Summary: The Power of Unfair Advantage

Review and Analysis of Nesheim's Book

BusinessNews Publishing

• Publisher: Must Read Summaries
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9782511016787
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business Strategy
• Index: Business

The must-read summary of John Nesheim's book: `The Power of Unfair Advantage: How to Create It, Build It, and Use It to Maximum Effect`.

This complete summary of the ideas from John Nesheim's book `The Power of Unfair Advantage` shows that when a company has an unfair advantage in business, it is no longer required to compete against everyone else on a level playing field. Instead, it loads the dice in its own favor, and makes success more likely. In his book, the author explains how unfair advantage is the holy grail of the business world and is the engine that drives the growth of business start-ups and turns them into world-class enterprises. Quite simply, everyone and every organization needs an unfair advantage in order to stand out in this intensely competitive world.

Added-value of this summary:
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To learn more, read `The Power of Unfair Advantage` and discover how you can harness an unfair advantage in the market and ensure success.

Summary of The Power of Unfair Advantage (John Nesheim)

1. What is an unfair advantage in business?

Unfair advantage is defined as the unique, consistent difference which allows a business entity to deliver superior value to customers over an extended period of time. Companies use unfair advantage to become the leaders of an entirely new market category.

The great thing about an unfair advantage is it will be hard for competitors to duplicate. When you offer customers superior value in a highly distinctive way by comparison with everyone else, you create a competitive advantage that is enduring, expandable and free to evolve and grow with the subsequent passage of time. Companies that successfully harness their unfair advantage have the potential to become world class brands.

There are ten basic sources from which different companies have developed their respective unfair advantages:

1. Superior knowledge of customers and their actual needs – so you can create products which are demonstrably different and which stand out from those offered by competitors because they do more of what customers want.
2. A detailed understanding of the incumbents in your industry – and a plan of attack for how to outmaneuver them in the marketplace.
3. Better capitalization – either sufficient funds to do things on a whole different scale or having on-board smart investors who have a reputation for backing winners.
4. Impressive strategic partners – who know how to get things done, have access to key technologies which will be useful or have a long track record of backing winners.
5. A clever business strategy – that correctly anticipates what will work best with customers while at the same time diluting the range of options available to competitors.
6. Substantial progress to date – meaning you have a head start over everyone else in an area where there is a first-mover advantage to exploit or where there are network effects which mean the early market entrants can build advantageous economies of scale.
7. The right corporate culture – allowing you to attract the right people because you offer a great place to work.
8. The ability to craft exceptional compensation packages – which enhances your ability to recruit and then retain high performance employees.
9. An exceptional management team – made up of people with unique experience in your industry, a great track record of success or world-class capabilities.
10. The organizational capacity to act quickly – so you can take advantage of new market opportunities and react well to the surprises which will crop up from time to time.

Note this list is not all inclusive. There are many other elements which also could contribute to an unfair advantage. The key is that all the various parts fit together well and reinforce each other. Your unfair advantage needs to be organic – it must be able to evolve and grow over time as the marketplace itself changes.

Unfair advantages also come in different levels of strength. A weak unfair advantage may have little impact. Conversely, a very strong unfair advantage, if leveraged appropriately, can grow and ultimately serve as the basis for long-term market dominance. From one perspective, having an unfair advantage is one challenge and then finding ongoing ways to exploit that unfair advantage is another challenge altogether.

“Think of an unfair advantage like a diamond. At first it is a rough, unattractive, dirty stone hidden deep below the surface of the earth, in very hard-to-get-to, sometimes dangerous places. After digging one up, diamond merchants examine the rough stone and decide what they can do to make it into a beautiful gem. Their plan will be to cut and polish the stone in a special way until it sparkles so brightly it will attract every eye. Experts know each stone is unique and there is a special way to bring out its hidden best. That is how unfair advantage mining works. There is a special process for its discovery, extraction, planning and polishing. When you learn it, you can do what serial entrepreneurs do: become a world class unfair advantage miner.”

– John Nesheim

“Unfair advantage propels new enterprises to victory. Without it, they die, sooner or later – mostly sooner.”

– John Nesheim

“Unfair advantage is like a unique collection of resources used to deliver so much appeal customers rush to buy your products.”

– John Nesheim

2. How to create and assemble an un...

Table of contents

• Title page
• Book Presentation
• Summary of The Power of Unfair Advantage (John Nesheim)
• About the Summary Publisher
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