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The Art of War, by the ancient Chinese military theorist Sun Tzu, is the most famous work on military operation in ancient China and the books have been repeatedly translated, investigated and discussed. Today, Sun Tzu’s The Art of War remains a compulsory text in major military schools around the world and its influences on twentieth century military thinking is undisputed. Also in recent times, the use of military strategies in the business and management contexts is increasing. This paper proposes a set of criteria based on Sun Tzu’s philosophy for evaluation of business management strategies against the world class business excellence models. The total quality management models of the European Quality Award and the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award are used to compare with Sun Tzu’s business management strategy model developed under the quality function deployment (QFD) methodology. The results of the QFD methodology can be used as performance indicators showing organisations’ improvement priorities for self‐assessment.

Career development involves how employees manage their career advancement. This study aims to investigate the relevance of Sun Tzu's Art of War to career development of construction professionals with the aim of suggesting strategies that may be adopted for career development.

The data collection technique was in‐depth interviews with 32 subjects who are Singapore‐based construction professionals. The subjects were asked 13 open‐ended questions which were developed based on the Art of War.

The main findings on the effective career development strategies are: outperforming peers by developing deep job experience and delivering excellent performance; adopting a team member posture before moving on to a team leader stance; handling office politics and conflicts effectively; maintaining flexibility and manoeuvrability in one's career; networking; and acquiring foreknowledge.

The study is qualitative in nature, thus, the actual effectiveness of the recommendations for career development is not known. There may also be some more strategies undisclosed by interviewees as sharing them may cause them to lose their competitive advantage.

The effective strategies for career development are found. Construction professionals may adopt some military strategies that may help them in their career development.

The relevance of military strategies to career development in construction firms suggests that career progression is akin to war, where winning is important and strategizing to win is necessary.

In this paper military strategies are mapped onto career development, and relevant career advancement strategies are identified.

As the key to value creation, construction firms should treat quality as a strategic issue. However, strategic quality management (SQM) is still a relatively new concept for construction firms. This paper aims to examine the application of the strategic treatise, Sun Tzu's Art of War with SQM in the construction industry.

Two sets of 20 statements each from SQM principles and Sun Tzu's Art of War were identified. A pilot survey and a questionnaire survey of construction project managers in Singapore were conducted to establish the relative ratings as well as correlations in the rankings of these two sets of statements.

The findings suggested that Sun Tzu's Art of War appears relevant for SQM thinking and practices for construction where appropriate lessons may be drawn.

There are, however, limits to the analogy between war and construction. Warfare represents an extreme situation that demands exceptional responses, espionage and sacrifice of human lives, which could lead to unethical practices in construction.

Nevertheless, this study helps to prompt construction firms into thinking about SQM through drawing appropriate lessons from Sun Tzu's Art of War.

The value of this paper is to synthesize the strategic issues encapsulated in Sun Tzu's Art of War with SQM principles in the construction industry.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the ancient, 2,500 years old The Art of War by Sun Tzu from a system of systems engineering perspectives. The aim is to show that even for an emerging discipline in engineering the underlying concepts may be much more deeply rooted.

The author approaches the subject by an in‐depth analysis of recent conceptualizations of system of systems engineering. The author relates by analysis these concepts back to business strategy. He illustrates from his own empirical work how corporate strategy is but an equivalent to “system” of systems. From original writings of Sun Tzu in The Art of War he then develops a generic model of system of systems.

Ideas in system of systems engineering, an emerging multi‐discipline are far more deeply rooted in history, at least 2,500 years or even more. Using the cockpit of as an illustrative metaphor, the author argues for a research agenda to design an The Art of War boardroom information system.

In this paper, the author argues why in the design of information system, it is useful to take a system of systems perspective. He draws upon the example of cockpit design of aircraft as inspirational design in modeling a futuristic The Art of War boardroom.

In this paper, the author illustrates how cross disciplinary researches between engineering, business and history may be so enriching. That in designing information systems for an The Art of War boardroom it is useful to use metaphorical equivalences. In this case, it is from the informational design of cockpits in fighter aircraft.

