Long Range Planning, Vol. 26, No. 3, pp. 133 to 135, 1993
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0 1993 Pergamon Press Ltd
Brief Case: The First Strategists
Stephen Cummings
An interesting paper by Bruce Henderson in a 1989
edition of the Harvard Business Review,’ examined
the origins of strategy. The message, although by no
means clear, seems to be that the development of
strategy can be traced to biological concepts such as
natural competition-‘Biologists
are better guides
to business than economists’.
This is probably
correct. However, associating the term strategy
with the science of biology is not universally
accepted by those concerned with the advancement
of that field. Gideon Louw, of Arizona State
University’s Department
of Zoology
offers the
following argument:
The term ‘strategy’ has become common currency among
biologists
. While I w ill concede that some higher
mammals, such as a pride of hunting lions, may employ a
decision making process which borders on strategy, can you
imagine a group of barnacles convening a meeting to decide
on which set of isoenzymes to use so that their metabolism
could become temperature independent? The use of the
term (strategy) is philosophically misleading, as it implies
that a process has occurred which is the very antithesis of the
evolutionary concept of chance and necessity
. ‘strategy’
implies that a rational choice has been made and has its
origins in ancient military practice.2
In this last respect, Henderson, the management
professor, does align himself with Louw, the
zoologist, by pointing out that the elements of
strategy have been recognized and used ever since
humans combined intelligence, imagination, accumulated resources, and co-ordinated behaviour to
wage war. However,
these roots of strategic
thinking have been somewhat neglected by the field
of corporate strategy. This paper aims at beginning a
Brief Case is a portfolio of commentary, opinion, research and
experience. The editors welcome contributions, comments and ideas
from readers. These should be sent to Andrew Campbell, Marcus
Alexander and Michael Goold at Ashridge Strategic Management
Centre, 17 Portland Place, London Wl N 3AF.
Stephen Cummings lectures on corporate strategy in the Management
Group, Graduate School of Business and Government Management,
at Victoria University in New Zealand. He holds a first-class honours
degree in classical histon/ and still continues to tutor in Greek social
history with the Department of Classics at Victoria. He has published
several papers in New Zealand and Australia on behavioural end
strategic management issues. Of related interest to this paper is ‘The
Classical System-Organizational
Insights Into What Made Periclean
Athens Great’with John Brocklesby, forthcoming in SystemsPractice
(6(4), August 1993).
rectification
by briefly exploring the origin of
strategy through examining the first ‘strategists’, the
Athenian zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLK
strutegoi, whose title is derivative of our
term ‘strategy’. In so doing it hopes to resuscitate a
‘dead’,3 but insightful, metaphor for business strat-
egy. zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONML
Origin
of Strategy
The word strategy derives from the ancient Athenian position of strutegos. The title was coined in
conjunction with the democratic reforms of Kleisthenes (508/ 7 BC), who developed a new sociopolitical structure in Athens after leading a popular
revolution against a Spartan supported oligarchy.
Kleisthenes instituted 10 new tribal divisions which
acted as both military and political sub-units of the
district of Athens. At the head of each tribe was
elected a strutegos. Collectively the 10 incumbent
strategoi formed the Athenian war council. This
council and its individual members, due to the
kudos granted them, also largely controlled nonmilitary politics.
Strutegos was a compound of stratos; which meant
army, or more properly an encamped army spread
otrt over ground (in this way strutos is also allied to
stratum) and ugein; to lead. The emergence of the
term paralleled increasing military decision-making
complexity. Warfare had evolved to a point where
winning sides relied no longer on the deeds of heroic
individuals, but on the co-ordination of many units
of men each fighting in close formation. Also, the
increasing significance of naval forces in this period
multiplied the variables a commander must consider
in planning action. Consequently, questions of coordination and synergy between the various emergent units of their organizations became imperative
considerations for successful commanders.
Of what interest are the origins of strategy to those
engaging in strategic activities and decision making
in organizations today. 7 In the words of Adlai
Stevenson we can see our future clearly and wisely
only when we know the path that lead to the
present. Most involved in corporate strategy have
134
Long
Range
Planning
Vol.
26
June
1993
tures, tantamount
to the city state in microcosm.
