(2023-10-14) Chin Market Cluster

Cedric Chin cluster on the Market. ‘Market’ is a shorthand for ‘factors influencing the market’, which is one of the three legs of triad mental model of business expertise.

The ‘Market’ topic cluster includes strategic adversarial thinking, though large bits of strategy also involve operating well. The big framework in the Market topic cluster is the 7 Powers framework by Hamilton Helmer. But Market covers other things. For instance, you need to understand the shape of the game you’re playing — which in turn means a deep understanding of your customers, your competitors, your positioning against those competitors, the threat of new entrants, and how that can change over time. We also cover thinking methods that make it slightly easier to reason about adversarial competition (particularly in a business context).

7 Powers by Hamilton Helmer is probably the best framework we have right now for thinking about competition in business. You may treat the following series of articles as a loose cluster of ideas around the framework.

7 Powers

Notable Articles

*Some notable Commoncog pieces in the Market topic cluster.

(2020-05-19) Chin Much Ado About The OODA Loop — Boyd’s ideas as a model for adversarial competition.

(2020-05-26) Chin Good Synthesis Is The Start Of Good Sensemaking — Ostensibly about adaptation in the face of uncertainty, but contains an explanation of process power as competitive advantage.*

(2021-09-21) Chin Are You Playing To Play Or Playing To Win

(2025-03-19) Chin Series Understanding Customer Demand