The Strategy Skills Podcast: Management Consulting | Strategy, Operations & Implementation | Critical Thinking

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss how to know what is corporate strategy. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo Subscribe to FIRMSconsulting's YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/Firmsconsultingsubscribe

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss what big picture thinking is. At least once in your life, you would have received feedback to be a more big picture thinker. The problem is that everyone will have a different definition of big picture thinking and many of the definitions are vague, counter-intuitive, or wrong. Based on advising some of the consultants on the study, this podcast provides a very simple, intuitive, practical, and correct definition of the big picture concept. It also explains why it is so important and how to use it. Keep in mind that this study is being updated on our website where you can view the training videos and PowerPoint slides. This is a huge study and will offer the most realistic training for both consultants and industry professionals. Pure corporate strategy studies are rare. This is a unique training opportunity. Click here to see the full study and here to see the merger study and market entry study. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sa

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 296, an episode with Nick Santhanam, the CEO of Fernweh Group, an investment company adapting an engaged investor & operator model (EIOM) to create alpha in the industrial and industrial technology sector. In this episode, we dig deep into the prevailing narrative about the decline of manufacturing in the US and if that is the case, the actions needed from the government to bring back the US as a thriving manufacturing nation. Nick Santhanam is a former Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company’s Palo Alto Office and was the leader of their global industrials practice. In addition, Nick was the global convener of several McKinsey annual events, including the Industrial CEO event (GILS), Industrial-tech and Semiconductors CEO event (T-30), Food Processing CEO event (FPH-30), and Senior Tech Influencers Summit (TEDS). He co-authored several of their leading industrials research – McKinsey on Industrials, McKinsey on Food Processing and Handling, and McKinsey on Packaging. H

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 295, an episode with a highly regarded global executive, Daphne E. Jones. In this episode, Daphne shares her inspiring journey of overcoming criticism, judgment, racism, and doubt. She was told by her career counselor that Black girls don’t successfully make it in college, but should instead go to secretary school. Today, Daphne is a corporate board member who has held CIO and other leadership positions at Fortune 500 companies including IBM, Johnson & Johnson, Hospira (now Pfizer) and General Electric. With the right mindset and perseverance, Daphne defied everyone’s doubts, overcame life’s challenges, and emerged victorious. Daphne also discussed the role and significance of finding the balance with your 5 F’s (faith, family, finances, fitness, and furthering your career) to succeed in life. She also elaborated on the 4-step EDIT methodology (Envision, Design, Iterate, and Transform) that enables women to transform their mindset to win. Daphne E. Jones has 30+ years of

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss about financial strategy. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo Subscribe to FIRMSconsulting's YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/Firmsconsultingsubscribe

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss scenario planning's common problems. Scenario planning / Scenario Analysis is a powerful tool in consulting. This is how to move from being a consultant to thinking and presenting like a partner. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo Subscribe to FIRMSconsulting's YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/Firmsconsultingsubscribe

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic from the Corporate Strategy & Transformation study. This podcast is for those who have mastered all the basics on slide design and formatting. In this podcast, we discuss how to determine if your PowerPoint slides are influential on a study. Influential PowerPoint slides may not be the most beautiful pieces of work or even the ones with the most effort, though it is usually at least the latter. Click here to see the full study and here to see the merger study and market entry study. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo

Welcome to Strategy Skills Episode 291 with the first-ever Chief Design Officer and SVP of PepsiCo, the world's second-largest food and beverage company, Mauro Porcini. In this episode, Mauro talked about how his career started and how his love of what he is doing helped made PepsiCo what it is today. He also talked about the step-by-step process of designing and establishing a new culture in any corporation and how this would lead to innovation, eventual growth, and overall success. In the past eight years, Mauro and his design team have won more than 1,100 design and innovation awards and in 2018, PepsiCo was recognized by Fortune in its Driven by Design list. He was previously 3M’s first Chief Design Officer. Porcini has been recognized with several personal awards, including Fortune’s 40 under 40, GQ Italia’s 30 Best Dressed Men, and Fast Company’s 50 Most Influential Designers in the United States. In 2018, he was awarded a knighthood (cavaliere) by the president of the Italian Republic. He lives in New

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss value chain analysis. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo Subscribe to FIRMSconsulting's YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/Firmsconsultingsubscribe

