The Infinite Game

by Simon Sinek

Advance a purpose: Offer people a sense of belonging and a feeling that their lives and their work have value beyond the physical work. Protect people: Operate our companies in a way that protects the people who work for us, the people who buy from us and the environments in which we live and work. Generate profit: Money is fuel for a business to remain viable so that it may continue to advance the first two priorities.

The responsibility of business is to use its will and resources to advance a cause greater than itself, protect the people and places in which it operates and generate more resources so that it can continue doing all those things for as long as possible. An organization can do whatever it likes to build its business so long as it is responsible for the consequences of its actions.

A nation exists to serve and include ordinary people as it strives forward.

company’s goals must also align with people’s goals, not simply the goals of shareholders. If we want our work to benefit ourselves, our colleagues, our customers, our communities and the world,

“Throughout the day, managers will walk past me and ask me how I’m doing, ask me if there is anything I need, anything they can do to help. Not just my manager . . . any manager.

So it makes sense why so many leaders, even some of the best-intentioned ones, often ask, “How do I get the most out of my people?” This is a flawed question, however. It’s not a question about how to help our people grow stronger, it’s about extracting more output from them.

Noah’s managers at the Four Seasons understand that their job is to set an environment for Noah in which he can naturally thrive.

Will encompasses morale, motivation, inspiration, commitment, desire to engage, desire to offer discretionary effort and so on. Will generally comes from inside sources like the quality of leadership and the clarity and strength of the Just Cause.

Most of us have sat in a meeting and listened to a leader present their priorities . . . and it often looks something like this: 1. Growth. 2. Our customers. 3. Our people. Though that leader will insist that they do care about their people (“our people” is one of their priorities), the order in which they appear on the list matters.

The infinite-minded leader may opt for furloughs instead of layoffs to help manage the resources; for example, requiring every employee to take two or three weeks of unpaid time off. Though people may be asked to sacrifice some money, everyone keeps their job.

Thinking beyond the hard times, an infinite-minded leader is okay to wait the quarter or the year or more for the savings to accumulate if it means safeguarding the will of the people. They understand that the will of their people is the thing that drives discretionary effort, as well as problem solving, imagination and teamwork—all things essential for surviving and thriving in the future.

Even a small bias for will before resources is more likely to create a stronger culture in which will and resources will both be in ample supply for the long game.

Too many leaders “see people as a cost,”

Apple gives all full-time retail employees the same benefits as full-time employees who work at corporate, including full medical and dental coverage and $2,500 in education reimbursement should they wish to take classes outside work. Apple was one of the first companies to offer new hires a $15-per-hour minimum wage and gives full-time retail employees the same option to buy stock in the company as any other corporate employee. All these additional costs are offset by the money the company saves from lower recruiting and training costs, which most firms that overuse layoffs are forced to pay to refill positions

And unlike many large retailers who have to maintain a huge staff of recruiters to work continually to replace the people who leave, Apple only needs a very lean recruiting staff for their retail operations.

Unlike resources, which are ultimately limited, we can generate an endless supply of will.

organizations that choose to operate with a bias for will are ultimately more resilient than those who prioritize resources. When hard times strike (and hard times always strike), in companies with a bias for will, the people are much more likely to rally together to protect each other, the company, the resources and their leaders. Not because they are told to, but because they choose

Our intention was to build a business where everyone associated with it thrives,”

There is a difference between a group of people who work together and a group of people who trust each other.

Trusting Team we feel safe to express vulnerability. We feel safe to raise our hands and admit we made a mistake, be honest about shortfalls in performance, take responsibility for our behavior and ask for help. Asking for help is an example of an act that reveals vulnerability.

the Naval Special Operations Forces are among the highest-performing organizations on the planet. However, it may surprise you to learn that the people on their teams are not necessarily the highest-performing individuals. To determine the kind of person who belongs in the SEALS, one of the things they do is evaluate candidates on two axes: performance versus trust.

