My companion for this month’s car rides and walks has been Simon Sinek with his book The Infinite Game. Sinek has presented the idea of the “infinite game” at several popular conferences, and his talks can be found on YouTube, including his recent appearance at the Nordic Business Forum in Sweden (link). So I won’t retell his thoughts, because he presents them much more powerfully himself; instead I will share how his ideas helped me make sense of a recent experience. If Sinek’s thoughts fascinate you too, I recommend finding 7 hours in your life to read or listen to his book – it contains a handful of seemingly simple but profound ideas. Sinek introduces them through many emotionally engaging examples that help you literally feel the magic of playing the infinite game or the pain of not playing it.
Sinek says that we often run our business (and live our lives in the broader sense) by the rules of a finite game, without realising that we are actually taking part in an infinite game. A finite game is a game with known players, agreed rules and a definite end. The aim is to win the game in line with those rules. But we live in a world whose end date is not known; it is also unknown when our life ends and whether the end really is the end. So the game called Life goes on forever, and in the big picture it makes no difference who won one game or another. What matters is staying in the game as long as possible, or achieving an impact that is wider and lasts longer than your mortal existence.
I can sense how early on I adopted the “finite game” mindset through the understandings common in society and through my upbringing. I always tried to understand the rules of the game and be successful within them. By school rules, the “winners” were straight-A students, and I strove for that. I got quite close to the “top”, finishing secondary school with a silver medal. Applying to university was my first sign that success in one game means nothing in the context of a new game. I liked maths and was successful at it in my school context, a straight-A student, but when I saw tasks in the university entrance exam that I had no idea what to do with, and got only 3 points out of a maximum of 10, my self-esteem about my maths skills dropped with a crash, and the blow came completely out of the blue.
Some inner wisdom has always kept me in the infinite game too – a game that doesn’t involve competing with anyone or anything, but is driven by an inner wish to contribute to something bigger than myself, to make the world better in some way. The bigger purpose I want to serve has taken different forms throughout my life. At times it has been clearer, at times blurrier, but I have always felt it was there. This bigger purpose has been the “something” that has given me strength, courage and creativity to act at critical moments. So, despite entrance exam results below expectations, I didn’t give up and found a way to get into university in the field I wanted. As the chosen field fascinated me, I immediately achieved excellent results, but this time not because of the grades, but because I had a deep interest in what I was learning – it was part of my infinite game.
The finite and infinite game mindsets compete within me to this day. I sense how dominant playing the finite game is in our society… and how engaging it is! Sports competitions, rankings, social media likes and all kinds of other ratings and comparisons feed finite-game thinking.
The finite and infinite game: an experience from life itself
I recently had the chance to work with the leaders of a company. It was a leadership development programme made up of several modules, which a colleague and I delivered in turn. At the client’s request, after each module the participants gave us – the trainers – feedback by filling in anonymous numerical rating forms, with the chance to comment on the rating. My colleague got mostly top marks from the participants (one participant even rated him 7 on a 6-point scale!). In my view too, he is so good that he doesn’t fit into the usual frames! Most participants also gave me fives and sixes, but there were a few who rated me 3. I was aware myself that I still had room to grow, especially compared to my colleague, but I had chosen to do this work because I felt it was in line with the “something” I want to contribute to. I wanted to give my best and saw it as an opportunity to grow personally. But the “3” shook me, because I didn’t rate myself that low. Although the average of all participants’ ratings was close to five, I got stuck on those threes. I felt I wasn’t good enough, and it made me ashamed. I also felt responsible to my team and the client for having taken on the challenge knowing that I wasn’t “perfect” for the task.
I analysed thoroughly what had caused the dissatisfaction and prepared for the next training day even more carefully – better than ever before. Rationally, I also understood that overall I had received positive feedback, which among other things showed my areas for growth, and I believed I had become aware of my feeling of shame and overcome it. Within the same training programme, I stood in front of a new group, with the same topic but different participants. Starting the day, I realised within the first ten minutes that I was frozen: my mind was as if blocked and I wasn’t able to express myself clearly. It happened completely unexpectedly, because I was perfectly prepared! When I stepped in front of the group, my unacknowledged feelings burst up like an avalanche and literally paralysed me. I carried on for a little while like a machine running at minimum revs, and when I saw it was only going downhill, I pulled the brake and we took a coffee break. During the break I was able to digest what was happening to me and found that the only way out was to share my inner experience with the group. The fear was great, but sharing brought me into contact with my feelings and my deeper wish to support the participants’ development as leaders, regardless of how I was rated in the short term. As a result, I changed the structure of the day on the go so that it better matched my view of what creates the most value for the participants, and we set off together.
At the moment I was able to be vulnerable with the group – to admit that I am imperfect – the situation changed. The participants went along with my story and what followed, and also shared their own difficult experiences, as a result of which we learned together through different examples. So my morning freeze became a helpful real-life example of what can happen to any of us and how to come out of it.
In hindsight, I realised that the “grades” had triggered an old pattern in me and I had automatically switched to the finite game, with the aim of getting a “better grade”.
Being vulnerable was the most important lesson of this story for me, and it is an important development topic for me more broadly too. I dare and want to share my imperfection, because I know I am not alone with this fear – showing vulnerability in a leadership role is one of the most frightening things for many leaders, and at the same time it is the only way to build real trust. Sinek also says this in his book, referring to Brené Brown, who has studied the topic in depth.
Features of the finite and infinite game, based on Sinek:
Finite game VS Infinite game
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it is known who is playing
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the rules are fixed
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the end of the game is clearly definable
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winners and losers are easy to identify
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players come and go
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the rules change
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the end of the game is not clearly definable
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winners and losers are not (easily) identifiable
The foundations of success in the infinite game, according to Sinek:
- Just cause – an inner passion, hunger or wish to serve an idea or dream that is bigger than yourself. It is what makes you get out of bed in the morning and do what you do. It is something that helps you last longer than your rivals and gives you strength when you are struggling and ready to give up.
- Courageous leadership – playing the infinite game requires the leader to put their “just cause” above everything else. This may mean opposing today’s rules of the game, including standing up to management, economic and political influences or popular views, in order to stay true to one’s just cause.
- Trusting team – the leader invests time and energy in creating a culture in their team, organisation and network where people feel so safe that they can be themselves – they can be vulnerable and say that they don’t know, can’t do something or have made a mistake, without fear of disapproval or being turned away. If a team member doesn’t feel safe in the team, that is the leader’s responsibility, not the team member’s.
- Worthy adversary – rivals are respected and one’s success is not measured against them. In the end we compete with ourselves, and our success or failure can only be measured against our just cause. In a business context, rivals push us to improve our products, services, marketing and so on, but in the infinite game our challenge is to grow into the best possible version of ourselves, so as to contribute as well as possible to the “something” that is our just cause.
- Open playbook – too many organisations try to reach a moving target with a fixed strategy. An open playbook means being ready to change strategy and plans based on one’s just cause. It also means transparency – all team members always have the same information. Many leaders fear transparency because they fear losing control. They fear that people may misuse information. But a lack of transparency doesn’t allow team members to make the best decisions, because they don’t see the whole picture.
Looking back at my story through the prism of Sinek’s book, I “froze” because I got caught on the hook of the finite game: without realising it, I had made it my goal to get a “better grade” than last time, while at the same time I lacked the self-belief to “win” that game. The moment I managed to switch to the infinite game and found the “something” that had drawn me into the trainer’s role, the training day started to flow. My “just cause” gave me the courage to share my weak point with the group, which created trust, and it also led to the decision to change the rules of the game and adapt the training day so that I could give the participants the most value within the topic and my abilities. In hindsight, I can also think of my colleague as a “worthy adversary”, who, through his example, makes me notice my areas for growth and creates a wish to become a better version of myself.
For reflection:
- Think of an important goal in your working or personal life – in striving towards it, are you playing by the rules of the finite or the infinite game?
- What is one thing you can change in your thinking or behaviour to contribute more, from today, to the “something” that gets you out of bed and into action in the morning?
