Strategy Lessons from Barack Obama (2)

Be calm and focused on your strategy. Be passionate but not emotional: Success in strategy requires intense focus, passion and commitment. But the line between passion and emotions is very thin. Don’t cross that line. Barack Obama never crossed the line. John McCain crossed it virtually every day of the campaign. He got angry, appearing irritated and insulted that Obama had the audacity to contest against him. In the debates, he couldn’t bare to look directly at Obama. The problem is anger and other disruptive emotions get in the way of your reasoning and lead to mistakes, and not surprisingly McCain moved from one error to another, acquiring a reputation as being erratic. Note however that genuine positive emotions (such as Hillary’s tearful moment) may sometimes help.

Execution is everything!: Barack Obama built an overwhelming and tight execution capacity and worked it very tightly through the primaries to the general election. Plans are nothing, if you can’t execute them. You must have a very effective and disciplined organisation that ensures you carry out your plans before your competitor. He raised money easily, had foot soldiers all over the US, even in republican strongholds and built a system that delivered the voters.

Use Technology: Obama’s campaign reminds businesses that technology can be a real source of competitive advantage, and not just a cost centre, or fanciful machines. The campaign used the internet better than any other campaign, used social networking sites such as facebook and myspace, kept an impressive database of supporters with whom it communicated seamlessly and raised vast sums of money through the internet, leaving experienced politicians versed in “manual” face-to-face politics wondering what hit them. Don’t just buy fashionable technology. Use it to overwhelm your opposition.

Charisma and Intellect combined with sound strategy and excellent communication skills make you an unbeatable brand: It is not accidental that the most important leaders in business and politics are charismatic and communicate well. J.F Kennedy, Bill Clinton, Kwame Nkrumah, Martin Luther King Jnr, Murtala Muhammed, Tony Blair are all “good looking” and speak well. For businesses, your brand is your looks, and your brand projection and external communication represents your ability to speak well. Nurture your “looks” and “speech” and your business will thrive. But note that this people didn’t just speak well, they had the intellect and depth to go with it. So build your brand on substance, not hype (like Sarah Palin).

Don’t fight today’s or tomorrow’s wars using yesterday’s strategies: Successful generals always make the mistake of using their old successful tactics and strategies anytime they are confronted with a new foe, ultimately to their peril. The war front and the competitive market place are always changing. No matter how successful you have been in the past, carefully observe in what way the terrain has changed and adapt or even overhaul your strategy accordingly. The Republican Party has been very successful against the democrats, beating Al Gore and John Kerry with a much weaker candidate-George W Bush. But they did not recognise that Americans were tired of war, and were worried about the economy. These ultimately cost them victory. Obama on the other hand, suspected that Americans wanted a new direction, with less partisanship, and issue-oriented campaigns, and crafted an appropriate strategy.

When the industry leader is over-confident and complacent, it may be time to move against him: The “industry leaders” in America were tired and arrogant, a very bad combination. The Republicans as a party, and the political elite-the Bushes, McCains, Clintons, and Kennedys no longer had the fire in their belly that had propelled them to the top. They now had a sense of entitlement, as if the world was obligated to them. Well the world owes you nothing! The market owes you nothing! You succeed or fail on your current performance, not historical record. Obama had that fire and challenged the tired incumbents. It is the same in business. Success often changes the successful and presents an opportunity to the ambitious. Seize that opportunity.

Don’t fight dirty, but don’t ignore your opponent’s underhand tactics: Barack Obama learnt important lessons from Al Gore, John Kerry and even Michael Dukakis. The republicans used “swift boat politics” to destroy Kerry’s record as a war hero; they rigged out Al Gore in Florida; and they turned Dukakis’ intellect against him making him look like a Harvard academic rather than a political leader. Guess what they used all three against Obama, but none of them worked because Obama prepared against all those tactics. He responded to every Jeremiah Wright or William Ayers accusation; he aggressively brought out black, Latino and young voters in the battleground states and encouraged early voting to preclude a Florida scenario; and he was careful not to validate republican accusations of being ‘professorial’.

