// strategy library · roger martin

Roger Martin

Strategy advisor, former Dean of the Rotman School of Management, co-author with A.G. Lafley of Playing to Win, developed through their work transforming Procter & Gamble.

This library maps his body of work as an interconnected system. Start with Playing to Win (the book and worldview), Strategy Is Choice (his definition, and how it evolved), the Strategy Choice Cascade (the five questions) and Martins Three Laws (the distilled principles).

Working methods: What Would Have to Be True, Possibility Portraits, Strategic Narrative. Diagnostics: The Opposite Test and The Cant-Wont Test. What strategy is not: Playing to Play, Strategy Impostors, Operational Excellence Is Not Strategy. The philosophical foundation: The Aristotle Distinction, Strategy as Logic Not Analysis, Strategy as Craft. Making strategy real: Enabling Management Systems, The Barnacle Problem, CEO as Chief System Designer, Honing vs Transformation, Culture Change Is Retail Not Wholesale. Context and applications: Winner-Takes-Most Dynamics, Cheap Strategy, Corporate Purpose, Diversification and Advantage, Functional Strategy, BHAGs Through Martins Lens, AI and Augmentation. Case: the Olay Case Study.

Our synthesis of Roger Martin’s published work, sources credited. Read the originals: they’re excellent.

// connected concepts
Playing to Win → Strategy Is Choice → Strategy Choice Cascade → Martins Three Laws → Explore all 122 notes →
// put it to work

Reading about method is not the same as running it. We install this system and build the capability that stays.

Turn strategy into executed strategy →