The big issue is the collision between uncertainty and commitment. The [strategy] paradox is a function of that underlying tension. So the strategies that succeed biggest are the strategies that are based on the boldest and the most difficult to imitate, and hence hard-to-reverse commitments. The problem is…it takes time for these things to unfold; and so as a consequence you are necessarily required to make choices today based on beliefs about what you think is going to drive performance in the future; and as we’ve discussed the future is irreducibly uncertain; and so there’s a very real probability that you will commit to the wrong things. And so that’s where the paradox comes from: precisely the same sorts of behaviors that are systematically associated with success are also systematically associated with total collapse.
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