{"id":9,"date":"2006-04-20T11:18:18","date_gmt":"2006-04-20T19:18:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/archives\/2006\/04\/20\/strategy-lessons-from-texas-holdem\/"},"modified":"2007-03-17T11:22:52","modified_gmt":"2007-03-17T19:22:52","slug":"strategy-lessons-from-texas-holdem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/archives\/2006\/04\/20\/strategy-lessons-from-texas-holdem\/","title":{"rendered":"Strategy: Lessons from Texas Hold’em"},"content":{"rendered":"

I don’t play cards, but I enjoy watching Texas Hold’em poker on TV. One might think that watching other people play cards would be boring. On the contrary. Poker games present a microcosm of strategy, tactics, personality traits and clues. I’ve learned a few important lessons about corporate strategy while watching these games.
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  1. If you’re going to play a hand, bet based on the effect you want to have around the table (market) rather than betting based on the actual strength of your hand.<\/li>\n
  2. Use your position at the table to lure your competition into an uncompetitive position.<\/li>\n
  3. When you believe you have the best hand, play it for the long haul rather than just using it to grab a quick win.<\/li>\n
  4. All you need is a chip and a chair to play. Many players have rebounded from near zero to win the tournament.<\/li>\n
  5. Two or three solid wins will turn an also ran back into a chip leader.<\/li>\n
  6. Play a tight game early in a tournament while evaluating the competition.<\/li>\n
  7. Play an aggressive game once you understand the other players.<\/li>\n
  8. When playing head-to-head with a competitor, take no prisoners.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    An example of betting for the effect you want to create around the table: The commercial airliner industry has evolved into a heads-up game between Boeing and Airbus. In the late 1990’s and early 2000’s, Boeing and Airbus were competing head-to-head in the long-haul airliner market. Boeing was promoting a proposed new 747-X and Airbus was designing the A380. Boeing determined that the market was not large enough to justify the development and manufacturing expense for a new 747-X model.<\/p>\n

    In 2001, Boeing started a PR campaign that “represented” a bet on a super-sonic long-haul airliner, the Sonic Cruiser – a replacement for the aging and soon to be discontinued Concorde. This would have been a serious competitor to Airbus’ market position in long-haul Pacific markets… if<\/em> it could have been priced low enough, been fuel efficient enough, been quiet enough, and if<\/em> technology problems could be resolved. Boeing’s PR “bet on the table” created the impression that all those uncertainties were resolved. Airbus responded by committing additional investment in the A380 – a monster airplane only suited to long-haul hub-to-hub transport. This is an important market, but also a relatively small market.<\/p>\n

    Once Airbus bet “all-in” on the A380, Boeing laid down their real cards. Whether Boeing’s Sonic Cruiser ever makes it to the market, the hand they had been holding during this <\/em>tournament was a product line of super-efficient short-haul airliners – the 787. This is a huge potential market that includes not only hub-to-spoke transport, but also the expected return to point-to-point one-hop transport. With nearly all their resources tied up in the 380, Airbus was not able to respond to Boeing’s real competitive threat for years. Score one for Boeing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I don’t play cards, but I enjoy watching Texas Hold’em poker on TV. One might think that watching other people play cards would be boring. On the contrary. Poker games present a microcosm of strategy, tactics, personality traits and clues. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,6,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-planning","category-product-management","category-strategy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bd.handspicker.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}