I’ve been reading Nilofer Merchant‘s book on the #SOCIALERA. The main point is that “Traditional Strategy” is dead. For example, one shift is that organizations can’t behave like 800 lbs. gorillas who use a single driving strategy to dominate a given space – and then expect to hold their place in the market for decades. Those business models are being disrupted every day (uber, airbnb, *cough, cough*).

Instead, the shift is toward the idea of 800 gazelles who are able to act independently and make shifts quickly and gracefully as a herd.

This phrase stuck out in particular:

In the Social Era, the idea is to get the general direction right and rely on feedback loops to iterate and adjust direction.

And it brought on a few simple illustrations.

What Traditional Competitive Advantage Looks Like:

What Competitive Advantage in the #SOCIALERA Looks Like: