The Hedgehog and the Fox

On Grand Strategy

According to John Gaddis, great grand strategists are both hedgehogs and foxes. A hedgehog knows one thing, a fox knows many things. A hedgehog has a vision. A fox knows how to operate. A hedgehog sees True North. A fox knows that if you follow the compass you’ll hit a swamp. A fox knows that sometimes you have to paint the pear purple for it to show up as green on the canvas. Hedgehogs are notoriously bad at predicting the future, because they operate from deductive logic. Foxes are better underwriters, but they tend to be reactive. The fox specializes in what needs to get done, but not in knowing where it wants to go.

David Brooks describes life as a climb of two distinct mountains. The first mountain is career, the second is meaning. If we agree with this claim, it seems that one should be a fox first, and a hedgehog later. Don’t have a thesis, just experiment and the thesis will emerge.

In business, especially young and small businesses, the line between truth and fraud is somewhat difficult to adjudicate. For example, is your experimental product the next iPhone or not? Who knows. But if you say it is, you’ll get funding, talent, and buy-in, and that will increase your chances of success. If you say, “Meh,” you’ll fail and your mediocrity will become self-fulfilling. For this reason, Hedgehogs tend to be very charismatic and inspiring. Whether they be hawking the next Theranos or WeWork or Tesla, they ned you to know that their solution is the next big thing. Foxes are not good at sales, but good at product, good at technicals. Foxes lack leadership ability. Hedgehogs lead people off cliffs (but occasionally into the Promised Land). Hedgehogs are bad at predicting the future, but when they succeed they bend the future in accordance with their vision.

Abraham is a hedgehog: he follows God, but doesn’t actually know where to; eventually he has to learn to lie and play the game. Jacob is a fox: he deceives his brother first, but eventually comes to a spiritual awakening when he falls asleep in Bet-El and dreams of angels ascending and descending a ladder. The God who destroys the world in the story of Noah is a hedgehog. The God who makes a covenant with the Israelites in Exodus is a fox.

Gaddis argues that great strategists (like Abraham Lincoln) transcend the tradeoff between hedgehog and fox, but most fail.

As a matter of strategy, the debate between generalists and specialists is: do both. Foxes are humble. Hedgehogs pursue greatness.