Decision-makers
at all levels of the corporation
were expected
to think strategically,
in accordance
with the behaviour exhibited
by those in leadership
roles at higher
levels of the Athenian
system.
Stmtegoi were expected to both direct and take part
in the thick of battle, leading
their troops into
action. For a strutegos not to play an active combat
Strategy and Strategist as Defined by
role would have resulted in a significant diminution
in the morale of those fighting
for his tribe. In
Ancient Theorists
contrast, many companies today view their ‘strateAineias
the Tactician,
who
wrote
the earliest
gic planning unit’ as an advisory or staff function,
surviving
Western
volume
on military
strategy, zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA
called in to tackle specific projects but somewhat
How
to Survive
Under Siege,
in the mid-fourth
removed
from the action themselves.
century BC, was primarily
concerned
with how to
deploy available manpower,
and other resources, to
best advantage.4
The term strategy
is defined
in
Practical Lessons from the Strategoi
more detail by Frontinus in the first century AD as
‘
. . . everything
achieved
by a commander,
be it
If military
practice is identified
as a metaphor
for
characterized
by foresight, advantage, enterprise, or
business competition,
the strategic principles of the
resolution’.’
great strutegoi still provide useful guides for those in
the business of strategy
formulation
today.
For
Ancient Athenian theorists also had clear ideas as to
Pericles,
perhaps
the greatest
of the Athenian
the characteristics
that were necessary in an effective
strutegoi, the goal of military
strategies was ‘. . . to
strategos.
According
to Xenophon,
a commander
limit risk while holding fast to essential points and
‘must be ingenious,
energetic,
careful,
full of
principles’.”
His often quoted maxims of ‘Opporstamina and presence of mind, loving and tough,
tunity waits for no man’ and ‘Do not make any new
straightforward
and crafty,
alert and deceptive,
conquests during the war’, are still applicable advice
ready to gamble everything
and wishing
to have
in a modern business environment.
everything,
generous
and greedy,
trusting
and
suspicious’.h These criteria for identifying
an excelEpaminondas
of Thebes was said to have brought
lent strategist still ring true.
the two arms of his military
corporation,
infantry
little knowledge
of where that path began. A great
deal of insight into strategy
can be gained from
examining
those from whom we inherit the term.
The first strategists-the
Greek strategoi, perhaps
practised strategy in its purest sense.
Xenophon
goes on to describe the most important
attribute
for an aspiring
strategos/ statement
as
‘
. . . knowing
the business which you propose to
carry out’.’ The Athenians in this period were very
concerned
that their leaders had an awareness
of
how things worked at the ‘coal-face’.
Strategoi were
publicly
elected by their fellow
members
of the
Athenian
organization,
and to be considered
a
credible candidate one had to have worked
one’s
way into
this position
through
demonstrating
prowess at both individual
combat and ‘hands-on’
military leadership. Wisdom was considered to be a
citizen’s ability to combine
political
acumen
and
practical
intelligence,8
and stvategoi should be the
wisest of citizens. The organization’s
future lay in
the hands of these men and, ipofdcto,
the strategic
leadership of the Athenian organization
was not to
consider itself immune from hardship when times
were tough:
‘no man was fitted to give fair and
honest advice in council
if he has not, like his
fellows, a family at stake in the hour of the city’s
danger’.”
To the ancient Athenians strategy was very much a
line function.
The formulation
of strategy
was a
leadership
task. The Athenian
organization
developed by Kleisthenes
was extremely
recursive.‘” The
new tribes, and the local communities
which these
tribes comprised,
formed the units and sub-units of
the army, and were, in their socio-political
struc-
and cavalry,
together
in a ‘fruitful organizational
blend’.‘* The Theban’s strategic principles included:
an economy
of force coupled with overwhelming
strength
at the decisive point;
that the close coordination
between
units,
and meticulous
staff
planning should be combined
with speed of attack;
and that the quickest and most economical
way of
winning
a decision is to defeat the competition
not
at his weakest but his strongest point.13 Epaminondas
was Philip of Macedon’s
mentor, and it was largely
due to the application
of the Theban’s
innovations
that the Macedonian
army grew to an extent where
it was able to realize Alexander
the Great’s (Philip’s
son) vast ambitions.
