strategy simulation

One-Trial Learning By Mark Chussil I love data. I spent 15 years working with the PIMS (Profit Impact of Market Strategy) database alongside academic luminaries. (I was in the room but I was not in their league.) Many years later, I think it’s fun to run and analyze a few billion simulations before breakfast. I […]

Can You Out-strategize a Couple Thousand People? The Top Pricer Tournament™ is a state-of-the-art business simulation that pits your pricing strategies against those from 1,900 (as of November 2019) other people from around the world. With all those entrants, the Tournament runs more than 17 billion simulations (17 gigasims!) to see whose strategies work best. […]

Some of these essays are about competitive strategy and strategic thinking; some are not. “Are Capitalists Copping Out?” “We Will Play Soothing, Uninterrupted Music While You Wait.” “The Formerly United States of America.” And more.

The outcome was not only to resolve the classic conflict of top-management stretch goals versus product-management practicality. It was also to preclude the equally classic conflict that comes later, the one about underperforming versus overexpecting.

J.C. Penney doesn’t have the performance it wants, Mr. Johnson has been tarred and “pundited” as a failure, employees and investors are dispirited, and customers are baffled. Help wanted: CEO.

Albert Einstein said, “Things should be as simple as possible, but not simpler.” So when it comes to business decision-making, what’s too simple, what’s not simple enough, and what’s just right? We’ll investigate with Groupon, social ROI, and a strategy simulation.

In business we expect decisions to come from careful analysis in which experts lay out the options, quantify the costs and benefits, and make the right choices. So it may seem perplexing when two senior executives, in symbiotically linked companies, publicly and decisively disagree on a key decision.

People whisper to horses, dogs, and (according to TV) ghosts. Why not models? The model whisperer — perhaps you, savvy strategist — gently, wisely guides models into shape and helps them achieve fulfillment as oracles of your business’ future. (#3 in a series)

ACS and SCIP Oregon conducted a business war game of the automobile industry. Here’s why, here are lessons from the war game, and here’s what you should do in your own business.

Don’t we all wish that the stress tests of banks had been done, say, a year and a half ago? The case for running our own stress tests on our businesses.