Your strength is your weakness!

Samson was regarded as the strongest Man in his time. He lived to that reputation until someone regarded as weaker sex, in person of Delilah demystified him. His weakness was his strength and his strength was his weakness. According to the story, all Delilah had to do is cut a hair on his head!

History gave us long list of names of characters who were strong in their time but whose downfall and weakness is found in just paying attention to a small detail or a flaw in them. Nobody is absolutely invincible from angle of strength. Every individual that walks the earth has a part of him which can humble him when exposed.

Ironically it is from the angle of weakness that the crowned victors often found the winning formula to defeat the strong.

When David was confronting Goliath, he was a dwarf compared to the giant Goliath.  He was insignificant in eyes of others except for himself and those who believed in him. Armed with stones and catapult with special skills in how to make use of them; he confronted his Goliath and defeated him from his angle of weakness. Stone and catapult are common and often used by children to hunt birds and sometimes for plays. It was not often you see people deployed them as a serious weapon of war. But it delivered!

Whatever you have that is seen as weakness, is not really a determinant of your actual weakness but rather, how you use it, and the surprise awaiting your giant that will dictate the last word before Victor is declared in the arena. In the same way, just having strength is no longer the basis for victory. The opponent can exploit your weakness when you are not paying attention.

In corporate world, many companies that has been been declared great and invincible have been reported to have fallen.

Nokia was a giant of it time and controlled the largest part of the market . Innovations, albeit small as they appeared were emerging but those were deemed good for the smaller companies. Until Nokia woke up one day and discovered that the small companies have overtaken it and left it behind in world of corporate performance. While it had many patents  that are still being in used today it is no longer a force in the sector.

Who would have thought Blackberry will go down so easily after its domineering exploits which saw its BBM took the world by storm and revolutionised how we communicate? Then the whatsapp came. The difference was in their weakness and Strength.

As Yahoo sparked a lot of innovations and led in the tech world, it eventually became a company that was dwarfed by the dwarfs in the field.

No company is too big to fall and no organisation is too strong to have weakness. In our world of adventure, we tend to place emphasis on strength. Whether you are going to work, or competing in sports, or commerce, or even war, often times what many do is to focus on their strength as the advantage that will see them through. They look at where they are better than their competitors and what was seen as comparative advantage, and then plot their victory map to connect to the finishing.

More often than not the one that upset them are one that target their weakness and threw them noff balance.

Your strength is your weakness and your weakness is your Strength. Titanic was too good to sink and yet it sank. But it was a good thing it did despite the magnitude of the tragedy. Had it not sank, as Prof Petroski suggested, the engineers will have taught that they have finally cracked the code and replicated the model. The possible results will be catastrophe across the world when those model started sinking in the same condition with attendant lives loss.

We invested so much in our strength; but our opponents know they can't match us at that level so they work on exploiting our weakness and use it to build their own strength.

As you work towards strengthening your position and achieve your goal, whatever it nature and whichever your aspirations, always take care of your weakness as well and at least protect yourself from being exploited from that angle. And If you are in business, your competitor will build on its strength and exploit your weakness to consolidate its position.

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