"The Standard is a breakthrough system for strategic communication management. It offers for SAP Global Communications a common lexicon and a proven method that helps us develop and drive SAP's agenda in a hyper-competitive marketplace."

"This is one of those books that eats its way into your brain and, to borrow Apple's tagline (but mangle some grammar), it makes you 'think different.'"

The Standard is a much-needed system for codifying the far too subjective discipline of strategy. It replaces aspirational thinking with objective analysis. Like our PR Generally Accepted Practices (GAP) study, the playmaker system sheds light on what can truly be called best (and worst) practices. To put The Standard to the test, we built a frontier graduate class around it and found that our students could systematically dissect complex strategies in timely cases and anticipate opposing actions. That's quite a breakthrough from a teaching standpoint, and it has enormous implications for the professions of communication and influence.