Interaction Associates

Accelerating high-potential leaders

Today's senior leaders must make fast decisions that have far-reaching consequences. They face making these decisions in a business environment that is ambiguous and ever-changing, with a complex mix of financial and human variables.

Interaction Associates' Strategic Leadership Skills™ a dynamic and intensive, multi-day executive-development program, integrates:

• A robust leadership framework
• Essential leadership strategies and tools
• A state-of-the-art business simulation
• 360° feedback

Deployed at G.E. Capital and other dynamic, fast-moving organizations, this executive- development program builds the leadership competence required in today's business environment.

Who should attend

High-potential directors and vice presidents who must develop critical skills in strategic thinking, team-building, effective communication, and personal effectiveness to broaden their contribution to the organization. Participants should have a working knowledge of basic business management concepts and have had some experience integrating multiple variables to make business decisions.

A customized solution

We partner with you to customize Strategic Leadership Skills™ to fit your organization's leadership competency model. The learning experience itself can be delivered over a five-day period or in three two-day sessions.

When delivered over a period of weeks or months, with assessment, ongoing practice, and action-learning activities, and individual or team coaching in between classroom sessions, competency development is optimized. We integrate your existing 360° feedback tool into the learning experience or can provide one.

Benefits for participants

Leaders who participate in Strategic Leadership Skills™ acquire specific leadership capabilities which, when applied to strategic decision-making, generate better and faster results. Participants also demonstrate:

• More strategic, big-picture thinking that advances the organization's strategic intent
• An enhanced ability to make a business case to obtain scarce resources
• Improved methods for assessing business deals with wide-ranging consequences
• Ability to build agreements amidst complex conceptual and interpersonal dynamics
• Superior skills for coaching peers and direct-reports
• The capacity to create and deliver a vision
• The ability to act deftly and with confidence in ambiguous situations

Benefits for the organization

Developing high-potential leaders creates bench strength for any organization that is undergoing growth, change, or innovation.

Organizations using Strategic Leadership Skills™ also experience:

• Increased speed and agility in meeting marketplace challenges
• Proficiency at choosing from among a number of possible growth, change, new product development, and resource allocation scenarios
• A shared language about collaboration, visioning, decision-making, and taking action that helps the organization work better cross-functionally
• Increased employee and customer satisfaction

How participants learn

Strategic Leadership Skills™ combines 360° feedback, innovative leadership concepts, and a hands-on business simulation to build leader competence and confidence. As they encounter new concepts, participants engage in classroom discussion and practice exercises to build their skills and receive continual coaching. Individual reflection time is built into the workshop for better assimilation of the learning. The integration of 360° feedback means participants can apply learning and coaching immediately to their own identified development areas.

The computer-based, facilitated business simulation requires participants to operate a business successfully for three years. Given variables such as business pipeline, employee investment, bench policy, and customer satisfaction, they work in teams to apply key leadership concepts to make the right business decisions. They experience functional decision-making in the areas of sales, marketing, operations, research and development, and finance.