In chess, amateurs play for tricks, masters play for position.
Amateurs assume competitors will fall for the tricks, but that is dangerous in business. Competitors could be sandbagging, and there's no ELO based on many prior games. You're also threatening their business and livelihood, not just the loss of a 2 hour game.
Masters assume competitors can see all the tricks, so they play for better pawn structures and piece placements. It is grinding out slight long-term advantages and converting it to a win in the end game. Grinding is the only way, because the players are so equally matched in the short-term: their pieces have similar powers, and they are limited to one move per turn.
In software, businesses can build only so many features per month due to the mythical man-month. Businesses are building on top of more or less the same technologies and mathematical techniques. Businesses understand what is important to customers and how customers use the features. Businesses watch each other's product demos and talk with each other's customers, so nothing released is hidden for long. Businesses also poach talent from each other.
Scholar's mate won't work here, there's no silver bullet features, and anything you build can and will be copied. You'll have to grind it out, fighting for better pawn structures, bishops on long diagonals, network effects, brand, and talent. And in the long-term, you come out ahead.
In a perfect information, turn-based game like Chess, there are no secrets. You know where all the pieces are, who moves what when, and the goal each person has. Direct subterfuge is simply not possible.
Chess masters use unpredictability, but in a perfect information, turn based game, unpredictability is indistinguishable from other traits like adaptability or position. Furthermore, their "tricks" are aimed at achieving proximal goals -- capturing a pawn, splitting a bishop pair, a better position. These proximal goals are then leveraged for victory. This speaks more about chess (or other, perfect information, deterministic, turn based, head to head games) than about mastery in general.
In a game where much information is hidden and victory can be sudden and swift, optimal strategies will take absolutely take advantage of deception, aggression, and risk taking.
I'm hating on your analogy, but I agree with your message. In most games, predictable things are predictable because they are among the most beneficial and safest courses of action. Doing something unpredictable carries with it the implicit cost of doing something that is materially worse, and hoping you will come out ahead because of side effects such as your opponent's confusion. You're probably much better off focusing on executing those simple, obvious, and predictable things well while your opposition bleeds to death while attempting a never ending cycle of net-negative cunning deceptions.
Amateurs assume competitors will fall for the tricks, but that is dangerous in business. Competitors could be sandbagging, and there's no ELO based on many prior games. You're also threatening their business and livelihood, not just the loss of a 2 hour game.
Masters assume competitors can see all the tricks, so they play for better pawn structures and piece placements. It is grinding out slight long-term advantages and converting it to a win in the end game. Grinding is the only way, because the players are so equally matched in the short-term: their pieces have similar powers, and they are limited to one move per turn.
In software, businesses can build only so many features per month due to the mythical man-month. Businesses are building on top of more or less the same technologies and mathematical techniques. Businesses understand what is important to customers and how customers use the features. Businesses watch each other's product demos and talk with each other's customers, so nothing released is hidden for long. Businesses also poach talent from each other.
Scholar's mate won't work here, there's no silver bullet features, and anything you build can and will be copied. You'll have to grind it out, fighting for better pawn structures, bishops on long diagonals, network effects, brand, and talent. And in the long-term, you come out ahead.