Competitive Strategy

Michael E. Porter's study of industries and competitors reduces the complexity of industry competition to five underlying forces. He then sets out three generic strategies (lowest cost, differentiation and focus) to give structure to strategic positioning, and defines competitive advantage through relative cost and relative price, tying it directly to profitability. His framework for predicting how rivals will behave helped give rise to competitor assessment as a discipline. The ideas address the fundamentals of competition rather than the particular ways firms compete. The book has been translated into nineteen languages and reprinted close to sixty times in English.

Bill Gurley included it in his list on X of books all entrepreneurs should read. Denise Morris Kipnis, founder of ChangeFlow Consulting, named it among the books she suggests to young people interested in her career path.