At Olay, the winning aspirations were defined as market share leadershipin North America, $1 billion in sales, and a global share that put the brandamong the market leaders. A revitalized and transformed Olay wasexpected to establish skin care as a strong pillar for beauty along with haircare. Establishing and maintaining leadership of a new masstige segment,positioned between mass and prestige, was a third aspiration.

The first question—what is our winning aspiration?—sets the frame for allthe other choices. A company must seek to win in a particular place and in aparticular way. If it doesn’t seek to win, it is wasting the time of its peopleand the investments of its capital providers. But to be most helpful, theabstract concept of winning should be translated into defined aspirations.Aspirations are statements about the ideal future. At a later stage in theprocess, a company ties to those aspirations some specific benchmarks thatmeasure progress toward them