A Holistic Comparison between Sun Tzu's Strategic Wisdom and Western Strategic Management Thoughts
Author
Abstract
Sun Tzu, the Art of Warfare, is an ancient Chinese book, heralded as a literary masterpiece. Both military experts and academic scholars have commonly applied Sun Tzu's strategic wisdom to guide decisions they make. Much academic research related to Sun Tzu has been initiated from humanistic approach. Today, western strategic management and other theoretical models are appropriate to compare with long last ancient Chinese strategic concept. Although Sun Tzu's strategic wisdom has been researched by many management scholars, little has been examined through social science approach.
This paper examines Sun Tzu's strategic wisdom by content analysis and offers a comparison with western managerial theories. This approach will enhance the understanding of Sun Tzu's concept, and make the application of Sun Tzu's wisdom in business strategic management more practical. The results of this paper indicate that Sun Tzu's strategic wisdom could apply to the western strategic school of planning, designing, and positioning as well as to the cognitive, environmental and conceptual school. However, we should aware that Sun Tzu's strategic concept emphasize on leader's point of view, thus missing the consideration of the influence of organizational aspects on decision making and this limitation should invites further examination of the ancient Chinese strategies.
Key Words
Sun Tzu's Art of War、strategy management、content analysis
