The Principles of War underpin military doctrine and conduct, they have been determined as a result of experience in conflict by examining the key components present in all successful military operations. As such, these principles can be applied to the conduct of more general, commercial and business activities to enhance the likelihood of success. Ergo, they can be considered as the Principles of Winning. Application of the principles alone does not guarantee success; however, failure to adhere to any of them will almost certainly guarantee failure in battle.

Selection and maintenance of the aim is making absolutely clear, precisely what is to be achieved (by whom, when and why) to ensure all concerned remain focused and all associated actions are co-ordinated. The aim must be understood and fully accepted by all involved. All activity must be aimed at achieving and contribute towards achieving the aim and it is important to understand in reality the aim may (will) change as the battle progresses.

Maintenance of morale will be crucial in determining the outcome of combat in the event of all things being equal, ie. when no side has a clear advantage. Irrespective of context and situation – well motivated people with high morale perform better than those without. Good morale can be the difference between success and failure; morale and motivation are the responsibility of leaders.

Security within any military context is generally obvious; in the business context the principle of security is concerned with managing all the essential risks necessarily taken to achieve an outcome. This includes (say) confidentiality, copyright, financial constraints, succession planning, etc. as much as the more obvious health and safety in operations. Security is as much about facilitating and safeguarding the bold moves which gain competitive advantage as it is about looking after routine business.

Surprise is about gaining advantage by doing the unexpected; it is the deliberate ‘wrong footing’ of the enemy (competition) to bring about his/her demise. Creativity, courage and speed are the key ingredients to surprise and as such need to be nurtured and developed as an organisational attitude. In a business context the ‘enemy’ may be a competitor, a specific situation or set of circumstances.

Offensive action is about proactive, deliberate action aimed at winning through in order to achieve the stated aim – exploiting advantage, opportunity and strength to accomplish the task. Again, this is as much an organisational attitude as anything else. To understand the nature of this principle as a ‘mind set’ consider polar views of defining business success in the current ‘economic climate’ presented in this question. Is success about avoiding failure or achieving stated objectives irrespective of prevailing circumstances? Offensive action is proactively doing what is required to succeed; it is not about accepting mediocrity or avoiding failure.

Concentration of force is about applying decisive force and effort at the most decisive place and time to secure victory in battle as no army can be the best at everything all the time. In the business world this principle is about achieving the right effect in the right location to ensure the desired outcome; for example (say) timing and targeting of investment to yield the best possible return. Rarely, if ever, will the opportunity of the right force being present at the right time in the right place present itself; concentration of force is a managed deliberate act of choice.

Economy of effort is self evident; it is about efficiency in all you undertake. Essentially, it is concerned with understanding the nature and effect of attrition on the conduct of enduring campaigns. It is about shrewd decision making, careful preparation and squeezing all you can from your resources and assets in order to retain sufficient reserves to deal with contingencies and exploit opportunities as they arise. In business this is about (say) spending as little as possible on those items which do not contribute directly to the main aim in order to direct revenue where it will be more effective in achieving the aim. This is not to be confused with ‘cost cutting’.

Flexibility, attitudinal and organisational flexibility, is required to be able to recognise when change is necessary and to change when needed. This requires strength of character and moral courage to change or modify a plan or course of action when the existing one is doomed to failure. The military maxim ‘no plan survives contact with the enemy unchanged’ is borne from hard earned experience, and understanding where the fine line lies between dogged determination to succeed and sheer ‘bloody minded’ dogma leading to failure.

Co-operation is about ensuring unity of effort to achieve a shared outcome and accessing the combined attributes of diversity. The challenge is to overcome inherent disposition to favour a single perspective or approach and inevitably necessitates compromise between those involved. In an organisation, co-operation is concerned with both interpersonal actions and interdepartmental activities. There is very little to no room for significant individual, personal gain in an organisation if achieving organisational aims has primacy.

