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Why Business and AI Are Infinite Games

Business and technology are a long-term game. Still, many leaders treat them as a short sprint.

Sure, in some cases a sprint makes sense: an early-stage startup launching a new product, a specific marketing campaign or event, or a sales peak like winter for ski companies or Black Friday for eCommerce.

But these are exceptions rather than the rule. When those short, intense periods end, you are back in your long-term business and tech marathon. And in that marathon, a clear long-term perspective makes all the difference.

This is where the concept of Finite and Infinite Games fits in nicely. It was introduced in 1986 by James P. Carse, a professor of history and literature of religion at New York University¹. Simon Sinek then brought it into the business world with his book The Infinite Game in 2019².

In the first edition of Beyond Tactics, I mentioned that Marc Andreessen calls markets "the ultimate infinite game"³. I promised the topic its own edition. Here it is.

So what is it?

Finite and Infinite Games

According to Carse, there are two types of games.

A finite game is defined and controlled. You know the players, the rules are clear, and so is the goal. That shapes how people behave. A football match or a chess game is a good example.

Infinite games are a very different story. Players come and go, so some are known and some are not. Rules keep changing, just like regulation and business and tech trends do. There is no real end. The game is continuous.

Goals can differ for each participant, but most share one: staying in the game. An infinite game can't be won the way a finite one can. And again, that shapes how people organise and behave.

Carse puts it in one line:

"A finite game is played for the purpose of winning, an infinite game for the purpose of continuing the play."¹

Here is a summary of the two game types. Have a look at the details. It shows how much they differ.

Finite vs Infinite Games ConceptFinite gameInfinite gameIn business 01Players Known and fixed Known and unknown, they come and go Competitors appear from outside your industry 02Rules Fixed and agreed upfront Change to keep the play going Regulation, tech and customer habits keep shifting 03Goal Win Keep playing Hit the quarter vs build a company that lasts 04End Clear finish line No end There is no “winning” business 05Time Set time limit Open-ended Sprint or campaign vs long-term strategy 06Others Opponents to beat Partners to play with Rival as enemy vs rival to learn from 07Boundaries Plays within boundaries Plays with boundaries Defend the current model vs reinvent it 08Surprise Trained to prevent surprise Educated to expect surprise Rigid plans vs adaptability 09Power vs strength Seeks power (titles, ranking) Seeks strength (the ability to keep growing) Market share trophies vs capability and culture 10Mindset Serious Playful, curious Fear of losing vs curiosity to explore 11Relationship Can sit inside an infinite game Can’t sit inside a finite game Campaigns and quarters are moves inside the bigger game

What it means for business

Business is an infinite game. Once you realise that, a lot changes.

Small wins still matter, but as steps in the right direction. That makes your long-term vision critical. Sinek calls it a Just Cause².

It also changes how you see setbacks. As long as you're heading the right way, you're more willing to accept them for a bigger win later. Sometimes you need to invest and sacrifice this month's or this quarter's P&L to reach a new level in the next six months.

When you build a culture around the infinite game, people understand where you're heading. That builds safety, trust and motivation. Multiply that by every task each person does, across everyone in your business, and it makes a huge difference. People are more open about what could improve and more willing to go the extra mile. More ownership means more impact.

You also start to see competitors differently. They are no longer enemies to destroy, but partners you can learn from. Sinek calls them Worthy Rivals². That opens space for collaboration based on complementary strengths. For example, an engineering agency can pair up with a design agency to deliver a better outcome for clients, instead of trying to win every deal alone.

That has a strong impact on culture too. You start to value real strength, the kind that keeps you growing and secures your ability to stay in the game. Not titles or rankings, which are often artificial and arbitrary.

You also realise it's not about seriousness and pressure on people. It's about joyful curiosity to discover new innovations and ways of working. Carse says it well: "To be prepared against surprise is to be trained. To be prepared for surprise is to be educated."¹ That curiosity opens up directions nobody considered in a power-first setup.

What it means for tech and AI

To grow technology, you need the right business setup in most cases. That's why I started there.

Tech growth also needs innovation, openness and empowered tech experts. That's hard in a finite game setup, where organisational power dynamics come first. A typical example: pushing small, low-impact enhancements to a product that sold well in the past, instead of evolving the product entirely.

This is where AI enters the discussion. AI tools dramatically lower the barriers to innovation and new business lines. The extra effort that used to hold teams back shrinks. Few would argue that AI isn't great at proofs of concept and at speeding up discovery for new tech.

