Business progress requires transitions from existing to projected states of affairs. Because causalities are the medium of transitions, the management of causalities largely determines whether transitions are effective. 'Explanations' are accounts of phenomena in terms of the causalities that give rise to them. Explanatory Power is the extent of a firm's ability to understand and manage those causalities. 

A strong explanation renders a projected state of affairs less contingent. Therefore, other things being equal, a firm with greater Explanatory Power always has a competitive advantage. The probability of its realizing projected states of affairs is higher than the probability that attaches to the efforts of a firm with lesser Explanatory Power. 

Many firms do not go far enough to test the fit of their analyses within the larger fabric of explanation that separates the real from the specious, the probable from the improbable, or even the highly probable from the moderately probable. The strongest actionable clarity crystallizes at explanatory distances greater than firms are accustomed to seeing. Ironically, those distances are much closer than firms might think. But when they aren't reached-for, they might as well be a thousand miles away.