Most organizations invest top management time in strategy design. Fewer invest as much in its mobilization—the critical work between decision and execution that ensures a strategy survives an organization’s inertia. Yet McKinsey research across more than 400 companies, representing various industries, geographies, and sizes—has found that the ability to mobilize is the biggest differentiator between companies that achieve the highest profits and those that fall to the bottom. Three actions make the difference: 1) Confronting cognitive biases, particularly anchoring to last year’s budget, and evaluating bold moves one at a time rather than as a portfolio; 2) Demanding precision around what you will do and what you will stop doing; and 3) Deliberately building an always-on mobilization muscle.