Bring It On There's nothing wrong with a little healthy competition. In fact, it's what some entrepreneurs live for.

The fresh-faced teenager in the McDonald's commercial mightbe smiling and seem friendly, but fast-food legend Ray Kroc oncesaid, "If I ever saw a competitor drowning, I'd put a livefire hose in his mouth."

Don't judge the late Ray Kroc too harshly. He was speakingof an age-old tradition. Entrepreneurs have always trounced thecompetition, and it hasn't always been pretty. in the 1800s,John D. Rockefeller made Standard Oil company into a monopoly,controlling 90 percent of the oil market, by negotiating secretrebates with railroads, bribing Congressmen and committingindustrial espionage. About the same time, in England, the UnitedKingdom Telegraph Company hired men to cut down the poles of itsrival, Electric Telegraph Company. As that century closed,newspaper baron William Randolph Hearst helped start theSpanish-American War to sell newspapers and crush his competition.More recently, Microsoft has been in the news facing accusations ofusing unfair business practices in an attempt to build its ownmonopoly.

But while entrepreneurs have always been against the opposingteam, the way we're competing is changing. "Competitionisn't as cutthroat as it used to be," observes RogerNagel, a professor at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania,and co-author of Cooperate to Compete: Building Agile BusinessRelationships (John Wiley & Sons) and Agile Competitors andVirtual Organizations: Strategies for Enriching the Customer (JohnWiley & Sons). "When you're finished with yourcompetitors, you no longer have to see them lying on theground."

And as competition evolves, entrepreneurs like Leon Richter areactually finding they enjoy it. Call it the thrill ofcompetition-it's a rush; it's a natural high; it's thekick you get making a deal before your nemesis does.

Richter, 29, is the CEO of Justice Telecom, a $100 milliontelecommunications solution provider based in Los Angeles thatcompetes for shares of the overseas phone market in places likeScandinavia, South America, and the United Arab Emirates. To hearRichter tell it, his company is a dinghy competing against theocean tide, but he nevertheless wakes up in a good mood every day."It's absolutely a thrill," says Richter ofcompetition. "It's a huge motivation for us."

In the competitive world of journalism, Geoff Williams is afrequent contributor to Entrepreneur and a features writerfor The Cincinnati Post. He recently saw his first featurein Ladies' Home Journal.

The Thrill?

When Jim Geary is interviewed by a reporter, the question alwayscomes: "Who's your competition?"

Geary looks at the reporter . . . mulls overthe question for a moment . . .
wonders why he should give his competition free publicity-then helies. He names his fourth and fifth competitors asthe guys he really needs to beat. Then if the reporter asks abouthis actual top competition by name, Geary waves them off with"Oh, we don't really compete with them."

Geary, 43, is the CEO of 2-year-old SHYM Technologies, aNeedham, Massachusetts, company that provides security software forcompanies that handle financial transactions through their Websites. "I think people thrive on it," he says ofcompetition. "People enjoy it because it validates theirstrategies. It helps validate the thinking or the insight that theyhad, and with that comes a heck of a lot of satisfaction-and, ofcourse, market success."

But Geary draws the line at calling competition "akick." And that's understandable, according to GaryCadenhead, a senior lecturer on entrepreneurship at the Universityof Texas, Austin. "I've never heard an entrepreneur jumpup and down and say, 'Hey! We've gotcompetitors,' " Cadenhead says. "It's notsomething anybody's going to think is great. That said,it's a reality, and, once the reality is there, it's likeany kind of athletic event where there's a thrill. There'san excitement in giving your best and seeing how that compares withsomebody else's best."

But Michael Morris, director of the entrepreneurial center atMiami University in Oxford, Ohio, doesn't see competition asever creating much of a rush for entrepreneurs. "Like mostpeople," muses Morris, "entrepreneurs are strongbelievers in competition and see the value in it-as long as itisn't for their business." Still, he concedes that manyentrepreneurs recognize that competition has benefited both theirbusinesses and their customers: "In terms of pricing, it keepsthem honest."

And if you're wondering who Geary's competitors are,don't bother. He wouldn't tell us.

