Business Acumen and Strategy
As your leadership responsibilities expand, so does your need to understand the impact of every decision on the strategic and financial goals of your organization. That's why business acumen—an intuitive sense of how the moving parts of a company work together to create profit —is indispensable.
This program will improve your understanding of how operations, finance, marketing, and other functions must work together to create and execute a successful business strategy. You’ll also polish your financial literacy and leadership skills and become more business savvy.
Who Should Attend
Functional managers who have new or existing responsibilities to help support other departments and the organization as a whole.
This program is also offered online.Learn More »
Continuing Education Units
This course provides 2.1 Continuing Education Units (CEUs)
How You Will Benefit
- Gain a realistic picture of your company’s position, market, and potential
- Examine the external environment and understand how customer and business changes affect your company’s ability to succeed
- Analyze where your business stands in relation to your key competitors and what the future will look like
- Measure the performance of your business using standards that are highly correlated with value creation
- Integrate your competitive analysis and financial metrics to improve your business decision making
- Create an actionable business strategy, get stakeholder buy-in, and develop a complete strategy implementation map
- Improve your business skills by learning the right financial terminology
SHRM Preferred Provider
The Center for Professional and Executive Development is a Preferred Provider with the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM).
Agenda
Day 1 - Business Acumen and Strategy Development
- Get hands-on exercises to construct suitable business models
- Explore how to segment selection and product service offerings
- Learn how to manage strategy execution through financial dashboards and how to measure the right results
- Understand which value chain components are right for your organization
Day 2 - Business Strategy Process Development
- Understanding why your company (and you) cannot be great at everything
- Apply competitive analysis principles to direct and indirect competitors and to future and blue sky opportunities
- Assess actionable business strategies for your company
- Test strategic models and decisions through mini case studies
- Avoid common planning traps and pitfalls by conducting a business strategy review
Day 3 - Strategy Implementation and Communication Plan
- Examine models, tools, and methods for strategic planning
- Explore the essential elements needed to implement a strategic plan
- Implementing goals through acquisitions
- Develop profit improvement strategies and planning for growth
Adam Bock
Adam is an award-winning academic, serial entrepreneur, and experienced strategy consultant. Adam has co-authored three books on business models and entrepreneurship. He has published more than 20 peer-reviewed articles and book chapters.
He was a strategy consultant with Michael Porter’s Monitor Group, serving clients such as AT&T, Hewlett-Packard, Heineken, and the State of California. Adam co-founded four university spin-outs in the life sciences: Nerites Corporation, Stratatech Corporation, Virtual Incision Corporation, and Cellular Logistics. He served as CFO of all four ventures and interim CEO of two of the companies. He has served on organizational Boards and mentors entrepreneurs around the world.
Adam provides executive education and coaching in strategy, entrepreneurship, and innovation through the Center for Professional & Executive Development at the Fluno Center. His CPED clients include international pharmaceutical companies, global consumer packaged goods businesses, regional and national technology companies, and state government entities. He has taught courses on strategy, entrepreneurship, and innovation at universities around the world. He has also developed a series of online entrepreneurship courses in use in the UK and the US.
He won the 2018 National 3E Award from the United States Association of Small Business and Entrepreneurship (USASBE) for the best experiential entrepreneurial classroom activity.
Adam is a Fellow of the UK Higher Education Academy. He was selected as a Member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Young Academy in 2012. Adam served on the World Entrepreneurship Forum (Lyon, France) from 2011-2013.
Adam holds bachelors’ degrees in Aeronautical Engineering and Quantitative Economics from Stanford University, an MBA from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a Ph.D. in Innovation and Entrepreneurship from Imperial College London.
Daily Schedule
Program: 8:15 a.m.-5 p.m.
Lunch and Breaks are Included with Program Registration
Program Check-In will be 7:30-8:15 a.m. on the first day of the program.