Sustainability is about ensuring longevity of both operations and effect and, as such, is primarily to do with long term logistical support to the enduring operation in a military context. For example, having the resources and support mechanism in place to ensure the commander can deliver (say) a defined number of missiles at a given rate throughout the expected duration of the battle and beyond. The business parallels are relatively easy to draw; for example, the supply chain is in place and has sufficient funding allocated to ensure enough pressings of the right type arrive at the factory every day for the expected duration of a production run. Sustainability requires dedicated and often ‘inglorious’ work, detailed analysis and application to task which require attributes and skills difficult to find and attract in business.

There is no order of precedence in applying the above principles after the first, selection and maintenance of the aim. The key is all are applied in order to avoid otherwise inevitable failure. Success also involves and requires the presence of other factors and circumstances – not least of which is an element of good fortune (or luck).

Leaders influence, inspire and motivate organisations and teams to a place or situation that may have previously appeared impossible to those team members involved. Leaders are futuristic in their perspective and that is why they stand out from managers. Whilst management was invented to control and optimise production lines and other process oriented ways of working during the industrial revolution, leadership has been around for a good deal longer. Management is about process and metrics, using targets and means of measurement as its tools. Leadership is much more intrinsic in its properties; more about vision and emotion it is much more the art of inspiration rather than the science of measurement. Leadership needs flexibility to match the human instincts it inspires, it needs vision to create and make real the desired end state, it needs trust to create the cohesion and judgement to mange and mitigate the risks and prioritise the available resources.

Strategy is about all this, it consists of four key tenets Vision, Risk Mitigation, Talent Management and the prioritisation of resources. The tenets are interdependent and require an overall strategy to hold them together and keep them synchronised. Strategy is not about two years it’s about 5- 10 years. Strategy is about inspiration and vision in a changing environment, it affords an opportunity to select a course and change a course, dependent upon the situational requirement to map out a route that matches the circumstances and yet still delivers the required end state. Strategy is synonymous with great leadership and it informs and inspires those managers and those teams that work for great leaders. Leaders need to understand and use strategy.

Can leadership prevail in a profit first organisation? Understanding the fundamental differences between leadership and management goes some way to explaining the nature of what I call the Leadership Profit Conundrum.

Though relatively simple the following succinct definitions and broad principles assist in illustrating the conundrum. Firstly, leadership is fundamentally about inspiration, motivation and direction and manifest more in terms of influence and guidance. Secondly, management is fundamentally about control, co-ordination and organisation and manifest more in terms of functional regulation. I believe it is unwise to interchange the meaning and use of the words leadership and management.

In business, leadership is inextricable from organisational performance; by which I mean increasing the bottom line and looking after the shareholders interests first. This is well enough for those at the most senior levels in a business who benefit from performance related bonuses. However, company profit generally does not motivate and influence staff engagement and performance throughout an organisation. In fact, growth linked to actualisation of profit and proportion of profit distributed to workers wages is disproportionate see http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-17033039 In essence, profit growth has become detached from wages with shareholder dividends and the highest echelons’ bonuses increasing whilst wages have stagnated and regressed in real terms. Those who are producing growth and ergo profit are receiving a decreasing share. This cannot be very motivating for the majority of individuals who are tasked with improving performance.

By definition, management restricts performance by setting limits, controls and regulation; furthermore, you cannot manage the way to achieving exceptional performance above and beyond expectation. On the other hand, good leaders influence and motivate others to perform successfully and achieve exceptional performance. Three questions come to mind here; is business leadership as we have come to know it really just business management? What is the place of customer service in businesses placing priority on profit return to shareholders? Which approach, leadership or management, is most likely to deal best with the challenges of an ever changing and demanding business environment?

The Leadership Profit Conundrum is management will continue prevail whilst profit is ‘king’ even though the enduring economic climate requires good leadership to prevail in order to succeed. Try this exercise to illustrate my point. Draw three columns on a sheet of paper and in the middle column write a list of words and phrases describing the current economic environment. In the left hand column write a list of words and phrases from definitions of management and in the right hand column do the same for leadership. In order to succeed and thrive in the environment of your middle column you can choose only to go left or right – which path would you choose and why?

