Tips to Building Your Business Simulation Strategy

Hello SimDevGroup Community-
Lately, we've been getting calls with people asking, "What is the best way to build a strategy that includes using a business simulation?" This is a great question and to be honest, we didn't really have any tips to help. So we took the time to create some. We then shared them with some of our partners and in the end, everyone gave us their thumbs up to the following 5 tips:
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Tips to Building Your Business Simulation Strategy:

• Become one with your corporate strategy- Before you build your simulation strategy for business training, you should know your corporate strategy very well. Talk to your corporate leaders about this.
• Know what drives the the business- Every enterprise has drivers that push the the organization forward in order to achieve it's strategic success. Sometimes its net profits, other times its cash on hand, or it could be just about anything. You'll learn what drives the business by reading your CEO's letter to shareholders in your annual report. At least this is a good place to start.
• Clearly define your training and development goals- You should have a very clear set of desired outcomes from your training and development programs. Take a look at those and ask yourself, "What content really needs an action learning module?" You'll quickly see what does and doesn't. Whatever does, see if a business simulation exercise would help with this.
• Look at your development resources- Whether we like it or not, we're all shackled by what's available. You'll need some good strong engineering and instructional resources. Once you do this inventory, you'll quickly realize if a business simulation is within reach.
• Examine the size of the training program- The training program you are thinking of using a business simulation within should be pretty healthy in size. If its a 1/2 day program, chances are the time and resource commitment might not be worth it. But if its a multi-day leadership development course. Then yes, its definitely worth the time.

Welp, that's what our HR leader friends within companies all agreed on. Its high level, but it does seem to fit within that 80/20 rule we've talked about before. Of course, there are other business simulation strategies, but these seem to cover the most ground to get things started.
Hope this helps!

Why Use A Business Simulation Exercise To Improve Leadership?

Hello SimDevGroup Community-
The question is: Why use a business simulation exercise within leadership development? Well, we thought we'd take one step even further back to ask, "Why build a high potential bench?" Well, we looked to PDI and found a great research summary.
Research: Leadership Simulation Exercise:
A recent study by PDINinthhouse found that organizations with more advanced high-potential strategies are:

• Almost 12 times as likely to impact business growth and bottom-line results
• Almost twice as likely to be able to address global business needs
• Nearly three times as likely to be satisfied that their high-potential strategy is driving business/talent goals

A correlation exists between advanced high-potential strategies and their impact on talent management results. Organizations with advanced strategies are:

• More than three times as likely to realize improved retention in key leader roles
• More than twice as likely to realize ready bench strength

The research shows that organizations with more advanced high- potential strategies and practices are markedly better in aligning their high-potential leaders to the needs of the business. Ultimately, this could create a significant competitive advantage.
Note: all information is take directly from PDINinthhouse's web site and is publicly available.
So, what does this have to do with a Business Simulation Exercise? The thought is that if you can build and engaging leadership training program utilizing a business simulation, you will engage your future leaders, build their leadership skills, their business acumen skills, and help them learn about the business they are about to help drive towards a great future. Also, if you're interested in world class leadership training content, you should certainly talk to PDI. We are strong supporters of their work.
Hope this helps.

5 Tricks To Successful Business Simulation Exercises

Hello SimDevGroup Community-
We often get the question, "How can I be successful at creating business simulation exercises?" Thus, in today's post, we have 5 tips for you that will help you build a successful business simulation exercise solution. Here are our top 5 tips and tricks:
5. Start at the finish line- This means you should start by asking, "What do we want the participants to walk out with?" This will help guarantee that your training and development simulation will be aligned with the goals of the corporate strategy.
4. Kiss! Obviously, we don't want you kissing your business simulation exercise (or participants for that matter), we mean that its incredibly important to keep your training and development simulation simple! There is a great tendency to make business simulation exercises incredibly complex. They don't need to be so keep it simple!
3. Business simulation exercises can be paper or computer based- This sort of goes along with tip 4. What we're saying here is that some of the most effective simulation exercises we've seen within training and development are paper based. They are easy to create and very effective when done right. Just remember tip 1.
2. Align the exercise with your corporate strategy- Don't create a rogue business training simulation. Create a nicely aligned business simulation exercise that fits within the corporate strategy.
1. Avoid the flash! In other words, don't get drawn into a business simulation exercise that is all glitz and no content. This training exercise is designed to reinforce your training content. Don't use it just to look flashy. Participants will see right through it.
Hope this helps and have a great day!

Business Simulations: To Use Or Not? Tips To Decide

Hello SimDevGroup Community-
Let's take a step back today and ask the basic question, "Should I begin to enter into the world of using business simulations within my corporate training and development or leadership development program(s). Well, this is a great question because business simulations are very slick, but aren't always the best tool to use. Here are some tips to decide if using a business simulation training program is a good idea or not.
Tips To Decide: Using Business Simulations
Tip 1: Most importantly, do you have the time to devote to building business simulations? If you are barely getting home in time for dinner as it is, you probably don't. Managing a business simulation is a big task. Count on it taking up about 5+ hours a day during development.
Tip 2: Do you have the technical expertise? If you don't know computer programming or have had little exposure to analytical statistics, you might get very frustrated very quickly.
Tip 3: Think about outsourcing the project: If you answered no to the above tips, but your participants are looking for business training exercises that business simulations create, then you might want to consider outsourcing development. There are many firms (including us) that would be helpful to getting started.
Overall, if you are caught in the perfect storm of needing action learning, but not having the time or expertise to create business simulations, feel free to give us a call. We aren't a sales-e organization and would be happy to help you learn more about getting started.
Hope this helps!

Business Simulation Facilitation Skills

Hello SimDevGroup Community-

We just helped a customer begin the process of self facilitation. They did great! While one of the trainers was facilitating, the manager of the program asked me, "What does it usually take for someone to facilitate a business simulation." The answer is very simple: Strong business acumen, strong technology acumen, strong training acumen, and a flare for entertainment." No problem, right? We know its a lot. But the point of this post is to remind you that it is indeed done and can be done very well.

Have a great weekend.

Not A Business Simulation, But Still Amazing

Hello SimDevGroup Community-

This isn't a business simulation article, but it really is still amazing to read. Its about the upcoming revolutionary version of SimCity. For those that remember the black and white grid, you will be shocked. We love Maxis. They inspired many of us to get into modeling and simulations.

Happy Reading! http://www.computerandvideogames.com/344432/previews/simcity-the-legendary-city-simulator-returns-to-its-hardcore-roots/

Have a great weekend!

Forbes: Serious Games and Simulations

Hello SimDevGroup Community-

Interesting article available online about the outward use of serious games or business simulations posted yesterday. Mostly focused on sales, but still interesting.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/gregpetro/2012/04/19/the-serious-business-of-games/

Enjoy!