Elliott Investment Management’s push for change at Phillips 66 borrows straight from its successful playbook at Marathon Petroleum. In other words, it would probably be a mistake for Phillips 66 to ignore it.

The activist investor said on Wednesday that it had taken a roughly $1 billion stake in U.S. refining giant Phillips 66 and pushed the company to sell noncore assets, focus more on its main refining business and fix its track record of relatively high operating costs.