The Harvard Business Review (HBR) published an interesting article in 2009 entitled ‘Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis’ which, in my opinion, remains a worthwhile read and is particularly interesting on two counts.

Firstly, it was published over a year after the time generally acknowledged as the start of our prevailing economic situation. I use the word prevailing rather than current because as we draw to the end of 2011 the current forecasts for 2012 offer little optimism or hope of change for the better. The HBR article refers to ‘the current crisis’ in 2009 and forecasts economic crisis as the future norm existing beyond the recovery from recession. For me, as we enter the fifth consecutive year of ‘current crisis’, this poses the question ‘double dip’ or new economic environment?

Secondly, specialising in leadership, strategy and cohesion; the prevailing economic environment provides opportunities which simply do not exist in a benign situation. As much as regularity, dependability and certainty instil confidence they are the arena of the manager; whereas, irregularity, challenge and uncertainty provide opportunities not otherwise available to a leader. No amount of tweaking of financial mechanisms, directives or policy changes are likely to impact sufficiently on global competition, political instability, energy concerns and climate issues to remove risk and uncertainty.

So what should we do? ‘Batten down the hatches’ and rely on the same old measures and techniques that got us where we are today whilst hoping someone will ‘fix’ something somewhere to make all things good again? Or realise leadership and organisational adaptability are required to overcome the relentless challenges of our ‘new economic environment’? The problem is this, as difficult as the former may be it is undoubtedly a much easier option than the behavioural and organisational change required by the latter. Either way, the outcome is not guaranteed success though one course of action is more likely to succeed than the other.

The message in the HBR article referred to does not appear to have been popular at the time and I doubt it will be today. Perhaps because there is no ‘spoonful of sugar’ offered with the medicinal advice therein. This said, it remains worth reading all the same on http://hbr.org/2009/07/leadership-in-a-permanent-crisis/ar/1

Well we are in the doldrums economically; however we are not going to remain there as the human requirement to drive forward to seek better times begins to take effect. Quite simply when you are the bottom of a well you have two choices drown or start climbing and I believe that we are now beginning our ascent. So as we emerge into a brave new world that will be very different from all that has gone before how are we preparing for it?

Most businesses are anchored in the world of current balance sheets, reducing overheads and expenses, laying off staff and acquiring investment. All of which can have a severe negative impact on a business and its ethos,   few have had the sense to take stock of their position strategically and seize the moment. A former Prime minister who lived through harder times once said:

“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty”. – Winston Churchill

So how do we seize the current moment for sure the economic recovery will be slow and for sure the competition will be tough and getting tougher and better. So how do you stand out as an organisation that gives added value?

People buy from people, people do business with people so the answer is there: Develop your people in preparation for the new world, develop your people to take your organisation forward, develop your people to show that you care and are prepared to invest in their futures as well as your own. Customers not bosses are the ones who ultimately pay wages unless you are fortunate enough to have found a generous benefactor.

I am constantly amazed at the lack of preparedness of UK companies to train their staff to gain competitive advantage. UK companies normally train to conform to legislation. A bout 80% of training is paid for by government subsidies and the popular belief is that government funds training. Unfortunately most of this training is below NVQ level 3.  Companies don’t train when they are busy- because there isn’t the time and don’t train when they are slack – because there isn’t the money. Yet if an organisation wants to recover or better its market position in the face of improving competition now is the time to train. Now is the time to give staff the tool set and the culture to provide an organisation with the competitive advantage. Particularly in a future world that is quickly looking very different from the one that took us to the current recession. We have to do something positive to seize the opportunity.

As that same Prime Minister said:

“For myself I am an optimist- it does not seem to be much use being anything else” Winston Churchill