As Michael Porter, the leading proponent of strategy
as positioning, has argued, "Efforts to grow blur uniqueness, create compromises, reduce fit, and ultimately undermine competitive advantage. In fact, the growth imperative is hazardous to strategy."
Essentially, a leader's most vexing strategic challenge is not how to obtain or sustain competitive advantage—which has been the field of strategy's primary focus—but, rather, how to keep finding new, unexpected ways to create value.