Build a loyal and committed team: Barack Obama reminds us of the invaluable benefit of having a loyal and committed team. The Obama campaign was a very loyal powerhouse, with no leaks and everyone absolutely committed to the team’s success. Victory was not just a credit to Obama, it was about Michelle Obama, David Plouffe, David Axelrod, Robert Gibbs, Paul Harstad, Susan Rice, Gregory Craig, Rahm Emmanuel, Valerie Jarret and other members of the tight Chicago team that Obama assembled working together towards a common goal. Obama had his back covered. Many people are surrounded by their enemies. To succeed in any enterprise, ensure you are surrounded by the right people.

Strategy Lessons from Barack Obama (1)

The strategist may be concerned and may derive conceptual lessons and applications from national development strategies, military and war strategy, politics, sports, love and friendship, personal success and even from spiritual warfare and the Bible. I have for instance written on these pages “Strategy Lessons from football” which was an attempt to distil lessons business managers could learn from soccer. I have also written “The Ultimate Strategist”-that of course is the Almighty God, who alone ultimately grants success to any human venture-“except the Lord builds, they labour in vain who build the house”.

Today we focus on politics and specifically Barack Obama’s astounding victory in the November 4, 2008 US presidential elections. It was an improbable victory. It looked like a long shot. Obama sought a political objective that was unprecedented, perhaps revolutionary. Yet in the end, his victory was total and complete, even redefining the US political map and changing probably for ever the course of political and social development in America and the rest of the world. Surely there must be some lessons business managers and strategists can learn from Barack Obama. In this article, we attempt to identify some of those lessons.

Don’t accept Industry Orthodoxy: If Obama had accepted the accepted orthodoxy in the political “industry”, he would have believed that he needed to build up a decent Senate legislative record before he could countenance a run for the White House. He would also have been told that an African-American could not hope to win the US presidency, especially a first-generation one with a Kenyan father, and a Muslim background. Obama did not believe any of this believing that industry conditions are dynamic, not static, and that individual market participants are not helpless concerning them. In short, he sought and succeeded in shaping his industry, rather than accepting received wisdom.

There is no reason why you can’t aim for industry leadership: Related to the above point, Obama felt he was as entitled as any one else to become US president. That would have been presumptuous considering the giants like Hillary Clinton (a former first lady with the powerful Clinton machinery behind her) within his party, and a war hero and distinguished long serving Senator like John McCain who he faced in the general election. Any conventional “manager” may have been sensible to discount the possibility of victory in such a lop-sided contest. But not Obama, and his audacity of hope. The concept of strategic intent is similar. Successful companies set audacious, stretch goals, and put strategy, passion and commitment behind them, and many times, they succeed.

Look beyond current industry boundaries: Barack Obama may not have won either the democratic primary or the general election if he didn’t attract new voters into the equation. So he aggressively courted young, first time voters and encouraged many to vote for the very first time. Business strategists must similarly think beyond current consumers and markets. Where are the “blue oceans”? Who are the consumers of the future? How can your firm change the market boundaries to your advantage?

When there is a winning idea, resources and capital will always be available: Many firms and entrepreneurs blame the shortcomings of their businesses on the lack of finance. Obama suggests otherwise. There is no conceivable reason why anyone could have expected Obama to raise more money than Hillary or McCain. But markets recognise good ideas. If your idea is a winning one, capital will become available.

A nimble, creative and resourceful new entrant can outmanoeuvre the big, unwieldy, resource-rich dinosaur: At the end of the day, creativity and innovation will defeat a bigger player, who has no new ideas. John McCain brought nothing new into the general elections except the scare tactics that had been used successfully against John Kerry and Al Gore. The voters facing economic crisis had been inured against those but McCain’s strategists did not recognise the need for a new strategy. Same with Hillary-she assumed it was about experience, but the market wanted change, and it was too late before she realised.

Find the right strategy, and stick to it!: Barack Obama had only one message throughout the democratic primaries and the general election-change! While John McCain kept on trying every tactic in the book, Obama stuck to his single message-change we can believe in, change we need, change has come to Washington!

Take the battle to your opponent’s territory: Barack Obama in the last days of the campaign forced McCain to continue to defend states that were historically assumed to be safe republican territory, and in the end won several of them. He succeeded in forcing McCain on the defensive, even spending scare campaign resources in his home state of Arizona. Of course McCain could not dare near any democratic stronghold-Chicago, New York, Massachusetts etc, but was on the defensive in Ohio, Indiana, etc. Don’t be continuously defending your markets, let the competitor be busy defending his while you consolidate your own markets.