Case Studies

A cross section of organisations that have used our business simulations is below. Please click on the links to read the case studies.

Shell's use of Bissim

Shell's Business Management Programme is a two-week programme designed to cover the role of the middle manager within Shell, to include strategy, marketing, finance, change, leadership and teamwork. Bissim is used to give delegates the opportunity to practise and apply the knowledge, techniques and tools learned, give a holistic view of business and link the constituent parts of the programme together.

After a strategy session, the simulation starts with the teams assessing the current position of the business they have inherited. They put together a mission statement, set objectives, strategies and construct a balanced scorecard. Sessions on: Managing with a customer focus, Alliances, Finance, Change, Stress and Teams follow, along with a couple of rounds of the simulation.

The final day and a half is made up of more rounds of Bissim, with teams then presenting on their performance in the simulation to a parent board. Each team presents their original objectives, strategy, key decisions, performance (against their scorecard) and their vision for the future. The other teams and adjudicators ask questions before an informal review of all the companies' performance. The programme is finished with planning for the return to work and a review of the whole programme.

In the words of one of the delegates: "Very good simulation. Especially the possibility to implement and try out a lot of the lessons learned in the course."

Thames Water's use of Tycoon

When designing our Graduate Development Programme I was keen to ensure that all our Graduate Trainees had the chance to develop their broader commercial acumen early in their career, and would be able to do so in a way that would encourage transfer of key concepts directly into a Thames Water environment.

Working with Simulation Training, we created a Residential Week that combined Soft Skills Development and Senior Management input with the business simulation. We used the simulation, Tycoon, as a thread running throughout the week and this enabled the groups to use the Thames Water based information in an unrelated environment, and created space to allow for reflection between the business simulation decision periods.

Using the simulation in this way is a large drain on the simulation leader's time, but it allowed his inputs throughout the week to be closely tailored to the week's evolving themes.

The residential week was positioned four months into the Graduates' careers in Thames Water which was enough time to allow them to integrate into the business but early enough to ensure that their newly developed commercial outlook can help shape the rest of their training period.

The Business Simulation was very successful, ranked by the vast majority as the high point of the week, and I have no hesitation in booking a repeat next year, and in recommending Simulation Training to all interested parties.

Management Training Partnership's use of Bissim with Unilever

Management Training Partnership (MTP) are a well established independent firm who provide tailored management training programmes to a wide variety of blue chip companies. Our core specialisms are Finance, Marketing and People Development Skills. Where possible we try and integrate these areas to provide cross functional programmes.

A programme on which we use Bissim is the Regional Financial Programme for the Central and East European Business Group of Unilever (one of our major clients). The course is designed to reinforce the professional skills (primarily financial) of young accountants (three to four years in the business) who work for companies within that Business Group and to ensure that they have the full range of techniques available, use them in the context of the businesses they work for and be aware of the business implications of decisions made. Typically the course runs for three one week modules during a year and some 30-40 participants from a variety of countries attend. MTP have run the course since its inception four years ago.

Bissim is run over the last two and a half days of the final week of the programme and is intended to put the learning acquired into the context of the full range of decisions made in a business (e.g. Marketing, Distribution etc.). Five groups of participants compete against each other over the duration of the simulation.

The activities that participants engage in involve initially setting the strategy and objectives of their business, trading for six rounds (years) and evaluating their performance at the end of the simulation. During the simulation participants also prepare marketing strategy presentations, team evaluations and a final stake-holder presentation. The tutor's role is to provide coaching and support to the teams during each round, provide round by round evaluations and some inputs where necessary (e.g. on what is a mission statement?) and finally to adjudicate on the simulation overall.

Bissim was chosen because it is complex enough to challenge a group of intelligent, motivated participants, robust enough not to have problems running it, competitive enough to stimulate enjoyment and broad enough to bring out a wide range of potential strategies, business decisions and learning points.