The close integration
of all its
individual
units became the major strength of the
Macedonian
army organization.14
Alexander
himself
is perhaps
the most famous
ancient
exponent
of a contingency
approach
to
strategy. It is often told that as a young man he was
asked by his tutor Aristotle what he would do in a
given situation.
Alexander
replied that his answer
would
depend
on the circumstances.
Aristotle
described
a hypothetical
set of circumstances
and
asked his original question again. To this the student
answered:
‘I cannot tell until the circumstances
arise.’ In practice Alexander
was not often caught
An example
is related
by
without
a ‘plan-B’.
Alexander,
fearing
the
Frontinus : ‘At Arbela,
numbers of the enemy, yet confident in the valour
of his own troops, drew up a line of battle facing in
Brief
all directions,
in order that the men if surrounded,
might be able to fight from any side’.15
Ancient Approaches
of Strategy
The
First Strategists
135
Now, as then, our strategic vision can be refreshed
and stimulated
through studying the character and
deeds of the great strategic leaders of the past. zyxwvutsrqponm
to the Learning
The ancient Greeks took great interest in both the
practical and theoretical
aspects of strategic leadership. They favoured
the case method
as the best
means of passing this knowledge
from one generation of strategists to the next. Frontinus argued that
‘
will be furnished with
. . . in this way commanders
specimens
of wisdom
and foresight,
which
will
serve to foster their own power of conceiving
and
also
executing
like deeds ‘.I6 Aineias and Xenophon
used and championed
such methods in ways which
would please any ‘Harvardophile’.
The best crafted
exposition
of the case method, however, belongs to
Plutarch, biographer
to the ancient world’s greatest
leaders :
It is true, of course,
Case:
that our outward
sense cannot avoid
apprehending
the various objects it encounters,
merely by
virtue of their impact and regardless of whether
they are
useful or not: but a man’s conscious intellect is something
which he may bring to bear or avert as he chooses, and can
very easily transfer it to another object as he sees fit. For this
reason,
we ought
to seek out virtue
not merely
to
contemplate
it, but to derive benefit from doing so. A
colour, for example, is well suited to the eye if its bright and
agreeable tones stimulate and refresh the vision, and in the
same way we ought to apply our intellectual vision to those
models which can inspire it to attain its own proper virtue
through the sense of delight they arouse.
[such a model is]
no sooner seen than it rouses the spectator into action, and
yet it does not form his character by mere imitation,
but by
promoting
the understanding
of virtuous deeds it provides
him with a dominating
purpose.”
References
(1) B. Henderson, The origin of strategy,
67 (6).
Harvard Business
43, November-December
(1989).
139-I
(2) G. Louw, Biological ‘strategies’,
Science,
Review,
203, 9 March (1979:
955).
(3) H. Tsoukas, The missing link: A transformational
metaphors in organizational science, Academy
Review,
16 (3).
(4) D. Whitehead,
Siege,
566-585
Aineias
(1991).
the Tactician-How
to Survive
Under
Clarendon (1990: 17).
(5) Frontinus,
Strategems,
1.
(5) Xenophon, Memorabilia,
3.1.
(7) Xenophon,
3.6.
(3) Plutarch,
Memorabilia,
Themistocles.
2.
(3) Thucydides, The Peloponnesian
(10)
view of
of Management
War, 2.44.
S. Cummings and J. Brocklesby, The classical system-organ-
izational
Systems
insights into what made Periclean Athens
6 (4) (forthcoming, 1993).
great,
Practice,
(11) D. Kagan,
Pericles ofAthens
and the Birth of Democracy,
p. 243,
Free Press (1991).
(12) H. Delbruck,
Framework
The History
of
of Political History,
the
Art
of
War-Within
the
Translation by W. Renfroe Jr,
p. 166, Greenwood (1975).
(13) P. Green,
Biography,
Alexander
of Macedon
356-323
B.C. A Historical
p. 25, University of California Press (1991).
(14) H. Delbruck, op. cit., p. 180.
(15) Frontinus,
Strategems,
11.3.19.
(16) Frontinus,
Strafegems,
I.
(17)
Plutarch, Pericles,
l-2.