Any organization without a sound strategy is bound to fail. Yet, most leaders don’t truly understand strategy nor how to apply it. This book by A.G. Lafley And Roger L. Martin demystifies strategy and equips you with concepts, frameworks, tools and processes to help your organization to win. In this free Playing to Win summary, we’ll explain “what’s strategy?”, outline the 5 choices in the strategy choice cascade, before giving an overview of how to apply it via your strategy playbook.
Playing to Win: An Introduction
The strategy framework in this book was jointly developed by the 2 authors, who were previously the CEO of Procter & Gamble (P&G) and the dean of the Rotman School of Management respectively. When Lafley became the CEO of P&G in year 2000, he used this framework to revitalize the company and it has now become a standard process at P&G. This approach to strategy can be applied to any business, function, or organization.
It’s a misconception that strategy has become irrelevant in today’s fast-changing environment. In fact, a sound strategy is even more vital today to create a true competitive advantage. Strategy is also not about adopting best practices nor is it the same as vision, mission, plans, tactics or optimizing processes. Strategy is fundamentally about making specific, integrated choices to win in the marketplace. We’ll now summarize the key concepts, components and processes involved in developing a winning strategy. Do get a copy of our full 14-page summary for more details.
Strategy: An Integrated Cascade of Choices
Basically, your strategy is your set of answers to 5 key questions. They’re closely interrelated: the choices at the top cascade downward, and the choices at the bottom refine and reinforce the choices above. In small companies, there may be only 1 choice-cascade, while in large organizations there may be sub-levels of choices.
What Is Your Winning Aspiration?
Your aspiration states why you exist, what you seek to be, and what winning looks like for your organization. It guides all your decisions and is the starting point to align the rest of your strategic choices. In our complete summary , we (a) explain why you must play to win and not just play to compete, (b) share examples to illustrate the difference between playing-to-win and playing-to-play, and (c) explain how/what it means to define winning at various levels.
Where Will You Play?
Choosing the right playing field is really about defining the business you’re in, where you’ll compete to win (and achieve your aspiration), and where you’ll not compete. You can go for a narrow or broad choice, but you must choose. If you try to play in every field concurrently, you’ll end up under-performing and failing in all sectors. In our full Playing to Win summary, we (a) explain each of these where-to-play choices (geography, product segment, customer segment, distribution channel, stages of production), and (b) what to consider and where to start.
How Will You Win?
Once you’ve chosen where to play, you can define how to win there, i.e. the strengths, model and value proposition to gain the competitive advantage needed to win in your chosen playing field. Broadly, you can go for a low-cost strategy, differentiation strategy or both, though the exact details will vary for each organization and your strategy must evolve over time. In our complete 14-page summary, we (a) explain each of these strategy approaches in more detail, and (b) share examples and lessons learned from various P&G brands’ experience (e.g. Pampers, Citrus Hill) succeeded or failed.
What Capabilities Must Be In Place?
Your core capabilities are the entire set of activities that jointly allow you to realize your where-to-play and how-to-win choices. An activity system (coined by Michael Porter) is a 1-page visual representation of these capabilities. A small business may have 1 activity system for the whole company, while a large corporation like P&G will have different activity systems for each business unit. In our full summary, we explain (a) how specifically P&G translated its where-to-play and how-to-win choices into a list of core capabilities, (b) the 3 criteria (feasibility, distinctiveness and defensibility) that your activity system must fulfill, (c) how to integrate and strengthen core capabilities in large organizations via reinforcing rods (shared capabilities that cut across multiple divisions or units form), and (d) how P&G used these principles to create massive success from its acquisition of Gillette in 2005.
What Management Systems Are Required?
Having a sound strategy isn’t enough. To win, your organization needs supporting systems and structures to cultivate its capabilities, as well as measures that tell you how well you’re delivering on your strategic choices. In our complete summary, we elaborate on various tools and techniques you can use to develop strategic-thinking abilities for better decision-making, to improve dialogue and communication at all levels, and to track/measure desired outcomes.
Getting Started: Your Strategy Playbook
The 5 sets of strategic choices above affect what you do and don’t do. Obviously, it’s not easy or straightforward to find good answers. There are many strategy tools (e.g. SWOT analysis or BCG Growth Matrix) that you can use to brainstorm and filter ideas, but where do you start?
Basically, you should start with a rough definition of your winning aspiration, then move on to spend more effort on your where-to-play and how-to-win choices, because they form the heart of your strategy and define where/how you will play to win. To find and choose the best where-to-play and how-to-win choices, the authors recommend using (a) the strategy logic flow and (b) reverse engineering. These, combined with the 5 strategic choices of the choice cascade, form your strategy playbook.
In a nutshell:
- The strategy logic flow gives you a structured approach to think through your strategy, using 7 questions along 4 key dimensions to analyze your organization’s current realities, and help you to generate strategic ideas/choices.
- The reverse engineering process helps you to choose the options that give you the highest chances of success.
In the Playing to Win book, the authors explain both elements above in great detail, along with other useful strategy tools. You can get a detailed overview of the process in our full summary bundle and infographic.
Getting the Most from Playing to Win
In this article, we’ve briefly outlined some of the key insights and strategies you can use to achieve desired change. For more examples, details, and actionable tips to apply these strategies, do get our complete book summary bundle which includes an infographic, 14-page text summary, and a 25-minute audio summary.
The book is packed with many detailed case studies and tips, including:
- Examples involving brands like Gillette, Pampers, Olay, Tide, Impress, Swiffer, Febreze and Bounty; and
- Details of various strategy tools and models you can use for your strategic analysis;
- Additional appendices about P&G’s performance and the microeconomics of strategy
You can purchase the book here for the full details, or check out more resources/details at the official website.
About the Author of Playing to Win
Playing To Win: How Strategy Really Works is written by A.G. Lafley And Roger L. Martin.
A.G. Lafley was the CEO of Procter & Gamble (P&G) from 2000-2010. He was chairman, president and CEO of P&G from 2013-2015 and stepped down as CEO in 2015 to become executive chairman, before retiring in June 2016. He has been credited for revitalizing P&G. He also coached and consulted on business and innovation strategy, advising on CEO succession and executive leadership development.
Roger L. Martin was the Dean of the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto from 1998-2013. He was previously a consultant at the Monitor Group for 13 years and served as the cohead of the firm for 2 years. He has written several business books, numerous articles, and has been recognized by several business publications as one of the field’s most important thinkers.
Playing to Win Quotes
“Not only is strategy possible in times of tumultuous change, but it can be a competitive advantage and a source of significant value creation.”
“Strategy is a way to win—and nothing less.”
“If everything is a priority, nothing is.”
“Focus is a crucial winning attribute. Attempting to be all things to all customers tends to result in underserving everyone.”
“Strategy is formulated at all levels of the organization, and to be successful, it needs to be clearly communicated at all levels as well.”
“In the end, building a strategy isn’t about achieving perfection; it’s about shortening your odds.”
Click here to download the Playing to Win summary & infographic
