摘要：As more and more small and medium-sized enterprises (SME’s) are now struggling to survive due to immense pressure created by both globalization of world economy and competition from giant multinational firms (Mulhern and Stewart, 2003) it is important to discern the competitive edge of small entities in alternative ways. So, since there is a lot of avenue for future investigation of competitive advantage in the environment of small and medium enterprises, this study paper aims to put emphasis on small and medium business sector and it’s elements that could be incorporated in order to attain the competitive advantage. The object of this particular study is the competitive advantage of small and medium enterprise sector. And there are four-fold objectives: 1) to analyze the SME’s and competitive advantage through the academic perspective, 2) to examine the characteristics of SME’s from the theoretical point of view, 3) to investigate the elements of SME’s competitive advantage, 4) to prove the paradigm shift of small and medium-sized enterprises competitive advantage via contemporary conceptual models. Additionally, the methods that have been incorporated in this study paper: 1) logical and comparative analysis of literature, 2)synthesis and deduction, 3) model methods. In this particular case, there is a wide spectrum of academic and empirical studies on competitive advantage which have been widely and deeply discussed, but nevertheless, it is interesting, that existing literature has shed the light on scarce elaboration of the competitive advantage concept and it’s augmentation in the context of small and medium enterprises, therefore, a further examination is needed. The monitoring of contemporary methods such as customer satisfaction and applying it in the activities in SME’s in order to reach competitive advantage is particularly new. Therefore, it could be assumed that this study paper is dedicated for opening the ways in the future practical and academic investigations. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.ee.26.3.6608
关键词：competitive advantage; competitiveness; small and medium-sized enterprises; customer satisfaction; methodology
