Cover Story is a game about pure imagination. The purpose is to think expansively around an ideal future state for the organization; it’s an exercise in visioning. The object of the game is to suspend all disbelief and envision a future state that is so stellar that it landed your organization on the cover of a well-known magazine
In Critical Uncertainties, groups develop strategies for handling factors that are impossible to predict or control. This helps to quickly test strategies and improve our ability to respond to future challenges. Rather than creating fixed plans, this structure builds creative adaptability, enabling groups to envision multiple futures, articulate higher-order goals, and act flexibly. It brings to life LS Principle #7, Emphasize Possibilities: Believe Before You See.
The real name of this jolt is Proactive Planning, but using that name will give away the key point that we want players to discover. Presented as a word game, this jolt lulls lures players to go after immediate gains in a mindless fashion only to regret the action later.
This game is most probably the most simple collaborative cost benefit analysis ever. It is applicable onto subjects where a group has expert knowledge about costs and/or benefits.
The partnership canvas is a tool that enables visualization of current and/or future partnerships. It can also be used for early testing of the value creating potential of a partnership between two partnership candidates.
Polarities live as interdependent pairs that need each other to exist, for example inhaling & exhaling. One pole is not valued as better than the other. Polarities have an enduring quality, they are unavoidable and unsolvable.
Polarities live everywhere from our internal dialogue to external patterns of relating in society and within organizations. Overfocus on any one pole leads to the breakdown of the system as a whole.
Ultimate tic-tac-toe is variation and more strategic version of Tic Tac Toe which allows for a more dynamic and strategic gameplay for participants. This is designed for 2 main players (which can be individuals or groups).
Measures of success vary across an organization. Executives concern themselves with company-wide Objectives involving Revenue, Cost, Profit, Margin and Customer Satisfaction.
Further down the org chart, management and individual contributors rate performance against more detailed Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) tracking customer behavior: a product manager may measure app downloads, or number of shopping cart items per visit. These customer behaviors clearly affect the larger corporate Objectives, but how? and which have the most impact?
This is a fantastic depiction of modern product and service development, and it allows a team and a leader to communicate effectively in which phase of the innovation journey are they. It helps the team to focus and to checklist the events, tools, and profiles that can generate the most growth on each phase.
The Make a World game appeals to visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners because of its layers of interaction. It’s useful (and downright fun) because it lets players imagine the future and take action to create a first version of it. All successful ventures start with a vision and some small, initial effort toward crystallization. Alexander Graham Bell’s vision for the telephone started as highly rudimentary sketches.
In Mad Tea/Calm Tea, everyone rapidly completes sentences related to a shared challenge to quickly provoke a deeper set of reflections and strategic insights among group members. Mad Tea is the louder, more energetic face-to-face version, while Calm Tea is the quieter online alternative. They both get people thinking differently, sharing new ideas, and understanding different perspectives while generating fellowship and laughter. Both bring to life LS Principle #9, Engage in Seriously Playful Curiosity. The questions focus attention and produce a fresh understanding of strategic options and next steps.
