I’ve come to see that sound strategic thinking (once you have clarity of vision) boils down to having insightful, empirically validated answers to three essential questions:

1. Where to place our big bets?

1. How to protect our flanks?

1. How to extend our victories?

While the rest of us are chasing victory, the best in the world know they must avoid losing before they can win. It turns out this is a surprisingly effective strategy.

Safeguard Strategy 3: Creating Friction

If there were a recipe for accumulated disaster, it would be giving the best of ourselves to the least important things things and the worst of ourselves to the most important things.

Safeguard Strategy 4: Putting in Guardrails

Safeguard Strategy 5: Shifting Your Perspective

Changing your perspective changes what you see.