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 288, an episode with Linda Yates, the founder and CEO of Mach49, the leading growth incubator for global businesses with clients including Goodyear, Hitachi, Intel, JetBlue, Nestlé Purina, Prudential and Shell.  In Linda’s new book The Unicorn Within, she empowers large companies to beat startups at their own game—to build a pipeline and portfolio of new ventures to drive meaningful growth through teachable, repeatable, scalable method focused 100 percent on execution across the spectrum of venture creation from Ideate to Incubate, Accelerate, and Scale. She also offers keys to managing the Mothership and seizing the Mothership advantage to ensure your ventures reach escape velocity and thrive. Linda Yate is a seasoned CEO with over 25 years of experience creating global strategy and driving innovation for large multinationals around the world. A native of Silicon Valley, Linda spent a decade as a member of the Board of Directors for NYSE-traded Sybase Inc. (now SAP) and has

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic from the Corporate Strategy & Transformation study, where we explain how benchmarking analysis, or what is also called best practice analysis, should be used for the top-down analysis and why they are so difficult to manage in a real study. Click here to see the full study and here to see the merger study and market entry study. Enjoying our podcast? Get access to sample advanced training episodes here: www.firmsconsulting.com/promo Subscribe to FIRMSconsulting's YouTube channel: http://bit.ly/Firmsconsultingsubscribe

For this episode, let's revisit a Strategy Skills classic where we discuss value chain mapping. We have seen many value chain mapping examples. We have seen good value chain mapping, bad value chain mapping, and incomplete value chain mapping. Ultimately, given the nature of how value chain mapping will work, it can and cannot do a few things. So if value chain mapping is presented to do things it cannot do, then it is flawed. When you do value chain analysis, 1.) it is far more useful to see where profits will shift over time. 2.) assign some probabilities of what are the odds of this happening. And 3.) what influences those probabilities? You are analyzing the entire sector, the entire industry. A lot of things influence a sector. Consumer spending can change with the recession. Recession can change things. Different legislation could cause profits to move from point x to point y. Competitors making a misstep could cause it, new competitors entering, and competitors going bankrupt. So whenever someone says

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 286, an episode with a top-rated speaker, best-selling author, and consultant, Dr. Cindy McGovern. Get Cindy’s book here: https://amzn.to/3Cys1ae   Most of us view “sales” as a pushy, manipulative, and one-sided thing. But really, “sales” is understanding what others need and trying to deliver on those needs. Regardless of the nature of work—whether you're selling a product, service, or idea, you are selling yourself first and it is a life skill that everybody needs. Therefore, it is important to first build trust and develop your personal brand around it which will make selling easier.    In this episode, Dr. Cindy defined sales in a different light. She discussed how to sell yourself and how to proactively manage your personal brand.   Dr. Cindy McGovern is the founder of Orange Leaf Consulting, which helps organizations, entrepreneurs, and individuals create dynamic and robust sales processes. Before launching her business, McGovern was a college professor of communicatio

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 285, an episode with Ashish Kothari. In his book “Hardwired for Happiness” Ashish outlines an easy-to-follow recipe that can help anyone increase joy, health, love, and meaning in their lives. His transformational approach is secular, interdisciplinary and integrates learnings and best practices across the fields of science and spirituality. Get Ashish's new book here: https://amzn.to/3yyzfdh   Ashish is an executive coach, author and founder of Happiness Squad, a company focused on helping individuals and organizations unleash the power of happiness and well-being to achieve their full potential. Ashish is a deep expert on happiness and human flourishing having read over 450 books and trained under masters across the disparate fields of spiritual wisdom traditions, psychology, and neuroscience. Prior to starting Happiness Squad, Ashish spent over 17 years at McKinsey and Co, a premier management consulting firm, supporting thousands of leaders and their organizations succee

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 284, an episode with CNBC’s Senior Media & Tech Correspondent, Julia Boorstin. Get Julia’s Book here: https://amzn.to/3ekjT4Y   In this episode, Julia speaks about female leaders and their struggles in facing gender bias and “pattern matching” in largely male-dominated industries. She discusses the key commonalities of female leaders who thrived in spite of the challenges that made them uniquely equipped to lead and grow successful businesses.    Julia also shared her journey of becoming a CNBC senior media and tech correspondent. As an expert, she shares tips on how to prepare for interviews, how to become a better communicator, and how to respond to opportunities.   Julia Boorstin is CNBC’s Senior Media & Tech Correspondent and has been an on-air reporter for the network since 2006. She also plays a central role in CNBC’s bicoastal tech-focused program “TechCheck” delivering reporting, analysis, and CEO interviews with a focus on social media and the intersection o

