Openly Repair The Walkway, Secretly March to Chencang

Strategy 8

Attack the enemy with two convergent forces. The first is the direct attack, one that is obvious and for which the enemy prepares his defense. The second is the indirect, the attack sinister, that the enemy does not expect and which causes him to divide his forces at the last minute leading to confusion and disaster.


Modern Example

I used to work with this project manager at one of the large companies where I had the misfortune to have been assigned. She suffered from Nancy Reagan Syndrome, which is Napoleon Syndrome for girls. Although we were on different projects, we had the same boss - a pretty good one, actually. Being that this PM was permanent, in time she came up for promotion and was quite wisely not chosen to become a full-fledged manager. She had no people, time management, or technical skills, nor the inclination to learn same. You would have thought that would have been the end of it. But no, she was determined if nothing else. She decided to get quite cozy with her boss' boss, as in roll around in the back seat of the car kind of cozy. Lo and behold, her promotion was announced shortly thereafter, and all her boss could do about it was fume.