5 Rules for Waging War

The February 2010 issue of the American History magazine had a great article on "George Washington's Five Rules for Waging War With Honor". As is often the case these days I could not help but think about how these rules apply to analytics. Not to say that working in analytics is like fighting a war, but there are many "battles" that each of us face in our daily tasks.

Washington's Rules were:

1. Don't Assume You Are Welcome
2. Cultivate Your Local Support
3. Respect Local Religious Practices
4. Don't Abuse Prisoners
5. Withdraw if Your Objectives Are Unobtainable

Washington provided these rules along with some instructions to his officers on how they should conduct themselves in war and in conflict.  If you examine the instructions, you can see how these rules can be applied to most projects or new ventures.  Here is my take on how these rules can be applied to working with analytics in a corporation.