The mundane and expanded marketing mix concept has an important role in Western marketing literature for both tangible products and intangible services. The nine Ps – namely promotion, product, price, place, process management, personnel, physical facilities, public relations and power – are now the foundation for strategic planning in many companies. While the marketing mix concept remains an important framework for the Western world, its contribution towards the latter′s declining economic prowess in recent years appears minimal. On the other hand, the East Asian economic powerhouse has grown from strength to strength. This can be attributed in no small way to certain oriental traditions and philosophies – not the least of which is Sun Tzu′s The Art of War. Although The Art of War is now more than 2,000 years old, it remains the cornerstone for strategic planning in the East. Attempts to integrate the Western marketing mix concept with The Art of War from the East using examples drawn from the construction industry in Singapore. The lessons to be learned therefore should be useful for strategic planners in the Western marketing community.

In currently facing dynamic environments, the tools of strategic management appear to be more and more important in improving the quality of decision‐making. Among the great Chinese wisdoms, Sun Tzu's, The Art of War, is probably the oldest military book in Chinese with principles which Sun Tzu advocated, still very valuable in business operations today. Thus, this study tends to evaluate the relationships among Sun Tzu's principles of situation appraisal, strategy implementation, and strategic control through an empirical study. Furthermore, how the levels of adoption on Sun Tzu's principles of situation appraisal, strategy implementation, and strategic control impact on a firm acquiring its key success factors is also verified. The results show that the adoption levels of Sun Tzu's principles on situation appraisal, strategy implementation, and strategic control are highly interrelated. The adoption levels are positively related to the firm acquiring its key success factors, as well.

Employing the Star Wars brand as a case study, this paper seeks to critically discuss the importance of comparative mythology for inter-generational branding and consumption practices within arts related markets.

Secondary data have been gathered focusing on the analysis of material in the form of books, academic journals, films, videos, television programs, websites and media reports related to the interface between comparative mythology, the Star Wars brand.

First, this paper indicates how the long-standing success of the Star Wars brand mirrors and reflects the power of monomythic storytelling in creating a platform for arts and place building branding associations and extensions for numerous products and services. Second, this study shows and highlights the potential of monomythic structures/storytelling and comparative mythology in acting an underlying cultural platform whereupon several arts brand associations, narratives, extensions and overall strategies can emerge. Finally, this project suggests how arts marketing scholars could further explore the infusion of mythological narratives within branding practices in the areas of performing/visual arts, museums, entertainment and arts related tourism campaigns.

Focusing on the most successful film franchise of all times, this study argues that comparative mythology constitutes an endless source for common templates of artistic, cross-cultural and inter-generational marketing practices focusing on universal moral codes and archetypes.

Arts festivals use projects to showcase creative works, configuring a creative field, whether locally, regionally or internationally, by whom engages and attends to the arts festival: artists, funders, media and audiences. This study compares the Edinburgh and Berlin arts festivals founded after World War II. Each city began with a founding festival. Edinburgh International Festival of Music and Drama sought to reconcile and heal international relations whereas the Berlin International Film Festival sought to showcase free expression and democracy. Both founding festivals were internationally oriented, as seen in their names. Each city added festivals over time and engaged in distinct temporal strategies and configured different creative fields. Edinburgh’s additional festivals entrained to its founding festival, synchronizing in time and place five festivals which led to greater duration and intensity of the experience and configured an international creative field: artists, media, and audiences who attended and engaged with the city festivals. In contrast, Berlin’s founding Film festival, which was internationally oriented, was followed by festivals that were treated as distinct, scheduling each festival sequentially across a yearly calendar and configuring a creative field regionally oriented around Germanic language and culture. Thus, a city’s temporal strategies for arts festivals may configure international, regional and local creative fields, changing who comprises the field to interact.

The chapter analyses Chinese and Russian hybrid warfare and their strategies. Although still under debate, it is increasingly recognised that both countries integrate and apply hybrid warfare in their strategic thinking. In doing so, they are able to increase their sphere of influence, promote authoritarian regimes and weaken democracies. It is therefore vital that we better understand their strategies in order to identify and bring to light the processes that encourage today’s rise of nationalism and populism, withdrawal from international organisations and an overall distrust in the global institutional order. Approaching the puzzle from current weaknesses in the EU and the United States, the chapter proposes a framework to analyse Chinese and Russian hybrid warfare. The chapter demonstrates that Western liberal democracies are not only unprepared for these new forms of warfare, but appear unwilling to take the necessary measures. In doing so, these countries leave the door open for (further) destabilisation and a risk of increased domestic polarisation.