Power play: Play fair when you have the winning cards

This is the best way to separate honorable Power Players from the dicks. If you already hold the winning cards, then playing fairly is all that’s left. A win is a win, there’s no need to decimate or humiliate your opponent.

If your objective is to have victory -- whatever the project, there can be no joy in watching your opponent (whoever they might be) fail. Fair play still means something in business (even if it is on rare display today).

There will be a day (sooner than you think) that you and your opponent cross paths. Though they will remember that you won, what they will remember far more is that you played fair.

Power Players don’t sour a win with unsportsmanlike conduct. Though McEnroe was a great tennis player, the thing we most remember is the guy who screamed at the umpire. While Bjorn Borg was simply great. 

Entrepreneur, strategist and author Rose Herceg co-founded Pophouse, specialising in social forecasting, market research and business strategy in 1998 before selling it to STW in 2006.

Until recently Rose was strategy director of the STW Group, working across 70 companies on strategy, social forecasting, trends analysis and innovation.

She is currently developing several online start-ups in media and media content.