02
PROBLEM
SOLVING
STRUCTURE
WINNING
STRATEGY
Designing a 'Playing to Win' strategy for viable, feasible, & desirable solutions.
For the last 10 years, I have been developing myself as a design strategist. There is a structure that has guided me in developing a strategic plan, called 'Winning Strategy. The winning strategy concept was developed by Roger Martin while he was CEO of P&G and consists of five integrated questions. To create viable, feasible, and desirable solutions, I have used this structure along with design thinking. As you can see my projects, I have laid out the story of my projects in this portfolio with the five questions in sequence.
This is the initial stage of a project where the vision and goals are established. It is imperative to ensure that all team members have a clear understanding of the outcomes and goals to avoid losing track as the project progresses. As a designer, my job is to set a clear and concise goal in one sentence and then work with the team to define the outcomes in our own words, which I believe is the most difficult process in a project. Using “winning strategy” every team member is able to align their actions to the goal and stay on track.
This is the research stage where a specific markets, customer segments, and geographic regions is chosen and their needs are understood in their context. Two types of solutions exist in a market: value-driven and product-driven. A value-driven solution creates an uncontested market by providing needs for specific customer segments, rather than entering an existing market with different product features (product driven solution). For example, Yellow Tail wine brand simplified wine selection and taste to create a simple and enjoyable wine experience for entry-level wine drinkers. Focusing on consumers' specific needs can create a unique market space in a traditional market.
02. WHERE WILL WE PLAY?
Choosing Your Strategic Playing Field
After finding the needs of the specific target customers, you are going to design a product with a plan for implementing it in a market. At this stage, the most effective model I use is the product user journey map, which is my specialty as a designer. Based on the insights of the target customers, you create personas and the storyboard of how the solution fulfills their needs.
The storyboard acts as a formula to simulate our solutions to the users in their contexts, including plans for marketing and customer management; However, these assumptions need to be validated before moving forward.
03. HOW WILL WE WIN IN CHOSEN MARKETS?
Designing a Winning Value Proposition
01. WHAT IS OUR WINNING ASPIRATION?
Defining Your Goal and Outcomes
In this stage, the focus is on identifying the key activities and capabilities required to support the strategic plan for success in the market., which allows to assess feasibility & viability of the plan. For instance, in my project of creating a photography service for B2B fashion e-commerce, four capabilities were identified: software development for online ordering, photo studio operation, partnership with model agencies and shipping carriers, and customer management. These capabilities were derived from the core capabilities of the main platform business, which is B2B fashion e-commerce - creating an ecosystem around the main business.
04. WHAT CAPABILITIES MUST BE IN PLACE TO WIN?
Building Necessary Organizational Capabilities for “How To Win”
In order to ensure a successful product launch, I create a comprehensive list of metrics to measure and communicate it to all stakeholders. For each phase of product development, I clarify the objectives and desired outcomes because every stage cannot be measured by net profit performance. A successful project may fail at the beginning if upper management does not understand the goal of the phase.
I learned this lesson the hard way with one of my projects, where some team members were expecting profits within five months, despite it still being in the promotion and marketing stage. To prevent such misunderstandings, it's essential for team members to use the same measurement system to review progress and move forward together to the next phase.