[HN Gopher] Seizing the Middle: Chess Strategy in Business
___________________________________________________________________
Seizing the Middle: Chess Strategy in Business
Author : feross
Score : 70 points
Date : 2021-06-14 13:02 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (fs.blog)
(TXT) w3m dump (fs.blog)
| GreedCtrl wrote:
| A bit off topic, but I'd caution against using business tactics
| in chess.
|
| > While the opportunities Rockefeller capitalized on are unlikely
| to come about again, they show how chess strategies can translate
| into business acumen.
|
| India's youngest billionaire Nikhil Kamath played chess when he
| was younger, and he used his chess background much as this
| article does to promote his business acumen.
|
| Just yesterday, he played in a charity simul against 5-time world
| champion Viswanathan Anand. He was the only player to defeat
| Anand, an obvious sign of computer assistance.
|
| That's what can happen now that computers are better than humans
| at chess. Maybe one day they will outclass us at business too?
| cout wrote:
| I agree; business tactics and chess tactics are different
| worlds.
|
| The big difference between chess and the real world is that in
| chess you lack resource production: the pieces you have are the
| pieces you will always have, and no more. This makes the
| hypermodern strategies viable: let your opponent occupy the
| middle while you prepare to attack from the flanks. While I am
| sure there is a business metaphor there waiting to be realized,
| a game with resource management like Settlers of Catan probably
| has metaphors that don't break down as easily under scrutiny.
| xwolfi wrote:
| The difference is that business has no particular win condiion
| or let's say "end" - the goal of it is in the name itself: to
| keep busy.
|
| What do you want a computer to do: to sell as many apple as the
| trees can grow ? To change the way people consume so they start
| eating berries instead because they're cheaper to grow ? To
| diversify into building the collection machine and not just the
| apple sales infrastructure ? To sell to far away outsiders ? To
| cultivate in more and more places ?
|
| It seems just so arbitrary and tied to human interest that a
| computer would have to have its own desires to satisfy to start
| doing "business" and then be so isolated from human desires
| that we d have no interest in keeping them online.
|
| Or we d have to imagine very clever yet obedient machines that
| would stick and readapt to our changing desire and assist us,
| but then are they doing business or we are ?
| kyshoc wrote:
| James Carse has a theory[0] about this: "There are at least
| two kinds of games. One could be called finite, the other
| infinite. A finite game is played for the purpose of winning,
| an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play."
|
| [0]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/189989
| sudhirj wrote:
| > He was the only player to defeat Anand, an obvious sign of
| computer assistance.
|
| Ok this is a bit much. This was a celebrities simultaneously
| against the grandmaster match, and this guy is a serious player
| who competed when he was young, and likely plays regularly for
| fun and practice. Given this was an exhibition fundraiser, and
| the guy had nothing to prove (already runs a very successful
| brokerage and hedge fund, India's youngest billionaire and all)
| why make an accusation of cheating?
| andrewzah wrote:
| There is a considerable gulf between "someone who competed
| when they were young" and a world champion. Looking at their
| rankings, Kamath is/was about 2055 and Anand is about -2753-.
| He is among a handful of players who have managed to peak
| above 2800. [0]
|
| As to why people cheat, there are a plethora of reasons.
| Running a brokerage or hedgefund is whatever, nothing really
| special to anyone. Being able to defeat someone like Anand
| -is- an incredible feat to have under one's belt. The thrill
| of dominating and/or getting key victories in a competitive
| sport far surpasses things like running a successful business
| or being rich. Money can't get you that. Business acumen
| can't get you that. Only your personal knowledge and skill
| can get you that.
|
| [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_chess_players_by_p
| eak_...
| CrazyStat wrote:
| He has already publicly admitted and apologized for it [1].
|
| [1] https://www.thehindu.com/sport/other-sports/chess-
| fundraiser...
| sudhirj wrote:
| Ah, thanks. Yeah, makes sense. I still don't get how
| everyone jumped to the conclusion that he was cheating
| before, though. Is there something so utterly impossible
| about the situation that make it obvious? Do grandmasters
| never lose games to non-GM players even when playing
| multiple people for fun?
| bspammer wrote:
| > Do grandmasters never lose games to non-GM players even
| when playing multiple people for fun?
|
| Pretty much, yeah. Especially when they don't make any
| big mistakes, as was the case here.
