You have undoubtedly heard the apocryphal story about the two guys in the woods that disturb a bear. As panic sets in, one starts putting on his running shoes. “You can’t outrun a bear!” his companion exclaims. “I don’t have to,” is the reply, now wearing his running shoes, “I just need to outrun you.”

This offers a useful lesson when considering the competitive strategy of your business. Success in a competitive situation is so much more that what you do, it is also about what your competitors do, and how these actions have an effect on the firms involved.

A common metaphor when considering strategy is rowing. Strategy is the method by which you get everyone ‘paddling in the same direction.’ The image here is that if your own staff don’t understand where they are heading, it is very hard to get there. Strategy is the polestar; management are the coxswains.

And this is a neat metaphor for strategy, except it isn’t. Yes, you are competing, but the rules say you have to stay in your lane. Your impact on your opponents is negligible. Picture an Olympic rowing race. Six lanes, each boat in its own lane. You can tune out your competitors in the other lanes, go hell for leather, and win. Yes, you have competition, but their actions have minimal impact on your execution.

I think of competitive strategy as more akin to yacht racing. Again, picture small yachts slugging it out. You don’t have a lane, so you can’t ignore what your competitors are doing. Winning requires both superior performance from you, and also specifically responding to what the other boats are doing. You don’t need to be the fastest boat, or the lightest boat, or have the best technology to win. You need to out-race the other boats on the water that day and cross the line first to win.

We could extend the metaphor of course. In most industries, competition isn’t between standardised competitors, and doesn’t have a defined start line or end line. Let’s not get too bogged down in the imagery.

The message here is that too many firms develop their strategy in a vacuum, as if it is like rowing. You have your own lane, and you can pretty much ignore what the other teams are doing, and still win. These firms are thinking ‘as long as we have the best plan, and great execution, we’ll win.’ But the reality is that you don’t need to raceperfectly to win. You just need to race better than everyone else on the day.

Your strategy needs to be based not just on what you want to do (win!), but needs to be adjusted and refined based on the actions of your competitors. You still need a strategy – the polestar, the gold medal – but it cannot be a set plan. Your strategic management processes need to be able to navigate in the desired direction, while also responding to what is going on around you.

Sometimes you can create a win by ensuring your competition don’t play their best. Identifying how you can get an advantage might mean forcing an opponent to play to their weaknesses.

For me, this metaphor also highlights some other important facets of competitive strategy. The first is you don’t need to play perfectly to win; you just need to play better than all the other competitors.

I don’t need to be able to run the fastest, I just need to be able to run faster than you.