Joe: Most companies, and maybe even most of us in our own careers, are playing to participate. We show up, we do the work, we hope for the best. But what if that’s a guaranteed recipe for mediocrity, or even failure? Lewis: That hits a little too close to home. It’s the corporate equivalent of getting a 'participant' ribbon at the school sports day. You were there, but you didn't really make an impact. The real game, I assume, is about playing to win. Joe: Exactly. And that's the entire premise of the book we're diving into today, Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works by A.G. Lafley and Roger L. Martin. It argues that winning is the only point. Lewis: Lafley and Martin... that's such an interesting duo, isn't it? You have A.G. Lafley, the CEO who actually orchestrated this massive turnaround at Procter & Gamble, paired with Roger Martin, a top-tier academic and consultant. This isn't just theory; it feels like it was forged in the fire of a real corporate battle. Joe: It absolutely was. The book is essentially their playbook from that P&G transformation in the 2000s. And while it's a Wall Street Journal bestseller and widely read in business schools, it's also got its critics. Some reader reviews say it's a bit of a P&G victory lap, and maybe less applicable to smaller companies. Lewis: Right, a bit promotional. We can definitely get into that. But first, the word 'strategy' itself feels so... bloated. It makes me think of PowerPoints, buzzwords, and meetings that go nowhere. Joe: And that is precisely the problem they want to solve. They argue that strategy has become this mystical, complex thing when it shouldn't be. At its core, they say strategy is simple. It's choice.

Lewis: Okay, "strategy is choice." I like the simplicity, but it also sounds a bit like a fortune cookie. What does that actually mean in practice? Joe: It means you have to answer five specific questions. They call it the Strategic Choice Cascade, where the answer to each question influences the next. It’s a connected flow of decisions. Lewis: Hold on, a 'Strategic Choice Cascade'. That sounds exactly like something you'd see on a corporate retreat poster, right next to a picture of an eagle soaring over a mountain. Break this down for me. Joe: Fair enough. Let's make it real. The first question is: What is your winning aspiration? And this isn't some vague mission statement. It’s about defining what winning looks like for your organization, in a way that actually inspires people. Lewis: So, not just "to be the leading provider of synergistic solutions"? Joe: Definitely not. The book gives a great example. Think of a local community hospital. Its aspiration might be to provide good, reliable care to the local population. That's playing to participate. Then you have the Mayo Clinic. Their aspiration is to transform the world of medicine, to be at the vanguard of research. They are playing to win. That ambition dictates every other choice they make. Lewis: I see the difference. One is about existing, the other is about dominating. But what happens if you have a weak aspiration? Joe: You get one of the most spectacular failures in automotive history: General Motors' Saturn. In the 1980s, GM was getting hammered by Japanese imports like Toyota and Honda. They were losing younger buyers, their costs were out of control. They needed a game-changer. Lewis: And Saturn was supposed to be that game-changer, right? "A different kind of car company." I remember the ads. Joe: It was. They set up a whole new division, a new factory, a new no-haggle sales model. There was massive hype. But here's the fatal flaw, right at the first question. Their winning aspiration was modest. It was essentially to compete with the Japanese in the small-car market, to stop the bleeding. They were playing defense. Lewis: And what were Toyota and Honda doing? Joe: They were playing to win. Their aspiration was to be the global leaders in reliable, fuel-efficient cars. So while GM was making just enough investment in Saturn to keep it afloat, Toyota and Honda were pouring billions into R&D, into continuous improvement, into building a global dynasty. Lewis: So Saturn was built to participate, not to win. What was the result? Joe: After twenty years and an estimated $20 billion in losses, GM shut Saturn down in 2010. It's a heartbreaking story of a brand that never had a real chance because its ambition was capped from day one. Lewis: Wow. But isn't aiming too high just as dangerous? Setting some crazy, unattainable goal? Joe: That’s the counterintuitive point the authors make. They argue a too-modest aspiration is far more dangerous than a too-lofty one. A lofty goal might feel impossible, but it forces you to think about making the huge, transformative investments required to even try. A modest goal guarantees you won't make those investments, and you'll get run over by someone who is playing to win. Lewis: Okay, that makes sense. So a winning aspiration is question one. What are the others in this cascade? Joe: The other four are: Two, Where will you play? This is your battlefield—which markets, which customers, which channels. Three, How will you win? This is your unique advantage on that battlefield. Four, What capabilities must be in place? What are you uniquely good at? And five, What management systems are required? How do you measure and support all of this? Lewis: That's a lot to unpack. But it sounds like the real action is in those middle two questions. Where you decide to fight, and how you plan to win the fight. Joe: Exactly. The authors say where-to-play and how-to-win are the absolute heart of strategy. And there's no better story to illustrate this than the incredible turnaround of the skin-care brand, Olay.

