Achilles Slays Hector, Peter Paul Rubens, 1630-1635
So Gahlord Dewald, seriously one of the big brains in the real estate industry, puts up a thought-provoking post on strategy. It’s worth reading in full. But I got obsessed with his definition of strategy, especially since I just wrote a post on strategy. Funny how things seem to come in bunches. Anyhow, Gahlord on Strategy:
Strategy
The art and science of maintaining and deploying resources in order to have the freedom and flexibility to continue operations.
There are a few things to unpack in this definition of strategy and since I’ve come this far I may as well unpack them.
- Strategy is an art because it involves personal choices.
- Strategy is a science because there are often visible and repeatable results.
- Maintaining resources is about conservation and growing.
- Deploying resources is about spending and taking action.
- Freedom is your ability to execute your plans at will.
- Flexibility is your ability to respond, react and pivot when required.
- Winning means to continue operations.
So that’s the root theory of strategy that I follow, as much as a bullet list will allow anyway. For the purpose of our “Large Business vs Small Business and the use of Social” conversation, the most important part is what I see as “winning.” It’s merely the ability to continue to operate.
It’s a really nice formulation. I posted a response on his blog in which I reveal that my definition of winning involves not just continuing operations, but getting the other guy to cease operations. It’s a far more martial, more violent, less peaceful view of the term, I guess.
So how might the above be modified if you believe, as I do, that strategy cannot be divorced from conflict. In business, we call that conflict “competition”.
Click: The Magic of Instant Connections is a slim little volume that resists easy classification. I suppose you could call it a book on psychology, as it explores a particular phenomenon that isn’t well-researched: how people connect with each other. From Chapter 1:
This book is about those mysterious moment — when we click in life. Those moments when we are fully engaged and feel a certain natural chemistry or connection with a person, place, or activity
Except it’s about far more than those “mysterious moments”. And as it turns out, I think Click has a good deal of applicability to the modern practice of real estate in a bunch of ways.
Get yer popcorn here! Fresh piping hot popcorn!
Earlier today, we had a bit of a brouhaha among the Twitterati of the real estate set. The genesis was this video blog by Greg Cooper in which he blasted Todd Carpenter, attacked him personally, and laid the heavy artillery on to NAR. Which then brought responses from various members of the RE.net, some friendly to Todd and others hostile to him, and resulted in this post by Bill Lublin.
Periodically, it seems we get one of these little kerfuffles in the RE.net; I personally think it’s pretty healthy. As far as the specifics of the Todd vs. Greg deal and all of that, the whole thing is likely blown way out of proportion, and others will address the “personal vs. corporate” burdens on someone using his personal channels. I hear Jay Thompson is working on a post. Suffice to say that Todd is a great guy, and if any “embarrassment” resulted, I’m 100% positive he did not intend it. So count me in Team @Tcar as far as that goes.
But the real issue I’d like to discuss is actually from a comment by Ines Hegedus-Garcia to Bill’s post which goes:
But again, that’s not the point – it’s not about Todd, it’s about the flaming of an individual on a public forum that totally crosses the line. (And the fact that is Todd makes it all the worse)
And via Twitter, there are a number of folks who thought Greg’s post was over the top, unfair, and illegitimate. Criticism, it goes, should be “constructive and thoughtful” of else, not worth the time at all.
This is where I part company with polite society.
