As an avid chess player, his passing isn’t so saddening as he had retreated from public life in 1974, and played only a handful of serious games in 1992 in an odd re-match against old foe (and current friend) Boris Spassky. Those games showed that, while still a strong player, Fischer’s skills had been overtaken by new, younger, better-prepared players. Indeed, commentators observed that Fischer’s games appeared frozen in time, not incorporating the years of advancement in theory since 1974. Fischer even demanded that the series be named the World Championship, even though almost nobody recognized the match in that context. Fischer won that match, most likely because Spassky’s age was more advanced and he was well past the physical prime required to play serious chess at a high level.

It is hard to understate the importance of Bobby Fischer in our culture in the early 1970′s and his star briefly lit up the sky with unprecedented luminescence from the chess world. Fischer’s apex was as the bulwark against the Soviet chess apparatus (and it was an apparatus with an entire system designed to dominate the world at the game), and then just stopped. His games had Cold War implications and the world watched his every move as he steadily ground down the USSR’s best players, such as Tal, Taimonov, and Keres, on the long march to the World Championship in Reykjavik in 1972. His style was reminiscent of today’s professional athletes. He set out not to win, but to humiliate his opponents. He was going to force victory down your throat because he was simply a lot better than his opponents, who happened to be the best in the world. It’s one thing to be arrogant; it’s entirely another to be arrogant and then back it up every day. Americans like arrogance. We (rhetorically; I was 2 in 1972) embraced his New York personality. To boot, he loved beating the Commies. He hated them. For a time, he was the perfect icon, smashing the Soviets at their game. ESPN would have loved him and he would have loved ESPN – at least for awhile.

And then one day, he just stopped. He got us hooked on him and the game and then took it away. Fischer was convinced the chess world was out to get him. The only thing worse than a paranoid is a paranoid who is right. The Soviets did manipulate matches. Sometimes the did so by changing room temperatures, sometimes by planting listening devices in Fischer’s hotel room to gain insight into his strategies (now called the Bill Belichek Attack). They made some of their people throw games so that their best players would accumulate less fatigue.

As a result of Fischer’s complaining (and, it should be acknowledged, of Spassky’s own opposition to the rigging, which put him in physical danger and nearly had him withdrawn from the Championship match by his own government), conditions were changed in the finals to make the playing field more level. Many of those changes persist in today’s tournament conditions, including much richer prize purses. Fischer once quipped about refusing to “play for peanuts”. Fischer handily won the match and the title of World Champion, the first U.S. born player to hold the title.

But, like catering to a 2-year old, giving in to Fischer only encouraged him, and he quickly and inexorably slid into mental decay, with perceived conspiracies by Communists and he became quite outspoken against Jews and Zionism. When asked once if he were an anti-Semite he replied “Arabs are Semites and I’m not anti-Arab”. When time came to defend his championship in 1975, Anatoly Karpov was the scheduled opponent (Spassky would later emigrate to France), but when FIDE and the Soviets refused to give in to Fischer’s tournament conditions demands, Fischer refused to play and Karpov won by default. Most commentators agree with Fischer that he “would have creamed him” had a match taken place, and Fischer could have been the one to face Garri Kasparov in 1985 in that seminal chess turning point.

Fischer was so arrogant, so convinced of conspiracies against him, that when he was ordered by the State Department not to play his 1992 match in Serbia (it was a violation of the U.S. embargo to try to outster Slobodan Milosevich), he literally publicly spit on the letter and renounced his U.S. citizenship.

After that match (it is rumored the sponsors never made good on their $1 MM prize), Fischer remained in foreign exile (it turns out he also hadn’t paid taxes since 1974), finally ending up in Iceland, the site of his greatest triumph. And he never played chess – or did anything from what anyone can tell.

But after 1974, Fischer never made any contributions to chess save for one book, “Bobby Fischer Teaches Chess” which remains a seminal work. Chess could have been elevated to a very high stature in the United States if he had stuck with the game. Fischer died in 2008, but we really lost him back then. Ultimately it is a sad tale of talent wasted and opportunity passed. And Fischer likely died rather unwealthy. He could have and should have been a multimillionaire.

The lesson here is that talent isn’t enough to be successful long term. Brashness and bullying works for awhile but after a time, the world decides you’re just not worth the effort. I’ve met many entrepreneurs with loads of talent but insufficient people skills and with such excessive paranoia and grudge-carrying tendencies, that their ideas simply never got far off the ground because nobody wanted to deal with them. I’m certain there’s a cure for cancer or a high temperature superconductor that hasn’t been developed because the inventors simply lacked the people skills required to make it a reality. People don’t have to love you, but they have to respect and understand you and your idea.

