C.K. Prahalad (1941-2010) was a towering figure in business strategy, widely regarded as one of the most influential management thinkers of his time. As a professor at the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business, he co-authored seminal books and articles that reshaped our understanding of corporate strategy, innovation, and global markets.

On Core Competence and Corporate Strategy

  1. "Core competence is the collective learning in the organization, especially how to coordinate diverse production skills and integrate multiple streams of technologies." - Harvard Business Review, "The Core Competence of the Corporation" (1990). This is the foundational definition of one of his most famous concepts.
  2. "The tyranny of the SBU (Strategic Business Unit) can be reduced by developing a corporate-wide strategic architecture that establishes objectives for competence building." - "The Core Competence of the Corporation". Prahalad argued against viewing a company as a mere portfolio of discrete businesses.
  3. "Core competencies are the wellspring of new business development. They should constitute the focus for strategy at the corporate level." - "The Core Competence of the Corporation".
  4. "You can't build competence in a vacuum. You need a strategic intent." - This links the ideas of competence and long-term ambition.
  5. "The most powerful way to cope with the future is to create it, not just prepare for it." - Competing for the Future. This captures the proactive, forward-looking nature of his strategic philosophy.
  6. "An obsession with competing for today's markets is the main reason why so many companies fail to create the markets of tomorrow." - Competing for the Future.
  7. "Strategy is not about being better. It is about being different." - A core tenet of his thinking, emphasizing unique advantage over incremental improvement.
  8. "The real source of advantage is to be found in management's ability to consolidate corporate-wide technologies and skills into competencies that empower individual businesses to adapt quickly to changing opportunities." - "The Core Competence of the Corporation".
  9. "If you are not a leader in your core competencies, you are not a leader in your business." - This highlights the direct link between internal capabilities and market leadership.
  10. "Senior management's top priority should be to build a portfolio of competencies, not a portfolio of businesses." - A radical reorientation of the CEO's role.

On Strategic Intent

  1. "Strategic intent is an ambition that is out of all proportion to a company’s current resources and capabilities." - Harvard Business Review, "Strategic Intent" (1989). This concept, co-developed with Gary Hamel, describes a powerful, animating goal.
  2. "Strategic intent provides the emotional and intellectual energy to journey to the future." - "Strategic Intent".
  3. "Strategic intent envisions a desired leadership position and establishes the criterion the organization will use to chart its progress." - "Strategic Intent".
  4. "The goal is not to just beat the competition, but to make them irrelevant." - While often attributed to others, this sentiment is central to the thinking in Competing for the Future.
  5. "Management cannot be a passive onlooker. It must be an active participant in creating the future." - Competing for the Future.

On The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid (BoP)

  1. "The real source of market promise is not the wealthy few in the developing world, or even the emerging middle-income consumers. It is the billions of aspiring poor who are joining the market economy for the first time." - The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid. This is the revolutionary thesis of his most famous book.
  2. "If we stop thinking of the poor as victims or as a burden and start recognizing them as resilient and creative entrepreneurs and value-conscious consumers, a whole new world of opportunity will open up." - The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid.
  3. "The Bottom of the Pyramid is not a market to be exploited, but a market to be co-created." - This emphasizes partnership and mutual value creation.
  4. "Poor people are not the problem. They are the solution." - This quote encapsulates the shift in perspective required to see the BoP as a viable market.
  5. "The BoP is the biggest potential market in the world." - He quantified this market as trillions of dollars in purchasing power parity.
  6. "Stop thinking of the poor as a monolith. The BoP is a mosaic of different cultures, needs, and aspirations." - This advises against a one-size-fits-all approach.
  7. "The poor cannot be just consumers. They must be partners in the process of innovation and value creation." - The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid.
  8. "The future of business lies in serving the poor." - A bold prediction about the direction of global capitalism.
  9. "The challenge is to create a market at the BoP that is both profitable and sustainable." - He was clear that this was not about charity, but about building viable business models.
  10. "The 4 A's of the BoP Market: Awareness, Access, Affordability, and Availability." - A framework he developed for companies looking to enter these markets.