Party In Private

We'll never know whether Geary dances in his underwearthrough his house-á la Risky Business-or Richter screams"I'm da man" after scoring a big deal. That's forthem to know and you not to find out. As Richter says, "If mycompany were an athletic team, when we score, we would try to makeit look like we've done it before. We're not thekind of people who do an end-zone dance."

If anybody had an end-zone dance coming to him, it was JimHeckman when he inked an exclusive deal with Fox Sports tobroadcast their events on the Internet. Heckman's Seattle-basedcompany, which, as things would have it, is called Rivals.Com,trumped numerous competitors, including ESPN.com (which is owned byThe Walt Disney Company, probably the biggest competitor of all).Nevertheless, Heckman, 34, who once sold his car to start afootball magazine, says he had no time to celebrate. "Weraised a glass of champagne," Heckman says. "Then Ijumped on a plane. That was the celebration."

But when pressed to admit whether he allowed himself to shout"Yee-haw!" in the privacy of his own home, Heckman dodgesthe question with an explanation of how he felt raising that glassof champagne: "What you really feel is relief, and all of theconcern you had felt leaves."

"Your excitement is short-lived," adds Geary,"because as soon as you sit back and bask in the glory, yourcompetitors are making their next move."

Competition Grows Up

Nagel, who travels the globe speaking and consulting on thetopic of competition in the 21st century, imagines a CompetitionUtopia, a land with "no winners and losers," a world inwhich competition and cooperation go hand in hand and you send carebaskets and thank-you notes to your competitors rather than dreamabout seeing them wearing rags standing in the soup line.

And that vision isn't a view through rose-colored glasses.According to Nagel, it's already happening. Flip through amagazine, he says, and you can see Motorola promoting a Palm Pilot.One World and Star Alliance, Nagel points out, are agreements amongindividual airlines to cooperate with each other, to help fostersmoother flights for their customers.

Somebody, of course, has to make money, and somebody else isgoing to lose it. But Nagel says the future mind-set will be:"I'm not really willing to backstab you; I'mwilling to beat you. But I don't want to do anythingthat will make me morally unacceptable to be a partner, because Imay want to partner with you tomorrow."

Richter echoes that sentiment. "We're on very goodterms with competitors who are like us, upstart companies. It'sreally the entrenched incumbents that tend to resort to eitherunfair practices or who are dismissive with us. People are in yourcorner, and they help you out. It's not a zero-sumgame."

Watch Your Back

But even if competition someday becomes fun for everybody, itisn't going to go away. Ask Richter, who's constantlyreminded that if he wants a market share, he going to have to fightfor it. Richter recalls that in his company's early days, whileattending a conference in a posh hotel in Santiago, Chili, hehappened to spot an executive from one of his chief rivals,Telefonica, which provides telephone service to one-third of SouthAmerican homes. Richter walked up and introduced himself as the CEOof Justice Telecom.

"Bah, Justice!" spat the rival. Surprisingly, theexecutive didn't twirl a handlebar mustache as he walkedaway.

"The dismissive [competitors] are the ones we go afterfirst," says Richter. "It helps fuel the fire."

And if you can't hack the competition? Here'sGeary's advice: "Get out of the business and moveon."

If that seems harsh, Geary explains his thoughts this way:"There are a lot of guys out there who really get depressed,and have their businesses suppressed, because their competitorshave put them in a box. If you can't enjoy the work, and itstarts to take a toll on you mentally or physically, maybe it'stime to do something different. That's what's great aboutliving in this country. We have lots of opportunities, and peopledon't choose that opportunity enough. Not that you haveto succumb, but maybe you aren't the best person to fight thebattle."

Tough love from Jim Geary, someone who sincerely cares aboutyour well-being. Or maybe not. Maybe Geary is only offering theadvice because he wants you out of the game. After all, whoneeds the extra competition?

Contact Sources

Justice Telecom, (310) 526-2000

Roger Nagel, fax: (610) 398-1220, roger.nagel@lehigh.edu

SHYM Technology, sales@shym.com, http://www.shym.com