Sublime

A company that best frames a problem is the company that often comes to define and take the category.

every employee in my department owns three to five business objectives per quarter, along with one or two personal ones.

What people want today are trustworthy brands.

John Doerr,

Each company doesn’t just want to serve customers; it wants to win with them. And that is the single most crucial dimension of a company’s aspiration: a company must play to win. To play merely to participate is self-defeating. It is a recipe for mediocrity. Winning is what matters—and it is the ultimate criterion of a successful strategy. Once the

Now, did we dominate the mid-range microcomputer business? That’s for us to argue in the years to come, but over the next quarter we’ll know whether we’ve won ten new designs or not.

“Our fundamental strategy is one of customer-centric intermediation.”

Understanding customer value requires deep engagement. The traditional approach of checking in with salespeople occasionally to see what retailers are thinking and doing is no longer enough. A much higher level of sophistication—and real commitment—is required. Almost twenty years ago, P&G began integrating staff from marketing, manufacturing,

Clarity about the winning aspirations meant that actions at the brand, category, sector, and company level were directed at delivering against that ideal.