| tylerhou wrote:
| Anand isn't a regular-ol GM; Anand is a former world
| champion. These super-GMs spend thousands and thousands
| of hours studying the game. Generally super-GMs don't
| lose to anyone except other GMs in classical time
| formats.
|
| If a super-GM does lose, then it's probably because they
| blundered. That's not what happened -- Anand played well,
| but Kamath played basically a perfect game with an
| accuracy of 99%. There are a handful of people on the
| planet who can do that consistently in classical, and
| they are all rated 2700+.
| sickygnar wrote:
| The guy didn't just cheat, he blatantly cheated, using the
| computer for every move outside of his first move blunder.
| Then he bragged about winning in the post-game interview.
|
| The guy obviously lied about his chess background, he lost to
| a scholar's mate (4 move checkmate) in one of his recent
| games. He probably just said he had a chess background to
| sound smart. Arrogant narcissist.
| erehweb wrote:
| Tangentially related, see "The Protracted Game: A Wei-Ch'I
| Interpretation of Maoist Revolutionary Strategy", which argues
| that Mao was using Go principles (control the edges) while the
| Nationalists were playing Chess (aim for the center).
| mechEpleb wrote:
| I would argue that this is ridiculously reductionist and
| probably has nothing to do with the actual decision making
| process on either side.
| andrewzah wrote:
| I would argue that games like go and chess are so vastly
| different from real life that it's not useful to make
| comparisons like this. Sometimes similar high-level
| strategies can be employed, but I'm certainly not thinking in
| terms of "controlling the middle" as that doesn't really make
| sense in real life. One can make that phrase as vague as
| possible to make it apply to real life, but what benefit does
| that bring?
| sdenton4 wrote:
| Well, call me when you're two months into dealing a deal
| and realize you didn't place a ladder breaker and end up in
| a completely untenable position.
| andrewzah wrote:
| I'm not saying that strategy shouldn't be used. Obviously
| one should have a goal to not act in a way such that in
| the future their positions will be untenable.
|
| What I'm saying is I don't find it useful to reduce
| complex real life positions or strategies into specific
| game terms like "ladder" or "ladder breaker" or "outpost"
| or whatever.
| sdenton4 wrote:
| (yeah, totally agree; was quipping about ladder breakers
| precisely because they're completely irrelevant to any
| real world scenario.)
| erehweb wrote:
| The book is much better than my one-sentence summary of it.
| As a small example, the author notes that Communist forces
| would often set up bases on the boundary of two warlords'
| areas, so that they could not be surrounded.
| andrewzah wrote:
| My point is that given enough contortion or reduction,
| one can apply any real life strategy to almost any
| strategy game.
|
| In the first example of controlling the middle vs the
| edges, well, there are chess openings with the strategy
| of explicitly giving up the center. A reply in a
| different chain on this post mentions these, known as
| hypermodern openings.
|
| It does sound like a good book since I'm a fan of
| history, chess, and go, so I'll give it a read.
| [deleted]
| CalChris wrote:
| That would make sense. Montgomery similarly advised about
| China: Rule 1, on page 1 of the book of war,
| is: "Do not march on Moscow". Various people have tried it,
| Napoleon and Hitler, and it is no good. That is the first rule.
| I do not know whether your Lordships will know Rule 2 of war.
| It is: "Do not go fighting with your land armies in China". It
| is a vast country, with no clearly defined objectives.
|
| He reiterated this advice in the NYTimes during the Vietnam
| war.
| justicezyx wrote:
| Mao might be playing Wei Qi, but Jiang definitely is not
| playing Xiang Qi...
|
| The difference is simply Mao sees a larger China and much
| better than Jiang. If you look at both men's life experience,
| you can easily see that Mao won't be nice to intercultural and
| Jiang will be very harsh to the poor. And in a power struggle,
| one who effectively mobilize the majority always won.
|
| This by itself will make Mao the winner in the power
| competition.
|
| As for other aspects, eg, Mao being a better military
| strategist. It's just a derived results of Mao knows the larger
| China better than Jiang.
| fedreserved wrote:
| Texas Holdem translates better for business strategy.
|
| Poker tournaments structure of blinds progressively increasing,
| mimics inflation and how the value of resource changes over time.
|
| Making decisions based off varying forms of imperfect information
| that changes over time is a very valuable skill that is the core
| of poker and business imo.
| bsder wrote:
| People talk about Chess as if they all play like Grandmasters.
|
| In reality, Chess below Master is a series of okay moves
| punctuated by complete blunders that your opponent may or may not
| notice or be smart enough to take advantage of.
