[Epics For Entrepreneurs] One Month Vs Five Days

Kurukshetra war was about to begin.

Arrangements were in full swing in both the camps. Important leaders were gathering around, deciding on the attack strategy.

Bhishma Pitamah, commander of Kaurava army, was inspecting the troops, when Prince Duryodhana approached him, 'I have a question. Can I ask you now?'

'Sure!' Bhishma answered in a majestic voice, 'Is it about our battle strategies?'

'No Sir, I want to know about our army strength, and our enemy army's strength, whom do you think will win this war?'

Bhishma thought for a moment, 'Duryodhana, I will list important people in both armies, and their skills, Based on that, you can make your own decision.'

'Sure Sir, Please do!'

Bhishma started his listing with these words, 'There are different levels of warrior excellence, Based on their skills and capabilities, someone may be called a Rathi, Atirathi, Maharathi, Athimaharathi, even Mahamaharathi.'

'Rathi is a great warrior, but an Atirathi can fight and win against 10,000 warriors at the same time!' said Bhishma, 'a Maharathi is capable of fighting 60,000 warriors simultaneously.'

'Someone who can face 12 such Maharathis is called An Athimaharathi, If 24 such Athimaharathis can be won by a single person, he would be called a Mahamaharathi.'

'Pitamahji, in this scale, where do I fit?' Duryodhana asked eagerly.

'You and your brothers are accomplished warriors, a Rathis for sure' declared Bhishma, 'Drona and his son Ashwatthama are Maharathis.'

'What about the Pandavas?'

'Yudhishthira is a Rathi, Bheema is equal to 8 Rathis' said Bhishma, 'Virata and Drupada are Maharathis, Dhrishtadyumna is an Atirathi.'

'But, that sounds like a lot!' said Duryodhana, 'Do you really believe we can beat them in this war?'

'I have thought about it Duryodhana' answered Bhishma, 'I am confident we can destroy their entire army in one month's time.'

Duryodhana's friend Karna, who was overhearing this conversation couldn't resist his smile, 'One month?' he asked in a teasing manner, 'I can defeat them in just five days!'

This made Bhishma very angry, He replied back in an insulting tone, 'Oh Karna, What do you know about warfare? You are after all a Charioteer's son!'

Bhishma's comment made Karna very angry, 'I will not fight this war, as long as you live!' he said.

When this conversation was happening in Kaurava's camp, on the other corner of the war field, Pandavas were discussing a different problem, 'Enemy army is very big, how are we going to manage with the limited resources we have?'

Arjuna replied, 'We will form a Vajra Vyuha, which can be very effective against armies of any size.'

Vajra in Sanskrit means lightning. As Arjuna Suggested, Pandavas' army was arranged in shape of a Vajrayudha and they confidently faced the large army of Kauravas.

This was the start of Kurukshetra war, which has tons of strategy lessons, both short term and long term. For the moment, let us focus on this prelude story which happened before the war.

• As Pandavas saw in their own eyes, Kauravas had a very large army, But that didn't make Bhishma over confident, he knew leaders, important resources in a side can make or break an army, and that's why he made a detailed analysis of how capable each one is, on both sides.
• In Kaurava's side, Duryodhana is the investor, and Bhishma is a CEO appointed to win the war. As someone who will be directly impacted (positively or negatively) with this war's outcome, Duryodhana was curious to know their chances; he wanted to know about the entire market, not just his team strengths!
• When Duryodhana asks for the strength of the enemy camp, Bhishma doesn't sugar coat his words to please him or give a wrong impression, Instead he gives his actual, realistic assessment, which makes Duryodhana nervous.
• Bhishma doesn't want Duryodhana to enter the war in this mood, so he does an estimation or a "What if" simulation analysis, he mentions he can destroy the entire Pandavas army in one month's time.
• Karna, who is not known to be a better warrior or commander than Bhishma, laughs at his estimation, and says he can complete this in five days, May be he is right, or he is wrong, but at that stage, it looks like an assessment made in a hurry, just to please Duryodhana, not a decision made out of solid data analysis (which Bhishma does properly).
• When Bhishma hears Karna's crazy numbers, he loses his cool. As an experienced warrior, and someone who understands (and respects) enemy's strengths, he can't take this kind of remarks. He insults Karna, who is one of the most important resources in his team. Karna also responds with a vow that he will not be part of this team until Bhishma is the head, both of them show lack of Emotional Intelligence and this resulted in weakening their team, even before the war started.
• Pandavas could see clearly that the size of their army is not enough to win over the large Kauravas' army. But, they are not panicking; they act resourceful and plan their strategies in such a way that they can extract best value from the available talents.

This brings us back to how right was Bhishma in his original assessment: (Team) size doesn't matter, resources and leaders do!

About the author:

N. Chokkan is the Co-Founder & Director at CRMIT, Bengaluru. He was previously the director at InFact Infotech before which he was the principle Consultant at BroadVision. He blogs at http://nagachokkanathan.wordpress.com/ (English) and http://nchokkan.wordpress.com/ (Tamil).