Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework lists the three categories that a distinctive capability can fall into:

• Reputation: Organizations should strive to develop an image that fosters faith and loyalty from customers. An organization’s bottom line is heavily dependent on its reputation because customers make purchasing decisions based on product and service reviews, a practice that becomes increasingly common with technological advancement. Additionally, a company’s reputation cannot be easily replicated by other businesses in the market, because of unique experiences that led to the creation of that reputation. More specifically, even if a company can create a similar product, a competitor cannot steal an organization’s brand identity.
• Architecture: The way that a business is organized is specific to that company and can act as a source of competitive advantage, provided that it is valuable to the business. This structure not only includes the organization’s hierarchy, but also includes relationships that the organization has with suppliers, customers and its employees. Although competitors might share clients or suppliers, the relationships the organization builds with these individuals are unique.
• Innovation: Innovative organizations that keep up with cutting edge trends are shown to be the most profitable. Specifically, because these organizations are aware of customer needs and values, they can remain ahead of their competitors. Constant monitoring of the direction of the market is critical because trends will fade once other organizations start to replicate once-innovative products. Remaining innovative also helps to improve an organization’s reputation because customers look favorably on companies that make positive change in the market. This can also help to support a business when other companies catch on to these trends.

Strategy teams looking to achieve success for their business or organization should implement at least one of the three distinctive capabilities mentioned by Kay in Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework. In order to most effectively use Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework, a SWOT or USP analysis can be used to identify the organization’s distinctive capabilities. The new online Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework template outlines a way for an organization to highlight its unique features (or distinctive capabilities) that give the organization its competitive advantage. This helps the company to be more prominent in the industry and beat its competitors. 

Get started with our Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework template. 

How to use it: 

1. List your business objectives and distinctive capabilities for each area.  
2. List non-capabilities that may not be “distinct” but are still important for your business.  
3. Create an action plan for completing the Distinctive Capabilities model. 

Unlike most traditional Kay’s Distinctive Capabilities Framework techniques, Praxie’s online Distinctive Capabilities Framework tools allow any team or organization to instantly begin working with our web templates and input forms. Our digital platform goes far beyond other software tools by including progress dashboards, data integration from existing documents or other SaaS software, elegant intuitive designs, and full access on any desktop or mobile device.