Does your strategy give you the right to win?

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  • Publication
  • June 2024

Today the business environment is rapidly changing and facing uncertainty, with constant pressure to compete. In this context, it is easy for leaders to overlook a basic principle: Build from your strengths. When you understand what you’re great at, by designing your strategy from your capabilities, you can define how you want to compete to shape your future.

More than 6,000 executives across the globe took part in the PwC Strategy Profiler, where two out of three respondents admit that their company’s capabilities don’t fully support their strategy, and only one in five are fully confident that they have a right to win

Most organisations agree that their company has too many conflicting priorities, and struggle to make strategies that are right for them. Instead of focusing on what makes them unique, they search for growth wherever it may happen, spending resources in many areas, leaving them with great ambition but no real advantage.



So how can organisations have the right to win?



The right to win comes from understanding the things your company can do better than anyone else. These differentiating capabilities can set you apart from your competition and open the market where you are uniquely positioned to win. This is what creates a true and powerful engine for growth and the key to building a strategy that works.

A company's right to win in any market depends not just on external market positioning, and not just on internal capabilities, but on a coherent strategy that aligns them at every level. 

There are three interlocking elements to formulate a capabilities-driven strategy: defining a way to play, leveraging your capabilities system, and formulating a product and service fit. Coherence is the glue that binds these three elements.

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A right to win comes from coherence between way to play, capabilities system, as well as product and service portfolio



A right to win is the recognition that the company is better prepared than its competitors to attract and keep the customers they care about.

Companies with a right to win will have a way to play that is:

  • differentiated from their competitors’ ways to play

  • relevant, given the changes that might take place in the industry 

  • supported by their capabilities system, and it is therefore feasible

Lastly, the products and services offered by the company will also benefit from this capabilities system.

Achieving coherence with one, or even two, of these elements is not enough. Only when all three are in sync, with one another and with the right market conditions, can a company truly claim the right to win sustainably.



How can we help?

If you are interested in discussing how we can assist your organisation in formulating your strategy, please contact our dedicated team.

Contact us

Claudine Attard

Claudine Attard

Director, Advisory, PwC Malta

Tel: +356 9947 6321

Katya Pirotta

Katya Pirotta

Senior Manager, Advisory, PwC Malta

Tel: +356 7973 6016

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