The assertion "business isn't war" (De Wit & Meyer p. 511) made me stop and think, as I instinctively challenged the statement. The arguments following that statement say that relations are a mix of co-operation and competition, as if this is somehow different to what goes on in war situations. Man is a competitive being, despite the veneer of civilisation which society applies to mitigate our basic urges for dominance and power over others. Successful business leaders tend to be regarded by those followers who never attain the heights of top business success as ruthless and determined also key attributes of the successful warrior. China's most famous general, Sun Tzu's precepts are still being used as business maxims 4500 years after he wrote "The Art of War". Niccolo Machiavelli's great work "The Prince" is a powerful treatise on the use and application of power amongst the trading states of fifteenth century Italy one of the first business texts and still fascinating reading, even if a touch extreme in its ideas for today's tastes.

Whether at an individual level or between businesses, everyone is looking out for themselves first, and only after that is covered does co-operation get a look-in. Maslow's principles of satisfying the basic needs before "higher" ones applies just watch how behaviours change when a business is in trouble a situation I've experienced several times from the inside. Staff CV's are polished and distributed in secret, competitors try to poach customers, staff or teams from the ailing firm, and opportunist takeover bids appear out of nowhere. When have you ever heard of friendly assistance being offered by competitors? Maybe banks protecting the good name of banking will bail out another ailing bank, but that's just self-protection from loss of consumer confidence. Business certainly is war, just slightly more civilised than the trenches of 1914.

"Formerly when great fortunes were only made in war, war was business; but now when great fortunes are only made by business: Business is war!"
Christian Nevell Bovee
1820-1904, American Author, Lawyer

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