Frameworks
The three Cs
Customer, company, competitors: reminders of where to look, not a structure.
Facts checked against sources onWhat does The three Cs mean?
The three Cs, from the 1982 book The Mind of the Strategist, are three angles on a market: the customer (who buys and what they want), the company (its strengths, costs and capabilities) and the competitors (who else is there and how they will react). Opening a case by naming them is a known way to sound rehearsed. Build the structure from the maths of the goal and use the three Cs only to check you have not missed a driver.
Where does it come up in case interview prep?
Related terms
- The four PsProduct, price, place, promotion: the marketing mix.
- FrameworkA ready-made list of buckets for a common kind of case; know the words, do not recite them.
- Porter's Five ForcesFive pressures on how profitable an industry is; vocabulary, not a case structure.
- Porter's generic strategiesCompete on lowest cost, on being different, or by focusing on a niche.
- BCG growth-share matrixSorting businesses by market growth and relative market share.
- Ansoff matrixFour growth routes: existing or new products in existing or new markets.
- McKinsey 7S frameworkSeven parts of an organization that must fit together.
- SWOT analysisStrengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
Learn it in context
See The three Cs at work in a lesson from How industries work: the toolkit, with checks as you go.
Spotted something wrong or out of date? Report a mistake. We check every report and correct the page.