1. Fundamentally, companies start with very high-level financial (and possible philanthropic) goals.
2. To achieve those goals, companies develop products or services that are successful only when prospective customers perceive them as valuable.
3. For customers to perceive them as valuable, they must be positioned properly; i.e. the products must stand for something simple and compelling in the mind, and must solve problems.
4. In turn, companies formulate lower-level internal goals that help build those perceptions.
5. Included among those internal goals is developing a product that actually delivers the value that the company wishes the customer to perceive.
6. To actually deliver the perceived value, the product must satisfy requirements that embody the intended positioning of the product.

Really interesting point about positioning. My initial reaction was “alignment is more important than positioning” – but the more I think about it, the more I think they are two sides of the same coin.

I think of alignment (with our internal goals) as “are we doing what we intend” where positioning is “will our product be perceived the way we intend?” Alignment is an inside-out perspective, where positioning is outside-in. Being market-driven requires that we include positioning as an aspect of how we engage our markets, to assure that our customers are considering our product as we intend.

So I don’t know that my initial reaction is right. How do you (and other folks here) make the distinction?

I also really like the “what one idea…?” way you describe positioning – very powerful!