Growing up, I played many competitive sports, including cricket. As captain of the varsity girls cricket team back in high school, I remember wanting to win. I remember training early morning every day. I remember understanding that both my team and our competition would be well-coached, disciplined and possess a decent spread of skill and athleticism. I also remember understanding that both teams could not win – and that the game was not necessarily won through athleticism but with the mind. Developing a winning mentality was drilled into me as a cricket player. As I examine my life today, I understand that this winning mentality is just as (if not, more) applicable to success in business, education, relationships, and many other aspects of life.
To win, a company must choose to do some things and not others.
During my MBA studies, I had the opportunity to listen to a lecture by Roger Martin, the former Dean of the Rotman School of Management. In his lecture, he spoke about a Strategic Choice Structuring process that helps managers work together to make powerful choices. Martin has worked for 20 years on developing and honing this process. Armed with a definition of strategy as choice and Martin’s work, any strategist in any organization can build powerful strategies.
This post summarizes the five-choice process for developing and implementing a successful strategy from Roger’s book Playing to Win, which he co-wrote with A.G. Lafley, former CEO of Procter & Gamble (P&G).
Lafley and Martin have created a set of 5 essential strategic choices that, when addressed in an integrated way, will move you ahead of your competitors. They are:
(1) What is our winning aspiration? This choice refers to the purpose of the organization.
(2) Where will we play? This second choice identifies specifically in which market the organization will compete.
(3) How will we win? This choice clarifies the value proposition and a path to competitive advantage.
(4) What capabilities must we have in place to win? This choice allows the business to define the competencies that support the where-to-play and how-to-win choices.
(5) What management systems are required to support our choices? The final choice defines the structures and measures required to support the first 4 choices.
The result is a playbook for winning. Of course reading the book alone will not make you the next A.G. Lafley; however, this five-choice framework is an invaluable map that gives strategists a fighting chance for a successful journey.
You can read more about Roger Martin at http://rogerlmartin.com/
