homeWelcome, sign in or click here to subscribe.login
     


 

 

Architecture & Engineering


Clive Shearer
Management
by Design
By Clive Shearer
Subscriber content preview

September 10, 2003

Don't take a chance with business strategy

  • Simply running your business from day-to-day, without thinking beyond the monthly profit and loss statement can lead you to a very bad position on the business "chess board."
    • By CLIVE SHEARER
    Special to the Journal

    Consider the birthday paradox. Randomly select any group of 23 people and you have a slightly better than 50 percent chance that at least two will celebrate birthdays on the same day of the month. With a similar group of 30, the chance of this occurring rises to almost 70 percent! This is easily proved by a randomly selected study of names in, say, "Who’s Who."

    Don’t look for people who have the same birthday as yours. The chances of that are much smaller. Rather, look for any two matching birthdays.


     
    . . .


    To read this story in full login or purchase a subscription.



    Previous columns:


    
    Email or user name:
    Password:
     
    Forgot password? Click here.