On Innovation and Co-Creation

  1. "The future of competition is not company versus company, but ecosystem versus ecosystem." - This forward-looking statement predicted the rise of business ecosystems.
  2. "The new source of competitive advantage is not in the firm, but in the network of firms." - This idea was foundational to his later work on co-creation.
  3. "Value is no longer created by the firm and exchanged with the customer. It is co-created by the firm and the customer." - The Future of Competition: Co-Creating Unique Value with Customers.
  4. "The focus of innovation is shifting from products and services to business models." - He saw that the real disruption often came from rethinking the entire value proposition.
  5. "The customer is no longer a passive recipient of value, but an active participant in the creation of value." - The Future of Competition.
  6. "N=1: The future of competition is about serving one customer at a time." - This refers to the ability to create personalized experiences and products for each customer.
  7. "R=G: The future of innovation is about accessing resources from a global network." - This highlights the importance of tapping into a global talent and resource pool.
  8. "Innovation must be a continuous process, not a one-time event." - He stressed the need for organizations to build a capability for ongoing innovation.
  9. "The challenge for managers is to create an environment where innovation can flourish." - This places responsibility on leadership to foster a culture of creativity.
  10. "Breakthrough innovation is not about big budgets, but about big ideas." - This encourages a focus on creativity over just resource allocation.

On Leadership and Management

  1. "The role of the leader is not to be a visionary, but to be a 'social architect' who can create the conditions for the organization to invent its own future." - Competing for the Future.
  2. "Managers must have the courage to challenge their own assumptions and orthodoxies." - A call for intellectual honesty and a willingness to unlearn.
  3. "The most important question a manager can ask is, 'What do we need to learn?'" - This emphasizes a culture of continuous learning and inquiry.
  4. "If you are not confused, you are not thinking deeply enough." - Prahalad often used this to encourage managers to embrace complexity and ambiguity.
  5. "The bottleneck is always at the top of the bottle." - A direct challenge to senior leadership to take responsibility for organizational constraints.
  6. "We have to move from a mindset of scarcity to a mindset of abundance." - This was central to his BoP thinking, but also applied to seeing new opportunities everywhere.
  7. "Stop the rhetoric of 'change management.' It’s not about managing change, but about leading it." - A subtle but important distinction in the role of a leader.
  8. "Managers must learn to manage in a world of 'dominant logic.'" - He warned that a company's past success creates mental models that can blind it to future opportunities.
  9. "The essence of leadership is to be able to see the future before it becomes obvious." - Competing for the Future.
  10. "Humility is the foundation of learning." - He believed that leaders must be humble enough to admit they don't have all the answers.

On the Future

  1. "The future is not what it used to be." - A simple but profound statement about the accelerating pace of change.
  2. "The convergence of technologies is creating a whole new set of opportunities." - He was a keen observer of how technology was reshaping industries.
  3. "The next big thing will not be a product or a service. It will be a new way of doing business." - This underscores his focus on business model innovation.
  4. "We are at a historic inflection point in the evolution of the global economy." - He saw the rise of emerging markets as a fundamental shift in the world order.
  5. "The challenge is not to predict the future, but to build a capacity to imagine and create it." - A fitting summary of his life's work, empowering managers to be authors of their own destiny.

For further exploration of C.K. Prahalad's work:

  • Harvard Business Review: Many of his most influential articles, including "The Core Competence of the Corporation" and "Strategic Intent", are available in the HBR archives.
  • Books: His seminal works like Competing for the Future, The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid, and The Future of Competition are widely available from major booksellers.
  • Interviews and Lectures: Many of his talks and interviews can be found on YouTube and other video platforms, providing a direct sense of his powerful communication style.