In Playing to Win, former CEO A.G. Lafley and consultant Roger Martin explain the steps for developing a successful business strategy. When the two worked together at Procter & Gamble, they used this approach to double the company's sales and market capitalization.
Their strategy involves answering five questions, each leading to the next like a cascading waterfall:
* What is your company’s ideal future?
* What are your target market?
* How will you succeed in those markets?
* What capabilities does your company need in order to “win”?
* How should you manage your company in order to “win”?
In this guide, we’ll examine each step of Lafley and Martin’s waterfall strategy, then discuss how to create a business plan that will help you dominate your chosen market. We’ll further enrich—and occasionally contrast—Lafley and Martin’s ideas with connections to other popular business guides such as Richard Rumelt’s Good Strategy/Bad Strategy and Simon Sinek’s The Infinite Game.
