Business Acumen Training for Leaders in St Louis, MO

How does it work?

Our Leading in Business Training focuses on Business Acumen Skills through experiential learning opportunities (better than business simulation training), customized cohort work projects, the collaboration between peers and mentors, business case development and capstone project presentations (a la Shark Tank presentations).

Note: Our programs are facilitated on or off-site for organizations. We do not offer public seminars at this time. While we have speakers and trainers that are available to facilitate and speak at public engagements, we do not offer public seminars.

Objectives

The learning objectives for the program include:

Organizational

• Strategic human resource development
• Align development with the Mission, Vision, and Values
• Increased competency
• Business competency development designed to impact the bottom-line
• Team projects with tangible strategic impact on the business
• Direct observational opportunities between executives, board members, and high-potential employees in support of future leader identification and succession planning
• Development aligned with strategic priorities

At the Cohort Level

• Encourage participants to routinize the sharing of best management practices
• Expose leaders to cross-functional problem solving with minimal risk to the business
• Build alliances across functions that can develop into concrete linkages for future collaboration
• Healthy competition and collaboration, a la “Shark Tank” type challenge and capstone projects

At the Individual Level

The program delivers a business simulation experience with real-work projects for a holistic and immersive, active-learning program. Participant learning objectives include:

• Develop strategic and critical thinking skills
• Develop quality decision-making skills
• Learn how to make a business case
• Gain an understanding of all areas of a business’ operations
• Ensure foundational confidence in financial analysis competency
• Comprehend the importance of strategic agility
• Build financial acumen and budgeting skills
• Develop the ability to ask questions that generate new thinking and solutions
• Set effective team goals
• Practice negotiation and influence skills
• Develop insight into the interconnectedness of business functions and operations
• Collaborate with their team to establish plans
• Presentation skills development
• Evaluate and Improve work processes
• Align organizational systems
• Engage in systems thinking and a continuous improvement focus
• Develop risk management skills
• Understand the builder mindset vs. the protector mindset

Peter Senge author of The Fifth Discipline, suggests five "component technologies" which include systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, shared vision and team learning, as the key components for building a learning organization. These components are true for building business acumen as well. In his book, P. Senge describes a learning organization as "... where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning how to learn together."
A leader's business acumen grows naturally as they experience and process through each component technology over time (assuming the organization provides those opportunities). However, what organization has the luxury of time to allow leaders to slowly simmer into competence?

Unfortunately, a typical workshop, wherein a trained expert shares theories and concepts around business acumen falls short of actually engaging the neurons required for learning how to think strategically and critically around a business growth strategy or how to overcome business challenges.

An article from People Matters (2017) reports that 65% of managers feel that they have reached their business acumen limit. Reached their limit? Does this mean they believe they are experts in the business acumen arena? Unfortunately, this flies in the face of the other research (BTS and the Economist Intelligence Unit, for example) that revealed 2 out of 3 executives believe their team lacks business acumen competency.

It is thus essential that organizations prioritize the development of their managers through business acumen training and/or a strategy for managers program, to ensure misplaced confidence isn't left unaddressed. A manager who is fully equipped with the following business acumen traits will, in fact, understand how they contribute to the bottom line and thus, be more deliberate and effective in their contributions.

Strategic perspective – the ability to recognize the current strengths and weaknesses of the business, its critical interdependencies, and the short- and long-term impacts of decisions made.

Financial acumen – the ability to determine the key investments that drive progress, productivity and cash flow and utilize financial statements to inform business decisions.

Market orientation – the ability to demonstrate discernment on current macroeconomic trends and synthesize market and business competitor data; And, the ability to understand the customer's needs and how to create a competitive advantage while effectively meeting those needs.

Leadership and teamwork – the ability to deliver business results through others; the capacity to foster alignment, commitment, collaboration, and a unified vision.

In an increasingly challenging marketplace, it is important for companies to enable employees at all levels to understand how the business works, and how their role impacts the business.