|
| The real lesson from Chess for anybody below Master is "He who
| makes the next to last mistake wins. And this can happen no
| matter how good you've been the rest of the game."
|
| And while that is _also_ a good business lesson, it is far less
| comforting.
| [deleted]
| [deleted]
| e2e4 wrote:
| Looks like the mobile strategy of Apple and Google.
| Tycho wrote:
| Hmm, control the middle. What does it mean in chess? Set your
| pieces out in the middle of the board so as to starve your
| opponent of opportunities, without knowing or caring what exactly
| those opportunities are. How does one do this in business? Hiring
| all the smart people, even if they spend their time
| unproductively, springs to mind. Sponsoring regulation, so that
| companies not in your unique position will struggle to establish
| themselves, is another way, perhaps. Cutting across multiple
| consumer categories, so that you can move in any direction where
| a competitor may try to outflank you (eg. Microsoft launching
| Xbox to compete with Sony), maybe? Or what about pricing -
| dominate the mid-priced products, avoiding the perils of thin
| margins at the low end and excessive R&D costs at the top. Or the
| supply chain - good old fashioned vertical integration, leaving
| only the broadest, most fungible activities to outside firms. In
| venture capital, thinking about the power of networks, the
| ability to connect innovation to expertise to capital, because
| you have the contacts and the credibility.
|
| It would be useful to think of counter-examples of successful
| businesses that clearly did _not_ seize the middle. Hard to build
| analysis on top of abstract interpretation though.
| helloplanets wrote:
| Don't agree with this writeup at all. It seems like writeups
| comparing life and chess are heavily biased towards the strategic
| concepts, when in reality playing the game well is heavily based
| on grasping tactical concepts, recognizing a certain amount
| patterns and being able to apply them under pressure. Strategy
| starts mattering only way later, and is still completely
| dependent on you not letting the other player catch you with your
| pants down because of a pattern that slipped your mind.
|
| I'd go as far as to say that applying the opposite of what the
| writer is implying is more beneficial in most circumstances.
| Instead of viewing running a business as a contest between
| businesses for Scarce Resource X and Y, it's probably better to
| view running a business as a contest of managing the scarce
| resources within the company itself: Capital, time, amount of
| great people working with you, etc. Although, even that sells the
| challenges of running a good business short.
|
| The better you get at chess, the more it can feel like you're
| trying to grind water out of stone, but persisting until you
| notice you've progressed after a year. I think that comes closer
| to the day-to-day experience of running a business.
|
| P.S. This is the best article I've read about chess and life:
| https://aeon.co/essays/playing-chess-is-an-essential-life-le...
| andrewzah wrote:
| Chess is a great game for learning strategical thinking, but I
| don't think it's really useful to try and reduce real life /
| business strategies into chess terms. Real life is fundamentally
| different and more complex than the rigid rules of chess.
|
| Chess is also not really special here other than it being a very
| old, culturally important game. You could swap it out for go and
| nothing would really change except some strategy
| metaphors/comparisons. With all strategy games there are general,
| high-level strategies that players employ. But is it useful to
| anyone to make empty comparisons like "forward thinking"?
|
| Actually rather than chess, I think it's better to learn strategy
| through more modern fighting games like Street Fighter III: Third
| Strike or Super Smash Bros. Melee. These kinds of games are much
| more reactive; one can see and intuitively understand their
| mistakes much more easily than through chess position analysis.
| These games still have very complex strategies going on, but they
| combine it with mechanical execution skills.
|
| No matter what strategy game it is, I think everyone should
| experience that in their life; particularly business people. It
| really is incredible how much these games can teach us.
| kyshoc wrote:
| While I appreciate the "middle" metaphor, I think it's unwise to
| generalize business (and real life situations, more broadly) as a
| chess game -- life doesn't often come with symmetric information
| and zero-sum stakes. Annie Duke says it better than I can, in her
| book[0]:
|
| > "Chess is not a game [in a game theory sense]. Chess is a well-
| defined form of computation. You may not be able to work out the
| answers, but in theory there must be a solution, a right
| procedure in any position [...] If you lose at a game of chess,
| it must be because there were better moves that you didn't make
| or didn't see."
|
| > "The decisions we make in our lives--in business, saving and
| spending, health and lifestyle choices, raising our children, and
| relationships--easily fit von Neumann's definition of 'real
| games.' They involve uncertainty, risk, and occasional deception
| [...] Trouble follows when we treat life decisions as if they
| were chess decisions."
