Are you playing to win?
Roger Martin argues in his book “Playing to win” that you are doing one of two things:
- Playing to win
- Playing to play
Strategy is, amongst other things, about making choices and these can be made actively e.g. we are going to do X, or passively e.g. not making a decision, and having someone or something make a decision on your behalf.
Playing to win
The goal here is to determine the playing field of a particular market, and then calculating steps to win that market. The number one player in a market gets more than their share - being number two or three yields exponentially lower results. The prize of being number one is high enough that it is worth the time and effort to plan to get there.
There is always risk to a real strategy, as making a choice has an opportunity cost - taking one road precludes you from taking others. You accept this risk because as mentioned above, the prize is worth the risk.
Playing to play
This is also phrased as “Playing not to lose”. The series of actions taken here defensive and avoid any risk taking. They try to do everything at once and not make any hard choices whilst focusing on operational efficiency - which as Michael Porter pointed out is not strategy.
Compounding all these problems is a focus on what your competitors are doing. If you focus your energy on your competitors, at best you can have what they have, but no more. This way of thinking leads people to fight for scraps of well known and well defined problems.
Summary
Playing to win involves a clear series of actions aimed at winning in a particular market. The rewards for being number one in any market are exponentially better than fighting for the number two or three spot. The problem is playing to win is risky, but the alternative low risk approach (playing to play) will at best yield mediocre results - fighting for the scraps left behind by the winner.