Lewis: Olay. I'm picturing a pink bottle on my grandmother's bathroom counter. Joe: You and everyone else in the late 1990s. That was the problem. The brand, then called Oil of Olay, was derisively known as 'Oil of Old Lady.' It was a dying brand. Sales were under $800 million in a $50 billion global market. It was seen as cheap, old-fashioned, and completely irrelevant to younger consumers. Lewis: So P&G is looking at this dying brand. What's their first move? They must be thinking about where to play. Do they try to sell it in fancy department stores? Joe: That was an option. They could have also killed the brand, or launched a totally new one. But they made a very specific 'where-to-play' choice. They decided to stick to the mass market—places like Walmart and drugstores. But, and this is key, they chose a new consumer segment to target: women aged 35 and up, who were just starting to see their first wrinkles and were willing to spend more than a 20-year-old on skincare. Lewis: Okay, so they've defined their battlefield: mass-market stores. And their target: women entering the anti-aging fight. Now for the big one: How do they win? How do you take a brand known as 'Oil of Old Lady' and make it a premium choice for this new audience? Joe: This is the genius of their 'how-to-win' choice. They decided to create an entirely new category that didn't exist before: 'masstige,' or mass-prestige. The idea was to offer a product with the effectiveness of a high-end department store cream, but sell it in the mass market. Lewis: A department store product at drugstore prices? Joe: Not exactly. This is where it gets really brave. The old Oil of Olay sold for about $3.99. The P&G team, led by a general manager named Gina Drosos, developed a new product called Olay Total Effects. It had a new, powerful ingredient complex called VitaNiacin. And they decided to price it at $18.99. Lewis: Wait, hold on. They took a brand people thought was cheap and outdated, and decided to charge five times more for it? That sounds like strategic suicide. How did they possibly get away with that? Joe: By building the capabilities and management systems to support that choice. This is where the whole cascade connects. First, the product had to be genuinely better. Their R&D team delivered on that. Second, the marketing had to completely change the brand's perception. They advertised Olay in the same high-fashion magazines as the expensive brands like Lancôme and Estée Lauder. They got independent experts to validate their claims. The packaging went from a cheap plastic bottle to a sleek, premium-looking pump. Lewis: So they made it feel like a prestige product, even though it was sitting on a shelf at Target. They were playing with consumer psychology. The book mentions a key insight here, right? Joe: A huge one. Drosos and her team understood the pervasive belief in skincare: "you get what you pay for." Women felt that the cheap stuff in the mass market just wasn't as good. By pricing Olay at $18.99, they sent a powerful signal. This wasn't your grandmother's Olay anymore. This was serious skincare that worked. Lewis: It's a bold move. You're essentially telling the customer, "We're worth it," and daring them to believe you. What was the outcome of this gamble? Joe: It was one of the most successful brand relaunches ever. After the 2000 relaunch, Olay saw double-digit sales and profit growth for a decade. It became a $2.5 billion brand with huge profit margins. They had successfully created a new playing field and completely dominated it. They didn't just revitalize a brand; they changed the entire landscape of the skincare industry. Lewis: That's incredible. And it all came from two clear choices: play in the mass market, but win by creating a premium experience within it. Joe: Exactly. They didn't try to be everything to everyone. They didn't try to fight the department store brands on their own turf. They made a clear set of choices that all reinforced one another, from the target consumer to the product, the price, and the marketing. That's strategy in action.

Lewis: So when you boil it all down, it seems like strategy isn't about having a hundred-page document that gathers dust on a shelf. It’s about the courage to make a few, really clear, and sometimes painful choices. Joe: That's the perfect summary. And those choices have to reinforce each other. Olay’s choice of where to play—the mass market—only worked because of how they chose to win—by creating a new premium tier within it. The high price supported the investment in R&D. The sophisticated marketing supported the high price. It's a cascade. One choice flows into the next, creating a system that's incredibly difficult for competitors to copy. Lewis: It really makes you think about your own work or even personal projects. It's so easy to just drift, to 'play to participate.' But this framework forces you to ask some hard questions. What's my winning aspiration? Am I just showing up, or am I actively trying to win? And where am I even choosing to play? Joe: That's the perfect takeaway. For anyone listening, just asking yourself those first two questions from the cascade can be a powerful exercise. What does winning truly look like for you or your team? And where have you chosen to compete? Is it the right place? Lewis: It’s a great challenge. And for our listeners, we're curious what you think. Does this framework of making hard choices resonate with you, or does it feel too 'big corporation' for the real world? We'd love to hear your thoughts and experiences. Joe: Absolutely. Let us know. This has been a fascinating look at a really practical approach to a topic that's often made way too complicated. Lewis: A great playbook for winning, not just playing. Joe: This is Aibrary, signing off.