| name | strategic-options |
| description | When the user wants to evaluate strategic options, develop a WHERE TO PLAY / HOW TO WIN framework, build a business case, or decide between two paths. Use when PMC says "what are my strategic options", "should I do X or Y", "build me a business case", "financial model for X", "what's the ROI", "portfolio review", "where should I invest vs. cut", or "where to play / how to win." |
| allowed-tools | Read, Write, AskUserQuestion |
Strategic Options & Business Case
Module 03 of the McKinsey Strategy OS. Evaluate the options, commit to one, build the financial spine. For pricing structure, packaging, and willingness-to-pay analysis, load pricing-strategy skill instead.
WHERE TO PLAY / HOW TO WIN
The two irreducible strategic questions. Every strategy is an answer to both.
WHERE TO PLAY = the arena you choose to compete in:
- Which customer segment (behavioral, not demographic)
- Which geography or channel
- Which problem or use case
- Which price point
HOW TO WIN = the capability or asset that makes you defensibly better in that arena:
- A proprietary data asset others can't replicate
- A distribution channel competitors can't access cheaply
- A brand that creates purchase intent before the sales conversation
- An operational capability that lets you serve the segment cheaper or faster
- A network effect that strengthens as the customer base grows
Test: if you can't name the HOW TO WIN in one sentence, the strategy isn't complete.
Option Development
Generate 2-3 genuinely distinct options before recommending one. Options are distinct when they answer WHERE TO PLAY or HOW TO WIN differently — not just different timelines or pacing.
Test for distinctness: if the options share 80% of their activities, they're not distinct. You have one strategy with minor variations, not real options.
How to force distinctness:
- One option should be the "safe bet" — lower risk, lower upside
- One should be the "ambitious play" — higher risk, higher upside
- One should be the "lean experiment" — minimum commitment to learn before scaling
Name the tradeoffs explicitly. Each option has a reason to choose it AND a reason to reject it.
Recommendation Discipline
"It depends" is not a recommendation. A strategy that says "it depends on X" is a framework, not a decision.
The CEO test: a CEO must make a call. They receive your analysis and choose one path. If your output doesn't give them a clear recommended path with explicit reasoning, you haven't done the strategy work — you've done the research work.
How to commit:
- Name the option you recommend
- State the two strongest reasons for it
- State the one condition under which you'd change the recommendation
- Acknowledge the risks explicitly (not to hedge, but to show you've looked at them)
Business Case Skeleton
Five components every viable business case must answer:
1. Revenue model — Who pays, how much, how often. One sentence per element. No vague "monetization TBD."
2. Key cost assumptions — The 2-3 costs that determine whether the model is viable. Not a full P&L — the variables that would make you stop if they're worse than assumed.
3. Break-even trigger — The single metric that proves the model works at steady state. "At 500 active customers paying $200/month, the model is cash-flow positive." Name the number.
4. Upside scenario — What 3× looks like, and what has to be true for it to happen. The upside scenario is a hypothesis, not a dream — it must be falsifiable.
5. Kill signal — The early metric that means stop before Phase 2. Defined up front, before the team is attached to the work. "If we reach 90 days without 3 customers willing to pay $X, we stop."
Portfolio Position
No venture exists in isolation. Every option reallocates attention from something else.
How to frame portfolio position:
- What does this bet require in terms of focus, capital, or team time?
- What does it crowd out?
- Apply the invest / hold / cut signal:
- Invest: high conviction, resource-constrained — this bet gets more
- Hold: working but not a priority — maintain, don't grow
- Cut: not working, or wrong time — free the resource for higher-leverage bets
Cross-Reference
For pricing structure, packaging tiers, and willingness-to-pay research, load pricing-strategy skill. This skill handles strategic positioning and business case logic; pricing-strategy handles the monetization mechanics.
Output Structure
Every strategic options analysis delivers:
- Strategic options — 2-3 distinct paths, each with WHERE/HOW and named tradeoffs
- Recommended option — one path, with two reasons for it and one condition that would change the call
- Business case skeleton — all 5 components filled in for the recommended option
- Portfolio signal — invest / hold / cut, with reasoning
Quality Bar
Common Rationalizations
| Rationalization | Reality |
|---|
| "We need more information before choosing" | You always will. Choose with what you have. State the key assumption and define what evidence would change the call. |
| "All options have merit" | That's true of every option set. Pick the one where merit × timing × your capability is highest. Explicit reasoning beats paralysis. |
| "The business case is too uncertain to build" | Uncertain cases need skeletons more than certain ones. Name the uncertainty as the key assumption in the model. The skeleton exists to surface that uncertainty, not to hide it. |
| "Portfolio context isn't relevant here" | Every decision reallocates attention from something else. Name the trade-off or you're pretending it doesn't exist. |
