applied know how
Whilst I don’t claim to be an expert on serious games and teaching business strategy, I often come across interesting ways in which games can be used to enhance learning. One such game is Settlers of Catan, (or Catan) which can teach players a lot about life and leadership while having a lot of fun.
Catan, is a board game that revolves around building settlements and amassing resources.… Read more
The fourth post on transitioning to a GM will focus on time frames and moving from what is usually a short term focus for functional heads to the need for a GM to be longer term in thinking/
Successful general managers resist the temptation to oversimplify the job by focusing on a few narrowly-defined short-term performance indicators and instead maintain integrity by looking at the long-term, organization-wide impact of any acts or decisions.… Read more
I’m a big fan of models; shortcuts that we can reference or leverage in various learning settings to address common business problems. They aren’t perfect but they are useful.
The best models have simple concepts yet are robust enough to apply in many different situations.
Perhaps unlike most executive development professionals I’m also a big fan of hands on activities and games to enable our participants to learn concepts.… Read more
I’m currently assessing how we can use people’s TOP of mind awareness of, and interest in Covid-19… here are my thoughts on strategy engagement
1. Hire competent people (hire competent Politicians) stress INTELLIGENCE & SKILL over loyalty
2. Discuss with your people the Long-term desired OUTCOMES ( the WHY)
3. Give your people the resources & capabilities to do the job
4.… Read more
The short answer to this question is deceptively simple- keep the strategy as long as it continues to work.
But lets look into this further, and with an example from Disney that I discovered in an article in HBR by Todd Zenger and which I have sued in my teaching at SMU.
I love this diagram from 1947. It shows Walt Disney’s original strategy, and importantly, the linkages between the various elements of Disney’s then business.… Read more