Lessons from Troy
Authors - Ajayya Kumar, Mohamad Abou-Zaki & Ghassan Khoury
Mighty gods, feisty goddesses, greedy kings, brave warriors, centaurs and cyclopes...stories from the Greek mythology have never failed to enthral us. And, in 2004, when they all appeared on the screen right before our eyes, we couldn’t ask for anything better.
Troy was one hell of a movie that talked about greed, honour, valour and love, but above all, about the futility of war.
Does this sword and sandal movie, inspired by Homer’s Iliad, have lessons to offer entrepreneurs? The answer is an astounding YES.
Here are five lessons for entrepreneurs from Troy, an all-time favourite.
- Be farsighted
The fall of Troy didn’t start when the Greeks landed in Troy, but when the Trojan prince Paris decided to take Helen, the queen of Sparta and wife of Spartan King Menelaus, with him to Troy just after attending a dinner hosted by King Menelaus as a sign of peace and friendship between Troy and Sparta. Whilst the two countries had forged a strong relationship through years of hard work and perseverance, this one wrong move made everything crumble. Paris relinquished Troy into the hands of Agamemnon, the power-hungry belligerent king of kings and elder brother of Menelaus who was waiting for the opportunity to lead his soldiers into Troy.
This isn’t just a story of a few kings and soldiers, but a learning you should apply at every turn on your entrepreneurial journey. When you are about to make a decision, remember that it might have far-reaching consequences that it does not just affect you, but many others. If the stakes are high, evaluate whether the risks are worth taking.
Courage and a risk-taking mentality are both important, but without farsightedness, they could be useless - if not harmful.
2. Do not plan your strategy based on bird signs!
One of the main reasons for the downfall of Trojans was that they were reluctant to do their jobs and ‘outsourced’ their strategic planning to the gods. As the court of Trojan King Priam was weighing the option of war, one of his advisors went on a rant about how seeing an eagle clutching a serpent was a sign of sure victory for them from the sun god Apollo. That was more than enough for King Priam to decide to go to war against the mighty army of 50,000 Greeks, against the wise words of his elder son Hector.
On the other hand, the Greeks devised extremely clever and well thought of strategies. They knew that they were unable to defeat Troy without getting into the city walls, or that a direct attack would not be practical, so they fashioned the fabled Trojan horse. Trojans being Trojans, they carried it inside the city with fanfare, thinking that the Greeks had retreated and left the horse as on offering to the god Poseidon to help them cross the seas. Once again Priam chose to listen to his advisers instead of to his son who had asked him to burn the horse down. The rest is history. At night, Greek soldiers who were hiding inside the horse came out and opened the city gates to the rest of the army waiting outside. Troy was burned down to ashes.
Hopefully, none of us devises strategies based on bird signs anymore. But jokes aside, your strategies have to be well thought out, rational and farsighted, and should be decided after discussions with the best of your teams.
3. Rise above petty rivalry
Power corrupts - be it 3000 years ago or today. It’s not uncommon for those at the top to be bossy, greedy, arrogant and want it all for themselves. They give no credit for the work of others and treat staff more like slaves. They pay no attention to the fact that it’s pushing people away and taking the entire company down, until it's too late.
That was Agamemnon’s mistake too. With every victory, he wanted more. He believed he was unstoppable and wanted all of his allies and soldiers to bow down before him.
But Achilles rebelled. He and his men stayed away from Agamemnon’s first war with the Trojans and the king's army faced a terrible defeat.
It's important you do not repeat Agamemnon’s mistake. Keep your people close to you and give credit where it's due.
4. Learn to negotiate
It was near to impossible to retrieve Hector’s body after it had been dragged by Achilles all the way to the Greek’s camp after their duel. But Priam couldn’t come to peace with leaving his son’s body, his eldest, the heir to the throne of Troy, desecrated like that without a proper funeral. Priam walked right into the camp of Achilles who was still raging with fury even after avenging the death of his cousin whom Hector had killed. After the two men had spoken, Achilles not only allowed him to take his son’s body with him but promised him that the Greeks wouldn’t attack the city during the 12 days of mourning.
The moral? Negotiations work. And in business, you need to do it effectively and quite often. So master the skill, and you’ll see that there’s no such thing as an impasse.
5. Look out for your Achilles’ heel
Although not mentioned in the movie, the legend says that Achilles’s mother dipped him in the underworld river Styx to make him immortal. But since the water hadn’t touch the heel from which she was holding him when he was submerged him, it became the weak spot of the warrior who was otherwise considered unconquerable.
In the movie, as he tries to save Briseis, Achilles lets his guard down. Paris shoots him in the heel and renders him weak. Before he knows it, arrows, one after the other, pierced his chest. And that’s the end of the legendary warrior.
It is not just Achilles, but every one of us who has an Achilles’ heel. No matter how big our companies are, there’s always the possibility of things going wrong. Remember the story of the ‘too big to fail banks?’ So constantly work on your weak spots. Always be on your toes and don’t let your guards down. Find the flaws, plug the gaps and work on your vulnerabilities.