|
| [0]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/35957157
| dharmaturtle wrote:
| As with any metaphor, one can take it too far.
|
| I agree with you that life doesn't come with symmetric
| information, but to argue that "Chess is a well-defined form of
| computation" is a bit much. Go/Weiqi is also a computation
| problem given this argument. What precludes asymmetric info
| games like poker from being "computation" problems, if one
| takes a wide enough view (to include the unknowns as the
| modeled state)? Quantum computing inherently probabilistic.
|
| Your second argument is about zero sum stakes, and I think this
| criticism applies to virtually all "toy" games we play.
|
| > They involve uncertainty, risk, and occasional deception
|
| As do decisions in chess, because the players aren't perfect
| computers.
| csa wrote:
| > Go/Weiqi is also a computation problem given this argument.
|
| I agree with the assessment that it is a computation problem.
|
| As a go player for 25 years, I never thought that I would see
| a computer consistently beat a strong amateur in my lifetime
| (with many decades still theoretically left to live). Not
| only did I see it much sooner than I expected, but AI beats
| the best pros at an almost 100% win rate.
|
| Within the Go community, there is consternation that a
| computer can make some moves that humans probably shouldn't
| make due to the ability of the computer to follow up properly
| where humans cannot (yet).
|
| This may change over time, but right now the computation part
| of the go world is much closer to expressing perfect play in
| a complete information game than humans are.
|
| > What precludes asymmetric info games like poker from being
| "computation" problems, if one takes a wide enough view (to
| include the unknowns as the modeled state)?
|
| Also as an avid poker player, I think many aspects of poker
| are rapidly leaning this direction, even though poker does
| not have complete information.
|
| I'm not sure how much you know about the current poker scene,
| but GTO solvers have opened the poker world's collective mind
| about what "good" play looks like, and the players are riding
| the tails of the computers in terms of strategic and tactical
| evolution.
|
| In some formats, like heads up limit hold em, the game has
| been effectively solved.
|
| Bringing it back to the original topic, I would love to see a
| GTO version of life. Even if it is hard to implement, it
| could provide a guide that informs decision making.
|
| I personally don't think I will see it in my lifetime. That
| said, like Go AI, I hope I'm wrong.
| rcoc wrote:
| In Dan Carlin's Hardcore History episode about the Nuclear Age,
| he makes a similar point about chess. The American leaders at
| that time didn't play chess, they played bridge as it simulated
| a more dynamic environment with a lot of missing information.
| jvanderbot wrote:
| "Unwise generalization to business" is the essential
| contribution of this blog. I've had the same feeling about
| nearly every post that made its way here.
| sorokod wrote:
| Zermelo's theorem for chess [1] emphasizes how different chess-
| like-games are from life.
|
| [1]
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zermelo%27s_theorem_(game_theo...
| abnry wrote:
| As someone else said in a comment, while any metaphor has its
| limits, I feel that there are many more analogies to make with
| chess.
|
| As a mediocre chess player who has played too many subpar
| bullet games, I've begun to recognize patterns. For instance,
| sometimes my opponent has a good move that they are ignoring,
| but then I make a bad move that naturally highlights that good
| move. And then my opponent makes that good move. To me, it
| seems there should be some good analogies to make in business,
| where your decision spurs your competitor to make a great
| decision. I just can't think of any.
|
| Or the idea that chess is about keeping your options as wide
| open as possible and limiting your opponents options (i.e., to
| restrict the king). That's one reason you might play for the
| center. It is certainly why the Queen is more valuable than all
| the other pieces... she has more squares she can move to.
| Typically a knight on the edge of the board is inferior to a
| knight in the center because the edge reduces its 8 maximum
| moves. IIRC, you can compare point values assigned to each
| piece with the number moves a piece can make average over all
| position in an empty chess board and see that the proportions
| match up. It is also why playing positionally matters. Your
| opponent could be up a piece but if one of them is trapped, it
| is almost like they are. That is an example of a un-usable
| advantage.
|
| Or take simple tactics. Forks are when you have two threats on
| your opponent and they can't deal with both. It is a lose-lose
| situation for them. Or a pin is about restricting their
| movement. Sometimes the pin or fork is subtle, where the fork
| is between checkmate and capturing a piece.
