Onsite Programs / "You Decide" Business Simulation

"You Decide" Business Simulation

Increasing Business Acumen by Running Your Own Business

Description:
This proven Business Acumen workshop uses a business decision-making simulation titled “DECIDE II- a Full Enterprise Business Simulation.” The simulation focuses on several competencies, including cross-functional thinking, cross-functional decision making, strategic planning, and financial decision making.

Participants are grouped into teams and given a hypothetical company to manage for two years. Each team establishes a vision, sets objectives, implements strategies, and fully controls its organization. Each quarter, teams make over 28 different decisions that affect their bottom line, concurrent and future decisions, and other teams’ results. Teams receive feedback on their profitability, cash flow, sales and production reports, quality status, customer surveys and competitive benchmarks, human resource issues, and on the effectiveness of their overall decisions.

Several brief case studies from the company’s recent past are used to teach and reinforce the concepts explored in the simulation. Company executives co-facilitate to ensure that the simulation has the highest relevance to and impact on what participants need to do and the realities of the business.

The overall objective of this three-day computer-based business simulation is to increase managers' ability to make better business decisions, create greater alignment around executing initiatives, and design more efficient cross-functional processes. The program and customized case studies provide managers with a real/near-real, hands-on experience that naturally breaks down business silos and facilitates team building in a dynamic environment.

Managers will be introduced to new skills and be put in situations where they must use and fine-tune them.  At the conclusion of the program, they will be better able to:.

Objectives:

• Make more effective business decisions.
• Demonstrate a higher level of business acumen.
• Plan, decide, and execute strategies as part of a cross-functional team.
• Apply more sophisticated finance and accounting skills within the context of managing a business.
• Assess alternative business decisions using financially-based analysis and criteria.
• Develop business plans that balance strategic, functional, and financial criteria.
• Understand and recognize the importance of:
  • Planning at all levels of the organization.
  • Interrelationships among Finance, Marketing, Sales, HR, R&D, Engineering, Operations, etc.
  • The need to communicate and plan jointly with managers of other functional areas.
  • Market and economic factors and how they influence the company’s performance.
  • “Balanced” business plans and why they are so vital in today's competitive world.
  • Income statements, cash flow analysis, and balance sheets.
  • Commitment to quality elements and continuous improvement.

Team Presentations
At the end of the simulation each team makes a final presentation to the group summarizing its simulation activities in four key areas:

1. Strategy: The team's strategic plan.
2. Finances: A summary of its financial performance and operating results.
3. Learning: Applications of tools and concepts covered during the workshop.
4. SWOT Analysis: Strengths and weaknesses of the team's business plan and decisions.

Each team receives a computer-generated performance analysis. The performance analysis details how each team's company performed relative to the competition and provides the basis for an informed debriefing session.

Target Audience:
Leadership, Management, and High Potentials