Last night I found myself in a finite game.  I lost.

I tried to play an infinite game but finite games are powerful things if you know how to play them.*

Here’s how it was a finite game: I was representing a colleague at the meeting – the meeting consisting of a small number of people holding key roles in the organisation; we had a time sensitive agenda which required decisions to be made on the night; this was a repeated game (occurring a few times every year) in which it appeared to me that those who spoke most resistantly and loudly prevailed; all the possibilities which didn’t make it onto the final list were lost.**

Earlier in the day I’d been describing the infinite game and the finite game to someone over a hot drink.  He asked some great questions which made me work to describe the infinite game, especially how its aim is not to have human opponents, ultimately taking on those things which threaten all Humans and our world: environmental catastrophes, disease, illiteracy, injustice, et cetera.  Of course, there will always be those who see the infinite player as their opponent, but the infinite player see these as people to bring into the game, somehow.

Ultimately, the finite player wants to control people – anything from including them in their field of influence to excluding any contact or influence with others.

The infinite player wants to learn and grow through the other, and hopes, through seeing the future together, for possible collaboration.

This is not to try to explain why things worked out as they did last  night, but to include it as part of the ongoing narrative – the infinite game is not lost.  I think the reason I’m still part of this organisation is because I believe the infinite game will prevail – that is, everyone will win.

One interesting juxtapose to all of this: funite players are fearful of the future, they seek a repeat of the success of the past.  They use prediction to control their opponent  – a prediction being an explanation in reverse.  They appear very reasonable because who wants something to go terribly wrong?  What we do not see, however, is ‘The uncritical substitution of plausibility for probability [which has] pernicious effects on judgement when scenarios are used as tools of forecasting.’

Obversely, the infinite player is a prophet of hope, knowing we are far more likely to succeed when we decide upon something together: we may not know exactly what will be but we have seen a need and we bring our significant skills and energy to bear upon it.

The infinite game goes on.  We win.

(*Infinite Game = include as many as possible and keep the game going – when necessary change the rules.  Finite Game = a select number of people with winners and losers – always play by the rules.
(**We almost got to these people going back to their areas of the organisation and encouraging people who wanted to begin something they were passionate about – the larger organisation would then help them to make this happen.)