Perspectives on The Only Sustainable Edge

For those who are interested in The Only Sustainable Edge, Harvard Business School’s Working Knowledge newsletter has just published an excerpt from the book and a Q&A with JSB and me.

Here’s one excerpt from the Q&A:

Q: The title of your book is The Only Sustainable Edge. Can you tell us what that sustainable edge is?

A: We make the case that getting better faster by working with others is the only sustainable edge. Structural advantages are eroding rapidly. Distinctive capabilities provide temporary advantage, but unless they are aggressively refreshed through rapid incremental innovation, they will be rapidly overtaken by other, more aggressive competitors. Relative capability is no longer the key strategic metric; it is the relative pace of capability building.

We also take to heart [Sun Microsystems co-founder] Bill Joy’s observation that "there are always more smart people outside your company than within it." So, if you are serious about accelerating capability building, you will need to focus on the edge of your enterprise and learn how to work more effectively with business partners in ways that help you to get better faster.