Your Business Isn’t a Game?

Game - an activity providing entertainment or amusement

There is billboard I pass on my way to work in the morning. It is from the local cable company. I don’t remember what they’re advertising. I just remember the tagline.

Your business isn’t a game.

This sign always depresses me. There are so many things wrong with it that it isn’t funny, and may show why cable companies are such a pain to deal with.

What jumps out is that games really don’t matter. Your business does. It is the most important thing in the world and has to be approached with an utmost sense of seriousness because failure is not an option.

Freud had a word for this. He called it a death wish. This is clearer when we consider that when you are truly participating in a game, you put part of yourself into it. You play enthusiastically - with a passionate joy in which the game and the players undergo a fusion at one level or another. Csikszentmihalyi was describing this when he was talking about flow.

Without this, you have set your business as something outside, something to be manipulated rather than something to be engaged in. You don’t partipate in it. It’s a slave that you drive with a whip. This is a recipe for misery.

Think about it. The people who make life absolutely miserable are the ones who don’t believe life is a game.

Jihadists?
Junkies?
Fascists?
Anyone who tries to force other people to do what they want them to do.

If your business isn’t a game, advertising becomes manipulation. Productivity becomes waste. Success becomes failure.

If you want to think your business isn’t a game, go ahead. I’m sure the cable company would be glad to meet you.

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