How to use the card deck for serious strategy planning

Short Concept Video

 Robert Cantrell, the author, is a professional strategist and a client of Atchity Editorial/Entertainment International

Leadership Styles

What has been the apparent favorite card for some key leaders?

A great strategist will have the capacity to draw on a wide range of possible actions to find success.  He will, however, tend to have favorites, especially if a given strategic principle is working or has worked in their past.  Here are some leaders and their observed favorites.

A question to ask, did their strategic preference match their situation, did it develop from the situation, or both?  Also, where you have leadership efforts that failed at the end, the failures often happened when the leaders moved off their usual style, for whatever reason.  Failing to maintain the discipline of their strategic approach was what happened to Lee when he ordered Pickett's Charge up the center of the Union lines and Napoleon when he forsake advantages of maneuver at Waterloo. 

Powerful people tend to figure out a strategic approach that works for them and stick with it.  If the person you study is an adversary, that can help you determine what will be your best counterstrategy?  Put another way, one of the best known pieces of strategic advice from Sun Tzu is to know your enemy as you know yourself.  The Art of War: Sun Tzu Strategy Card Deck provides a way to do just that.  

If you are successful, then you probably also have a card you play very well.  Do you know what it is?  If you have not been as successful as you would like, then you may not have found your card or the right place to play it.

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Jeff Bezos - Two of Spades

Napoleon Bonaparte - Six of Clubs

Joshua Chamberlain - Joker Red Star

Winston Churchill - Three of Clubs (among others)

Albert Einstein - 2 of Hearts

Dwight D. Eisenhower - Ten of Diamonds

Mahatma Gandhi - Joker Black Star

Bill Gates - Ten of Spades

Ulysses Grant and William Sherman - Jack of Clubs

Andy Grove - Nine of Spades

Heinz Guderian - Eight of Clubs

Thomas (Stonewall) Jackson - Five of Diamonds

Steve Jobs - Ace of Clubs

Garry Kasparov - King of Spades

John F. Kennedy - King of Diamonds

Lao Tzu - Ace of Hearts

Robert E. Lee - Ten of Clubs

Abraham Lincoln - Ace of Diamonds

Peter Lynch - King of Clubs

John Mosby - Two of Spades

Barack Obama - Five of Spades...Has been very effective until the Presidential Debates of October 3rd.  Will need to play another card...

Joel Olsteen - Seven of Hearts

Larry Page - Five of Hearts

George S. Patton - Queen of Clubs

Colin Powell - Queen of Spades

Ronald Reagan (against Soviets first term) - Six of Spades

Ronald Reagan (against Soviets second term) - Nine of Clubs

Sidney Reilly ("Ace of Spies") - King of Hearts

Manfred von Richtofen - Jack of Spades

Mitt Romney (at Bain) - Jack of Hearts

Mitt Romney at 3 OCT Presidential Debates - 10 of Clubs "Challenge your adversary's plans with an aggressive defense that is prepared to receive him."  Good counter to a 5 of Spades used by Obama.  Obama's performance shows quite clearly the card Romney should play next.

Joseph Stalin - Ace of Spades

Sun Tzu - Jack of Diamonds

Donald Trump - Queen of Hearts

George Washington - Two of Clubs

Mark Zuckerberg - Nine of Diamonds

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