Take Claude Design. It produces strong mockups and interactive prototypes within minutes, a great basis for product testing with a focus group. As Aneesh Kethini, Product Manager at Datadog, puts it: "We've gone from a rough idea to a working prototype before anyone leaves the room."⁴

From there, you can use Claude Code to turn it into a first working version of the app, to test early demand or to show at a conference around the corner. thoughtbot did this in a design sprint for TellaDraft, a book-writing platform for nonfiction authors. Instead of static screens, they built a working prototype. Founder Heather Hays said: "I was handed a cutting-edge, technologically functional prototype." She could share it with her community and potential investors⁵.

Senior experts can also orchestrate the work of AI agents more and more. At Rakuten, Yusuke Kaji, General Manager of AI for Business, describes it like this: "You can have five tasks running in parallel by delegating four to Claude Code while focusing on the remaining one." Rakuten cut the average time to market for new features from 24 working days to 5⁶.

Simpler tech work can be done by less technical people who work only at the requirements layer. Frameworks like OpenSpec allow exactly that: you describe what to build in a written proposal and spec, and the AI coding assistant implements it⁷.

That covers a company's day-to-day needs and gives experts more capacity for long-term, more challenging tech work. But for that you need the culture infinite games represent: ownership, curiosity, a long-term vision and the courage to take short-term risk. Otherwise, no interesting bets get made.

AI as an infinite game

There's a lot of talk about the AI race. Will the US or China win it? Will Google, Anthropic, OpenAI or xAI become the new leader? And there's the fear that AI becomes self-aware and independent and stops working in humanity's best interest, with a Skynet-style worst case straight out of The Terminator.

Sure, there is competition, and some concerns deserve attention. Still, all of these are finite game mindsets. As if the AI journey had an end date, like a football (soccer) match after 90 minutes.

Reality is different. The players in the AI journey will change. So will the rules and the boundaries of what's possible. Every year brings a new trend in AI. And there is no set time limit on how long it will last, just as there isn't for any other business or tech trend.

5 ways to play the infinite game with AI

Drawing on James P. Carse and Simon Sinek, plus my own perspective, here's what I suggest:

1. Focus on the journey, not only the goal. Stay open-minded. What do you know about AI tech today? Where does it give you value? Where can you learn more?
2. Define your long-term vision. What tech doesn't exist for you yet that you could build and then evolve? What type of company do you want to drive? Are you there already? How do you want to evolve?
3. Know the players. Who is in your business or tech game? What can you learn from them? How fast are they changing? Who's leaving and who's coming in?
4. Challenge the rules. They will change anyway, and the first to challenge them successfully get ahead. In 2000, Blockbuster laughed Netflix out of the room when offered to buy it for $50 million⁸. Netflix kept rewriting the rules of how we watch films. Blockbuster is down to a single store.
5. Aim to stay in the game. What kind of participation would satisfy you? If you're there already, how can you keep at least that? Appreciate what you have, keep going, and keep evolving your business, your tech and yourself.

There is no final whistle in business, tech or AI. And that's good news. It means you can always keep playing, learning and building.

This is edition 2 of Beyond Tactics, my newsletter. A new edition every Tuesday. Subscribe so you don't miss the next one, and tell me in the comments: which finite game are you playing right now that is really part of an infinite one?

Google Tom Dulz for more info on what I do and how we can work together!

Sources

1. James P. Carse, Finite and Infinite Games, Free Press, 1986. Author background: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_P._Carse. "Surprise" quote (p. 19): https://www.tau.ac.il/education/muse/maslool/boidem/155carse.html
2. Simon Sinek, The Infinite Game, Portfolio/Penguin, 2019. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Infinite_Game
3. Marc Andreessen, "The Techno-Optimist Manifesto", Andreessen Horowitz, October 16, 2023. https://a16z.com/the-techno-optimist-manifesto/
4. Anthropic, "Introducing Claude Design by Anthropic Labs", April 17, 2026. https://www.anthropic.com/news/claude-design-anthropic-labs
5. Chad Pytel, Kevin Kwon and Michelle Taute, "Rapid prototyping with Claude Code: How we transformed our design sprint process", thoughtbot, January 13, 2026. https://thoughtbot.com/blog/rapid-prototyping-with-claude-code-how-we-transformed-our-design-sprint-process
6. Anthropic, "Rakuten" Claude Code customer story. https://claude.com/customers/rakuten
7. Fission AI, OpenSpec. https://github.com/Fission-AI/OpenSpec
8. Fortune, "Netflix cofounder Marc Randolph recalls Blockbuster rejecting chance to buy it", April 14, 2023. https://fortune.com/2023/04/14/netflix-cofounder-marc-randolph-recalls-blockbuster-rejecting-chance-to-buy-it