Performance is about technical competence. How good someone is at their job. Do they have grit? Can they remain cool under pressure? Trust is about character. Their humility and sense of personal accountability. How much they have the backs of their teammates when not in combat. And whether they are a positive influence on other team

The way one SEAL team member put it, “I may trust you with my life but do I trust you with my money or my wife?” In other words, just because I trust your technical skills doesn...

In a culture dominated by intense pressure to meet quarterly or annual targets, too many of our leaders value high performers with little consideration of whether others on the team can trust them. And those values are reflected in whom they hire, promote and fire. Jack

These team members tend to have a high EQ and take personal accountability for

They want to grow and help those around them grow too.

“You have a problem,” he would tell them. “You are not the problem.”

Nothing and no one can perform at 100 percent forever. If we cannot be honest with one another and rely on one another for help during the challenging parts of the journey, we won’t get very far.

We must model the behavior we want to see, actively incentivize the kinds of behaviors that build trust

Culture = Values + Behavior

I know many people who sit at the highest levels of organizations who are not leaders.

Ethical fading is a condition in a culture that allows people to act in unethical ways in order to advance their own interests, often at the expense of others, while falsely believing that they have not compromised their own moral principles.

finite mindset are especially susceptible to ethical fading.

Leaders who give their people a Just Cause to advance and give them an opportunity to work with a Trusting Team to advance it will build a culture in which their people can work toward the short-term goals while also considering the morality, ethics and wider impact of the decisions they make to meet those goals.

The problem was, all the metrics of who was ahead and who was behind were arbitrary and I set the standards for comparison. Plus there was no finish line, so I was attempting to compete in an unwinnable race. I had made a classic finite-mindset blunder.

If we are a player in an infinite game, however, we have to stop thinking of other players as competitors to be beaten and start thinking of them as Worthy Rivals who can help us become better players.

They may make a superior product, command greater loyalty, are better leaders or act with a clearer sense of purpose than we do. We don’t need to admire everything about them, agree with them or even like them. We simply acknowledge that they have strengths and abilities from which we could learn a thing or two.

Traditional competition forces us to take on an attitude of winning. A Worthy Rival inspires us to take on an attitude of improvement.

As for my Worthy Rival, when I thought of Adam Grant as a competitor, it didn’t help me. Rather, it fed my finite mindset. I was more concerned with comparing arbitrary ratings than I was with advancing my own Cause.

Disney was advancing his Just Cause, inviting audiences to leave the stresses and strains of life behind and enter into a more idyllic world of his creation.

Existential Flexibility is the capacity to initiate an extreme disruption to a business model or strategic course in order to more effectively advance a Just Cause.

When an infinite-minded leader with a clear sense of Cause looks to the future and sees that the path they are on will significantly restrict their ability to advance their Just Cause, they flex. Or, if that leader discovers a new technology that is more likely to help them advance their Cause going forward than the technology they are currently using, they flex. Without that sense of infinite vision, strategic shifts, even extreme ones, tend to be reactive or opportunistic.

CVS Caremark announced that it would stop selling any tobacco-related products in all of their over 2,800 stores. It was a decision that would cost the company $2 billion per year in lost revenue. It was a decision they chose to make even though there was no competitive pressure to do so.

We can wait for a life-altering experience that shakes us to our core and challenges the way we see the world. Or we can find a Just Cause that inspires us; surround ourselves with others with whom we share common cause, people we trust and who trust us; identify a Rival worthy of comparison that will push us to constantly improve; and remind ourselves that we are more committed to the Cause than to any particular path or strategy we happen to be following right now.

When companies and the people who lead them act with courage and integrity, when they demonstrate that they are honest and of strong character, they are often rewarded with good will and trust from customers and employees.

The courage to see the Infinite Game—to see the purpose of business as something more heroic than simply making money, even if it’s unpopular with the finite players around

Courageous Leaders are strong because they know they don’t have all the answers and they don’t have total control. They do, however, have each other and a Just Cause to guide them.