The Road AheadWar & peace [Archives:2003/650/Business & Economy]

Raidan Al-Saqqaf
Nope, not Tolstoy's endless cycles of war & peace, but business' war; outsmarting the competition, gaining market share, making enormous profits, killing substitute brands, locking-up customers, making strategic alliances, and many other tactics in business are very similar to those made in war, this is why business is sometimes said to be war.
However, in businesses, there are two streams; one that says it is not enough to succeed; others must fail, and the other that says you don't have to blow out the other's light to let your own shine. These two streams represent war & peace in business.
But is business the ultimate win-lose situation or a situation of peace and harmony? The first stream consists of those businesses and businessmen who focus more on the competition (or enemy) more than focusing on how to make their own light shine brighter, these are the people who usually indulge in price wars, copying others' strategies and trying to have a bigger bite of the same pie (profits).
Yet, the other stream focuses on making a bigger pie instead of trying to have a bigger bite of the same pie; these people want the whole industry to be more profitable, and this involves cooperation between all the players in such a way that they all can compete and cooperate in the same time, not to let competition reduce the industry's overall profits.
There are many good examples for cooperating companies' take the example of Intel and Microsoft; the faster and better processors Intel makes, the more demand will be created for Microsoft's powerful softwares, and vise versa. And the better softwares Microsoft creates the more computers will be sold. And in turn the more computers will be sold the more demand will be created for software packages, and also the increased use of the internet, which will benefit phone companies through dial-up internet connections, so you can say that Intel & any internet provider are cooperating; Accrete – growing together.
But this isn't the case everywhere, the goal of business is to do well for your self, even if that was at the expense of others; it doesn't make sense to create a pie you cannot capture, so you have to undertake many war-like strategies.
In conclusion, business can be both war & peace; when it comes to making strategic alliances and cooperate with them when you are trying to increase profits and make a bigger pie, and war when it comes to getting your share of that pie. However, business, unlike war, can have multiple winners, because most businesses succeed if others only succeed; like the relative success of Intel with Microsoft with Dell, etc.
Endnote: War & peace brings together competition & cooperation, because both are important for business survival and prosperity.
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