Finite or Infinite Play?

Earl Johnson, a work friend of mine, shared an interesting video with me a few weeks ago. Simon Sinek is speaking at Google on leadership. He couches it in terms of game theory. There are games that have an ending. Someone wins and the game is over. There are games that never end. Players come and go, but the game keeps happening. He links these kinds of gaming mentality to business concepts.

• Arbitrary (short term) wins v. values-based strategies
• Growth focus v. stability focus

The video is close to an hour long. It took me a few days to get through it. The bulk of the thesis is presented in the first 20 minutes. The rest is a Q&A where he brings out additional ideas and examples from politics, warfare, and corporate competition to support the basic argument. He also talks about the need to link both kinds of games. Short term growth is not bad so long as you know to what end. How  will growth support the vision? The examples seem pretty concrete.

Thanks, Earl. I found it worth the time.

Here’s the link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_osKgFwKoDQ