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 283, an episode with an expert on organizational paradoxes, Wendy Smith. Get Wendy’s Book here: https://amzn.to/3fF1b8C   When faced with a tough decision-making situation, it is common for us to assess and select what we believe is the best deal and then move on. We tend to assume that we need to pick one option and eliminate the other. But what if we could actually succeed in pursuing both options?    In this episode with Wendy Smith, we discuss how leaders and individuals can effectively respond to contradictory yet interdependent demands and have the mindset shift needed to successfully navigate a paradox.   Wendy Smith is the Dana J. Johnson Professor of Management and faculty director of the Women’s Leadership Initiative at the Lerner College of Business and Economics, University of Delaware. She earned her PhD in organizational behavior at Harvard Business School, where she began her intensive research on strategic paradoxes—how leaders and senior teams effectively re

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 282, an episode with a reporter for The Wall Street Journal, Sean McLain. Get Sean’s book here.   This episode with Sean McLain revolves around the story of Carlos Ghosn, one of the world’s most feared and admired business executives who had remarkable success, yet faced a catastrophic fall. He was accused of financial misconduct and arrested for a bevy of alleged crimes—all of which he vehemently denied.   Sean is a reporter for The Wall Street Journal based in Los Angeles, covering EV startups like Rivian, Lucid, and Japanese and Korean automakers.   Since 2016, Sean McLain has overseen The Wall Street Journal's coverage of the largest automakers in Japan, including Toyota, Honda, and Nissan, and received the Malcolm Forbes Award by the Overseas Press Club of America for his coverage of the former Nissan and Renault executive's arrest and detention.   Sean graduated from St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, and lives in Tokyo.   Get Sean’s book here: Boundless: The R

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 281, an interview with a leadership coaching legend, David Noble.   Most leaders experience a lack of motivation to continue the things they once had a passion for. So, how do you rekindle the fire of motivation when it starts to die? The key is to know your “why” and assess if your reason is strong enough to continue the journey.   In this episode, David shares the role he plays in reframing things and bringing the best out of leaders, executives, and CEOs. David shares a powerful new framework called MOVE that characterizes great and extraordinary leaders. Most of us dislike having only one strategy to win. In David's framework, he discusses the four simple yet powerful options that will take you to the same goal: lean in, lean back, lean with, and don’t lean.   David Noble has more than twenty years of global experience advising CEOs, their teams, and major investors on leadership and strategy, and an additional fifteen years as a top executive. He was named by Thinkers50

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 280, an episode with a renowned digital entrepreneur and founder of ENTRE institute, Jeff Lerner. Get Jeff's book here.   In this episode, Jeff discussed how he was able to build a multi-million dollar company from scratch and the key elements behind his success.   At the age of 18, Jeff started his first business after dropping out of high school and becoming a musician. After the first one failed, Jeff continued starting more businesses and failed at them too. Despite years of trying and numerous unsuccessful businesses, one of which had left him $500,000 in dept, he chose to keep going and eventually built multiple successful businesses.   Instead of retiring early, Jeff chose to spend his time inspiring and helping others build their businesses. After becoming an authority in startups, he established ENTRE institute, an online education company dedicated to helping entrepreneurs how they could start their own businesses. To date, ENTRE Institute has taught over 150,000

Welcome to Strategy Skills episode 279, an episode with a practicing emergency physician at Mayo Clinic, Dr. Richard Winters. Get Dr. Richard’s book here.   As a physician, Dr. Richard shares how he managed, adapted, and remained calm during times of covid. He discussed some of the best practices that can be adapted from the medical field into the space of business. We speak about leadership, administration, and leveraging your expertise to be effective in your career.    In this episode, we also discussed one of the traps that most leaders face today where they strive to become successful in their career, and groom and develop new leaders while taking into account the fear of being replaced.    As director of Leadership Development for the Mayo Clinic Care Network, Dr. Winters facilitates retreats and delivers programs that train leaders at healthcare organizations worldwide.   Dr. Winters graduated from the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine in 1994. He is board certified and residency trained in Emergency