Hedgehogs vs Foxes

“You want to know what separates those who make the biggest impact from all the others who are just as smart? They’re hedgehogs.” – Marvin Bressler, Princeton professor.

In his famous essay “The Hedgehog and the Fox,” Isaiah Berlin divided the world in to hedgehogs and foxes, based on the ancient Greek parable: “the fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.”

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The story: The fox waits in cunning silent at this juncture in the trail. The hedgehog, minding his own business, wanders right into the path of the fox. “Aha, I’ve got you now!” thinks the fox. He leaps out, bounding across the ground, lightning fast. The little hedgehog, sensing danger, look up and thinks, “Here we go again. Will he ever learn?” Rolling up into a perfect little ball, the hedgehog becomes a sphere of sharp spikes, pointing outward in all directions. The fox, bounding toward his prey, sees the hedgehog defense and calls off the attack. Retreating back to the forest, the fox begins to calculate a new line of attack. Each day, some version of this battle between the hedgehog and the fox takes place, and despite the greater cunning of the fox, the hedgehog always wins. (p. 90-91).

The fox is a cunning creature, able to devise a myriad of complex strategies for sneak attacks upon the hedgehog. Day in and day out, the fox circles around the hedgehog’s den, waiting for the perfect moment to pounce. Fast, sleek, beautiful, fleet of foot, and crafty – the fox looks like the sure winner.

The hedgehog, on the other hand, is a dowdier creature, looking like a genetic mix-up between the porcupine and a small armadillo. He waddles along, going about his simple day, searching for lunch and taking care of his home.

Foxes pursue many ends at the same time and see the world in all its complexity. They are “scattered or diffused, moving on many levels,” say Berlin, never integrating their thinking into one overall concept or unifying vision. Hedgehogs, on the other hand, simplify a complex world into a single organizing idea, a basic principle or concept that unifies and guides everything. It doesn’t matter how complex the world, a hedgehog reduces all challenges and dilemmas to simple – indeed almost simplistic – hedgehog ideas. For a hedgehog, anything that does not somehow related to the hedgehog idea holds no relevance.

To be clear, hedgehogs are not stupid. Quite the contrary. They understand that the essence of profound insight is simplicity. For example, what could be more simple than e = mc2? No, hedgehogs aren’t simpletons; they have a piercing insight that allows them to see through the complexity and discern the underlying patterns. Hedgehog see what is essential, and ignore the rest. (p.91).

In his best selling managment book, Good to Great, Jim Collins, argues that those who built the good-to-great companies were, to one degree or another, hedgehogs. According to him, the essential strategic difference between the good-to-great and comparison companies lay in two fundamental differences. First, the good-to-great companies founded their strategies on deep understanding along three key dimensions (what you can be the best in the world; what drives your economic engine; what are you deeply passionate about). Second, the good-to-great companies translated that understanding into a simple, crystalline concept that guided all their efforts - hence, the term the Hedgehog Concept.

"Are you a hedgehog or a fox?"

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source: Jim Collins (2001) "Good to Great".