|
| There is a lot to explore here that goes far beyond "chess
| requires thinking deeply, chess requires anticipating your
| opponents moves, etc" that requires the pattern recognition
| that comes from playing many games.
| phkahler wrote:
| >> While I appreciate the "middle" metaphor,
|
| You kind of have to use a metaphor to praise monopolist
| practices ;-)
| its_nikita wrote:
| > Unsurprisingly, other oil companies had no hope of offering
| lower or even equivalent rates and still making a profit. If any
| of them seemed like they might pose a threat, Rockefeller could
| use his influence over the shipping companies to restrict their
| ability to transport oil.
|
| The chess analogy is interesting, but I'm not sure it applies to
| Rockefeller. If anything, his strategy is closer to cheating than
| actually being good at the game.
| j4yav wrote:
| Somehow all I can think of here is Business Secrets of the
| Pharoahs, from the comedy Peep Show, which begins:
|
| > The first thing to note when discussing the business secrets of
| the Pharaohs is an acknowledgement that their era was so
| completely different from our own that almost all cultural,
| political and, particularly, business parallels we draw between
| the two eras are bound, by their very nature, to be wrong.
|
| > So then, as the critics and the nay sayers and the tall-poppy-
| chopper-downers ask with their probing questions and their
| knowing sneers and unfriendly voices: "Why use the Pharaohs as
| the basis for a business manual?"
|
| > "Well," I would answer, "I think any 'business' that lasted for
| more than three thousand years, as did that of ancient Egypt, is
| probably worth studying!" (Even if in a strict, or indeed even
| vague sense, it wasn't really a business at all but a
| civilization, with no comparable notion of "business".)
| WJW wrote:
| There are some strategic elements that are important for both
| chess and business but they are so incredibly high-level (like
| "think ahead" and "control vital resources") that it becomes
| almost a joke. I am reminded of [this
| article](https://nongaap.substack.com/p/shopify-a-starcraft-
| inspired-...) which tries to claim a link between starcraft and
| shopify strategy. Any links presented in the article are
| present between any two activities involving strategic thinking
| and so both SC2 and Shopify are completely incidental.
| jsjsbdkj wrote:
| IME the success of shopify is less tobi being some kind of
| genius than luck, timing and protectionism from the canadian
| government. He's very eager to point to specific things he
| _thinks_ make him successful, but it 's all post-hoc.
| Ultimately being profitable forgives all manner of sins, just
| like how google has Ads and consequently can fail 99% of the
| time but still print money.
| LanceH wrote:
| While nothing to do with chess strategy, learning the game
| does provide lessons. Relying on yourself and your analysis.
| Playing the board and not the player. Playing the player when
| the board doesn't favor you. Playing solid principles that
| may not pay off now, but leave open the possibility later.
| Controlling your thoughts, ego and fear in tense situations.
| beaconstudios wrote:
| Games are just bounded microcosms of reality, so it would
| make sense that learning a strategy game would teach you
| about areas where strategy applies in reality.
| jerf wrote:
| I think the big lesson chess in particular teaches is the
| duality of offense and defense. A naive player sees them as
| different things, a skilled player sees them as a unified
| whole. This insight applies to plenty of things in real
| life as well.
|
| It is also something that demonstrably many people don't
| understand and don't even see as something they should
| understand, in contrast to "plan ahead" which of course
| everyone will agree is important, even if they don't do it.
| LanceH wrote:
| I guess the other big lesson beginners get is that the
| other person has a plan, too.
|
| Since everyone has all the information available, it
| lends itself to what you describe -- attack without
| weakening yourself. Or eventually allow weakness if it
| reaches victory conditions.
|
| Generally the chess strats/tactics relating to business
| are more metaphor. "go for their king" may be fine as a
| metaphor to imply "win it outright". As a strategy,
| though, it's not possible to just castle in response.
| Unless you create another metaphor for castling. Keep
| repeating that and you're just describing your own domain
| coded into chess terms, with any cross-domain
| applications being by definition or coincidental.
| maest wrote:
| Also, the hypermodern chess style actually involves letting the
| opponent occupy the centre and then applying pressure from long
| range with pieces, looking for weaknesses in the opponent's
| defence.
|
| https://www.chess.com/terms/hypermodern-chess
| llimllib wrote:
| (where "hypermodern" means "early 20th century")
| zsmi wrote:
| And it's way harder to pull off than just good old fashioned,
| cease the center and bludgeon the opponent. Especially
| against a competent opponent.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-06-14 23:01 UTC)