In this excellent speech ‘What game theory teaches us about war’ (Youtube), Simon Sinek reminds us that there isa great difference between playing finite or infinite games. This brings back to the book ‘Finite and Infinite Games‘ by James Carse.
“There are two types of games: there are finite games and there are infinite games. A finite game is defined as known players fixed rules and agreed-upon objective (such as baseball for example). An infinite game is defined as known and unknown players the rules are changeable and the objective is to perpetuate the game.“
He reminds us then that business or strategy is an infinite game, and those finite players won’t last long. “The game of business is an infinite game. The concept of business has existed longer than every single company that exists right now and it’ll exist long after all the companies that exist right now go away. The funny thing about business is the number of companies that are playing finite they’re playing to win they’re playing to be the best they’re playing to beat the quarter or the year and they’re always frustrated by that company that has an amazing vision, a long-term vision that seems to drive them crazy and over the long term that player will always win and the other player will run out of resources or the will and they’ll go out of business“.
There can be some differing views about how to play infinite games (see this post about whether the current unpredictability of US external policy could be a way to play the infinite game: ‘Why Simon Sinek is wrong about Game Theory.’
Still this distinction is important and it reminds us that when we play infinite games, rules are not so essential as they are constantly reinvented; and strategies such as unpredictability can be valid to have other players on their toes. Are you playing a finite or infinite game?
