What matters more — fixing weaknesses or growing strengths? The scale can be anything: a nation, a company, or a person.
You can read a mountain of strategy books and still find no clear answer — only more arguments for both sides. I didn’t grasp it when listening to successful CEOs or sitting in lectures at Chicago Booth. The revelation entered me through… jiu-jitsu.
Suppose you have a chronic knee injury, or you keep getting choked from the back. How does your style change?
You become conservative. You wait. You rely on old moves. The price of a mistake is high. You just want to survive — it’s no time for play. Aggression, spontaneity, and creativity disappear.
Nothing changes until you patch the “hole in the hull.” But the point isn’t chasing 550-pound squats. Nor do you need a reputation as “the Champion-Strangler.”
You just need hygiene — heal the knee and learn to escape the back control with confidence. Hard tasks, but doable ones. They may take six months; “champion level” might take ten years — if you’re lucky.
Fix your weak spots by moving them from "red" to "neutral".
Now you can focus on developing your Tokui Waza (得意技) — a judo term with many echoes:
Signature move.
Crown jewel.
Superpower.
Ace in the hole.
Knight's gambit.
Secret weapon.
Competitive advantage.
Unique selling proposition.
Yours sincerely,
-Alexander
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