In the mid-1980s, a philosopher by the name of Dr James Kars, wrote a little book called

Finite and Infinite Games.

And in it he defined these two kinds of games.

A Finite game is defined as known players, fixed rules, and an agreed upon objective, football, baseball, there's always

a beginning middle and an end, then if there's a winner, there has to be a loser.

Then there are infinite games. Infinite games are defined as known and unknown players, which

means new players can join the game at any time. The rules are changeable, which means every

player can play however they want, and the objective

is to perpetuate the game, to stay in the game as long as possible.

We are players in infinite games every day of our lives.

There's no such thing as being number one in your marriage.

No one ever wins career. There's no winning global politics.

You can come in first in the time you're in school, but you can't win education,

and there's definitely no such thing as winning business.

But if we listen to the language of so many leaders, it becomes abundantly clear that they have no idea the game they're playing in.

They talk about being number one, being the best, and beating their competition based on what

based upon what agreed upon objectives time frames or metrics and this is a

problem because when we play with a finite mindset in an infinite game, when we play to win in a game

that has no finish line, there's a few very predictable and consistent outcomes. The big ones include the decline of trust,

the decline of innovation, and the decline of cooperation.

I am enamored by the concept of the infinite game, so much so that it

profoundly changed the course of my life and I ended up building upon Dr. Carson's work

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