The Strategy Choice Cascade, explained properly.
The five questions at the heart of Playing to Win. Not a checklist, a portrait. Each answer must fit the others; see Integration.
- Winning Aspiration, what does winning look like?
- Where to Play, on which field?
- How to Win, by what theory of advantage?
- Must-Have Capabilities, with what muscles?
- Enabling Management Systems, sustained by what nervous system?
Two structural rules Martin insists on:
WTP and HTW are inseparable. Choosing the most attractive market first, then hunting for a way to win there, is the most common cascade failure. The pair is the heart of strategy and must be chosen together.
The cascade runs both directions. Aspirations constrain choices downward; capability realities push back upward. A cascade that only flows down produces fantasy.
The cascade is validated with The Opposite Test, The Cant-Wont Test and What Would Have to Be True. Applied in full in the Olay Case Study.
Seam with the OKR system: OKRs live in box five, the full mapping between this cascade and the OKR system is in Where OKRs Meet Strategy.
Our synthesis of published thinking, Roger Martin and A.G. Lafley, Playing to Win (2013), and Martin’s subsequent writing, sources credited. Read the originals: they’re excellent.
Reading about method is not the same as running it. We install this system and build the capability that stays.
Turn your cascade into executed strategy →