout Asia have had a secret weapon for success -- the philosophies and strategies found in an ancient game called Go.
Now, Troy Anderson, an entrepreneur, knowledge management expert, Fortune 500 management consultant, and one of only five Americans to train at the Japanese Professional Go Academy, brings these philosophies and strategies to the West.
Leaders and intellects such as Mao Tse-tung, Bill Gates, and John Nash (the game was featured in the movie A Beautiful Mind) as well as many CEOs and political leaders throughout Asia are among the 27 million people who have played this simple two-person board game known as the "game of geniuses."
In this unique book, Troy Anderson shares the essential elements of strategy and competition that define the game of Go and shows how these principles can be applied wherever strategy is called for:
• How to make use of limited resources and time to produce the largest gain • Which initiatives to continue and which to abandon • When to lead and when to follow your opponent • How to weigh competing interests among different units • How to enter a market where the competition is already well established • How to proceed to ensure success if the competition enters your market • How to create a strategic plan when the market changes quickly • How to go global but think locally
Go provides experience and understanding regarding basic strategic problems that no other art, science, or field, other than war, can readily claim. In addition to an enriching account of how the game of Go has influenced Anderson's life, the valuable lessons imparted here add up to a powerful prescription for success -- whether you are seeking professional achievement, better competitive understanding, stronger personal relationships, or simply a more rewarding life.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Anderson, a consultant and managing director of Knowledge Initiatives at the Fannie Mae Foundation, is an accomplished player of Go an ancient and popular Japanese game gaining fans around the world. Requiring strategic moves like chess, the game is more complex and can teach players how to handle situations in business and life, Anderson argues; "Most strategies resource allocation decisions are at their roots classic Go strategy problems," he writes. Experienced players will have less difficulty than novices handling key problems such as when to expand into a competitor's territory, how to allocate scarce resources and how to create strategies in a time of rapid change because of their knowledge of Go. Anderson is an adept writer and conveys his enthusiasm for the game, particularly when he recalls devoting an inordinate amount of time to it during his college days. He arrives in Tokyo without even a hotel room but simply the names of a few players and an eagerness to learn from the masters of Go. Anderson does offer some real business scenarios to support his thesis. However, readers unfamiliar with Go may find the book tedious; without an understanding of the game's strategies, they're unlikely to be persuaded that the game's lessons are critical to business success.