'Real world' learning for ABBEY GRADUATES

Objective

To provide genuine development of both soft and hard management skills for the 100 graduates of Abbey's intake.

Solution

SIMPACT was delivered together with Impact Development Training Group, combining the power of experiential learning with the business focus of a rigorous computer simulation.

Inputs on competitive and strategic analysis, culture and values, empowering staff, creativity and innovation, allowed the graduates to experiment and make a difference to their team's performance with new knowledge, thus making it real and immediate.

Result

The graduates found the experience both challenging and rewarding. The experiential nature provided a stimulating and powerful learning experience.

"We were delighted with the way Impact worked in partnership with us to produce some exciting results in relation to improving commitment, skill and motivation."

Liz Dean
Management Development & Education Consultant
Abbey

Using 'bissim' at Arcadia Group Ltd

Introduction

We used 'bissim' to support the personal development of selected middle managers within the company, who had been identified as having the potential to take on a larger role.

How

It was used as part of a 'Strategic Thinking in Action' programme the aim of which was to:

• Learn to be more strategic
• Have the opportunity to present ideas and build profile with senior management
• Have the opportunity to influence the business direction

The programme ran over a few months, consisting of 1 full day, 12 hours of facilitated time and a final presentation to senior management on what participants had achieved by the end.

Results

Some of the key learns from participants were:

• To focus on the really important decisions first
• Working as a team and sticking with natural team roles and playing to strengths is most effective
• Using scorecard to measure and monitor progress
• Greater understanding re: the role of key players in running a business
• Importance of investing in staff
• Value of being pre-emptive
• How to remain strategic in the midst of crises

Participants also fed back some months afterwards, on the positive differences in performance that their line managers had noticed e.g.:

• Meetings being more structured and effectively controlled
• More strategic approach to decision making
• Increased confidence when focusing on key goals
• Better ideas being generated

Addleshaw Goddard

Jim Hever article for The Lawyer

One of the challenges facing business lawyers, whether in-house or in private practice, is how they can position themselves to be perceived as real business players. Mere legal advice is easily outsourced and will become an ever cheaper commodity.

In truth, lawyers must manage a difficult balancing act faced by few others. There's a a real tension between being independent officers of the court and, being truly commercially minded. Their training has emphasised the former role which creates a mindset of searching for flaws. In the May edition of the Harvard Business Review, leadership guru Warren Bennis compares the ineffectiveness of MBA programmes and business schools to that of law schools. He argues that both fail to prepare people for business roles because of their overly academic emphases. As lawyers know only too well, picking flaws is relatively easy. Creating solutions is more challenging.

To be perceived positively in business, lawyers are advised to enhance their commerciality. Providing commercial advice is regarded as including but going beyond compliance and legal risk management. In the many mature markets of Europe and the US, competitive advantage consists in innovation throughout the business, new products and services and, speed to market. This is most evident for example, in the Financial Services market. Government's appetite for regulation drives lawyers, quite rightly, to emphasise compliance. The skill of thus advising the business while at the same time enabling innovation and speed in bringing new products to market requires aligning with the agenda of internal clients whether they be Marketing, Bankers, Procurement, Commercial, and so on.

For many, this requires both a shift in attitudes and developing a business management skillset. It is why Addleshaw Goddard, turned to Simulation Training when we sought to develop a unique business simulation programme for lawyers. We also enlisted the help of eight FTSE 100 heads of legal and five experienced partners. Our confidence in Simulation Training was such that we were willing to involve them with our most prestigious clients.

The programme demonstrates the impact of business legal decisions on an organisation's bottom line. Teams are thrust into a competitive and unpredictable business environment. Lawyers put themselves in the shoes of a managing director, a finance director, a sales director, a production manager, and so on, and have to trade their company competitively for four simulated years.

Working with their coaches participants explore what they need to do differently at work, how they will align themselves with business units and become champions of staying close to their clients to be perceived as real business partners. It is doubtful if that kind of role can ever be outsourced.