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Blink 3 of 8 - The 5 AM Club
by Robin Sharma
The Unfair Advantage summary
Ash Ali & Hasan Kubba
How Startup Success Starts With You
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4 (139 ratings)
19 mins
7 key ideas
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What is The Unfair Advantage about?
The Unfair Advantage (2020) demonstrates how we all have something that can catapult us to success. Drawing on their extensive experience in the start-up world, co-authors Ash Ali and Hasan Kubba break down various personal advantages and how they can be leveraged for the benefit of your business. Wherever you are on your start-up journey, The Unfair Advantage will help you identify what gives you the upper hand and how you can immediately start making it work for you.
About the Author
Ash Ali is a growth hacker, entrepreneur, and angel investor with over 20 years of experience in the tech industry. Hasan Kubba is an entrepreneur whose specialities are growth, marketing, tech, and fundraising. Both Ali and Kubba have lent their expertise to hundreds of start-ups and founders the world over, and they’ve spoken at events for TEDx, Startup Grind, Salesforce, and Ernst & Young. The Unfair Advantage is their first book.
Table of Contents
Key idea 1 of 7
Whoever you are, you have unique circumstances that can help you succeed.
Often we look at people who are wealthy, famous, or even attractive, and think, “Wow, they’ve got a lot going for them.” But the truth is, these aren’t the only kinds of advantages that exist. Wherever you find yourself in life, you’ve got something you can leverage.
For some people, the advantages are obvious ideal circumstances like wealth or good looks. A great example of this is Evan Spiegel, the co-founder of Snapchat who became a billionaire at 25. Raised by wealthy lawyers who were friends with successful business people, Spiegel had access to money, funders, and mentors right from the get-go. Spiegel’s Snapchat idea was definitely innovative, but it’s easy to see how his advantages helped the company succeed.
Does this mean you won’t be successful without wealth and connections? Absolutely not. There are many advantages that just aren’t as obvious as a big bank balance or friends in the right places. Think of all the “rags to riches” stories you’ve heard – or consider the story of Ash Ali, co-author of The Unfair Advantage.
Ali grew up in an area of Birmingham, England, where drugs and gangs were the norm. He dropped out of high school, and while his peers were getting degrees, he worked at an office supply store. But Ali had something going for him – he was a natural entrepreneur who had been coming up with ways to make money from as young an age as 13. When a friend approached him about building an online shoe shop when he was 19, Ali was all in.
Nevermind that it was 1998, and e-commerce was practically non-existent; Ali got to work teaching himself about building websites. Eventually, the pair had a fully operating online store with visitors and orders coming in. This kicked off Ali’s career, and since then, he’s founded several start-ups and become an angel investor.
Whether your advantage is wealth like Evan Spiegel’s, a hidden talent like Ash Ali’s, or something else altogether, success is a matter of identifying it and then putting it to use. In the following blinks, you’ll learn about various unfair advantages and how they can work for you.
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Who should read The Unfair Advantage
- Aspiring founders who want to build their start-ups on solid groundwork
- Early-stage entrepreneurs grappling with challenges, from finding that big idea to funding their start-up
- Anyone looking to glean the secrets to a successful start-up
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