The best momento I have of Fischer’s brilliance is a two volume collection of the 744 tournament games of Bobby Fischer (before the 1992 series), in the “original” Russian. The greatest compliment you can get is the respect of a grave foe.

- Mike Blake

I learned to play the game of chess as a kid, although I’m certainly no Gary Kasparov. I have always been intrigued by its simultaneous complexity and simple elegance. After running several startups, and going through the exit process more than once, I have come to the conclusion that running a company is very akin to playing chess, although running one effectively is probably closer to mastery of the game. Chess is a great game for entrepreneurs – it is a lot like entrepreneurship at its core.

For starters, consider the pieces. Chess is played with a number of pieces, ranging from the pawn (the lowly foot solder) to the queen, the most powerful piece on the board. Although the various pieces are each equipped with their own unique abilities, they are all critical to winning.

The Opening

There are two sides in chess – black and white. Your company is one side, and your competition is the other. Two armies standing toe-to-toe, each trying to topple the other.

Traditionally, the player playing the white pieces moves first. This is the first-mover advantage. As experienced chess players will tell you, many amateur players lose the game on the first move (the opening move). However, it isn’t enough to simply have an “opening move”. A monkey can make a first move. It is knowing what to do after that first move that really counts. How will you execute once your plan has been set in motion? Unless you have a plan, don’t move. When you move, move with a purpose. As Sun Tzu once merrily quipped “Let your plans be dark and as impenetratable as night, and when you move, fall like a thunderbolt.”

The Pawn

The pawn is the most common piece on the board. Each team controls eight (8) pawns. The pawn is a “soldier”, and while they can only move freely in one direction (forward), and can only attack in one direction (diagonally), they are critical to the game.

For starters, the pawn is the only piece that has a different set of movement rules for their first move. They can move up to two (2) squares forward on their opening move. However, after their opening move, a pawn can only move one square at a time. Just like employees in a startup company – everyone is juiced coming out of the gate, but eventually, they normalize, and don’t move with quite the same fervor as before.

From a strategy standpoint, the concept of pawn chains is an important one in chess. A “pawn chain” consists of two or more of a player’s pawns connected (lined up diagonally), where a rear pawn is protecting a vertically forward pawn one rank forward and in the file to the left or right of the rear pawn. In other words, one pawn is covering the ass of another. With a nice arrangement of pawns, you can really block an opponent. Think about your employees – do they cover each other? Is there sufficient cross-pollination and a team-culture in your ranks?

The Specialty Pieces (Knights, Bishops, and Rooks)

While pawns are cool, the real fun can be had in mastering the various specialty pieces: the knights, bishops, rooks, queen, and king. The specialty pieces are analagous to your management team, each excelling in their own field.

Bishops can move any number of squares, but only diagonally. Rooks have the same freedom of movement, but along the vertical/horizontal axes. Knights have a quirky set of movement restrictions. They can move two squares foward, and then once to the left or right.

Okay, so those rules are fairly easy to understand. However, to effectively win in chess, you have to not only master the movement constraints that accompany each piece, but you have to master the various ways in which the pieces can be used together to accomplish your mission. I don’t think I have to point out that the same can be said of running a company. Unless your rooks, bishops, and knights can work together, the king and queen are dead. The same can be said of marketing, sales, engineering, public relations, and IT.

The Royalty (King and Queen)

The king is the most sacred piece on the board. The King can move in any direction, but only one square at a time. You lose the king, and the game is over. I like to think of the King as your “Chairman of the Board” (or “chairperson”, if you prefer). Powerful, but limited in its ability to affect the game.

The queen, on the other hand, is the most powerful piece on the board. She can move any number of squares, in any direction. This is your CEO. She can kick the ass of any piece on the board, but if you lose your queen in battle, you are sunk (unless you are Gary Kasparov). It is incredibly difficult for the remaining pieces to rally together for a victory if your queen falls.

A Random Thought (Does Size Matter?)

In chess, the pieces are often different heights/sizes. The pawns are the shortest, and the king is the tallest. In theory, they can be arranged from shortest to tallest, in the order of their relative importance to the game. While an argument can be made about the sizes of bishops, knights, and rooks, at the end of the day, the king/queen are taller, and the pawns are the smallest. However, in the world of business, this is where the analogy to chess ends. While the CEO is important, he or she alone cannot win the game. Without the minions in play, the game wouldn’t last very long.

A search on google for “chess business” reveals that I am not alone in my thinking. Here are a few selected entries if you’d like to take a look:

• Kasparov on Business and Chess
• Should Business Managers Learn Chess?
• All The Right Moves (Fast Company)

Food for thought. Have a great holiday season everyone! I’m gonna settle in for a game of Chess Titans, courtesy of Bill Gates. :)

Cheers.