Over the past years, we have seen a rapidly growing community of Strategy Tools practitioners. From business school faculty in the US, executives-turned-consultants in Latin America, to Australian Innovation Clusters, the Strategy Tools platform is used across the globe to accelerate impact.
So how are people using Strategy Tools in Action? How are companies changing the way they work with strategy based on the toolkit? How are global consultants building their business with the help of the Strategy Tools platform? We’ll be launching Strategy Tools in Action, a report where we explore this in full detail.
Leading up to the release of the new report on the 16th of September, we’re releasing a few choice excerpts from the full report.
Featured today is Javier Sevilla, Managing Director at Novarek, based in Mexico. Javier is the founder of Novarek, a boutique consulting firm, that helps their clients in their growth efforts. I’ve been involved in consulting, tech and management, for almost 20 years in projects in USA, Argentina and Mexico in the private and public sectors. Engineer, wine enthusiast, salsa lover and entrepreneur. Always eager to question, help and learn.
Here’s the story on how he’s using the Strategy Tools Platform.
The best time to transform your company is when you’re at the top. You have resources and no pressure, but it’s the most difficult time because everything just seems to go great. So, why change?
My Preferred Strategy Tools
The Transform! Simulation
The main reason is that it is so flexible you can use it as you need it. Do you want to stress the importance of understanding strategy as making choices? Just focus on “Strategy Intro Canvas” You want to focus on the options companies have to use innovation to take advantage of market opportunities (where to play), then focus on ”Minimum innovation strategy Canvas”. Transform! is so powerful and versatile that the limit is your imagination on how to use it.
How I Use It
This was the only discovery session we were able to do before all in-person meetings were shutdown. Here the emphasis was to show the client how we could use Transform! to communicate their strategy to all regions and branches they have. The client really loved it, the energy, the focus, the good vibes and the discussions on how the learnings from the sessions could apply to them.
You can discuss how your landscape is shifting, what are the weak signals you can identify, changes in the behavior of your clients, etc.
Now we are exploring options to be able to use the Simulator on a completely online setup. This way we plan to conduct workshops and blended services using Transform!
Client Impact
The main impact was seeing how their previous strategy efforts were making sense, how the different pieces were coming together. Where they were competing, what were their value propositions, why they needed to create the motor for new growth (growth & explore arenas) Moreover, being able to reflect on the events on the simulation and discuss how those applied to them really drove great learnings. In general, being able to translate the simulation learnings to their own companies is one of the most important aspects of Transform!
Recommendations to Others
1. Clear objectives
My first recommendation with Transform! is you need to have a clear objective on what you want to accomplish when you use it (it’s so flexible and fun, that you need to know what you expect from the session).
2. Don’t call it a game
Even though it is implemented through a game and gamification plays a really important role, just avoid using the word “game”, it’s not easy but once you get over it, people around you see that it’s not just “a game”.
3. Tell stories
At least learn some of the stories that go behind all Boom and Bust events, when you are able to talk about the real stories, people get really interested and your position as expert really improves.
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Want more strategy insights from across the globe? Pre-register for the Strategy Tools in Action Report launching on September 16.
