"Bring reality and context to your leadership training"
Leadership, Management Skills, Change Management, Problem Solving,
Simulation Game Overview
Power of Leadership is a business simulation that helps participants understand the challenges they face when they are given power to accomplish a task. Even though power is a taboo topic for many people, it is what sets the leader apart from others in the organisation. Studies show that effective leaders understand and have a need to have power. More important, they know how to use it to accomplish their goals.
But using power effectively is not an easy task. There are many challenges that, if not met, will create disastrous results for individuals and the organisation. This simulation teaches leaders how to use power to resolve conflicts, communicate effectively, solve problems, and manage positive change in the corporate culture.
The Power of Leadership brings reality and context into the teaching of leadership. It's easy to tell a group that a leader should do this or do that. What's hard is leading under the types of pressure every leader faces. For example, how do you lead people when individuals or groups:
- Are resisting changes designed to make the organisation more effective?
- Are jealously competing for scarce resources?
- Are forming unhealthy coalitions based on self-interest and without considering the needs of the organisation?
- Don’t trust the leaders to use their power to make the best decisions for them or the organisation?
- Are unable to see the organisation as a system?
This leadership simulation helps participants understand why the decisions, behaviour, and attitudes of leaders are often misperceived by their followers. It helps participants who are power averse understand what they must do to improve their effectiveness and helps those who are power prone understand what discipline they must employ to use their power effectively.
How this simulation works
The simulation is conducted in rounds. During each round participants earn individual points by trading. Based on the number of points they earned during trading, they are divided into three groups; Top Performers, Midders, and Greemers. They then earn group points by claiming territories on a tri-board. All groups are governed by two types of rules; inherited rules and rules of nature. At the end of each round, participants have a chance to change the inherited rules to improve the organization. During the first round, the system is designed to create a dysfunctional organisation.
Once the dysfunctional organisation is established, the group has the opportunity to fix it. To be successful, the leaders must figure out how to lead the organisation out of the quagmire that has been created. In doing so, they must get the groups to work for the good of the entire organisation rather than compete among themselves. They must also redistribute the resources, review and revise policies and practices that need to be changed, and earn the trust and cooperation of all members of the organisation. We don’t tell them that their task is to fix a dysfunctional system. Part of the learning is to discover that the system is not working well. In other words, we give them the opportunity to lead but it is up to them to take advantage of the opportunity.
To successfully change the organisation they must:
- Meet in groups and make plans for the rule-making session.
- Conduct the rule-making session.
- Use power effectively.
- Successfully lead and manage organisational change
- Develop trust under difficult circumstances.
- Resolve conflicts between individuals and groups.
- Negotiate for resources.
- Communicate effectively
- Collaborate
- Establish roles and goals.
- Use higher order thinking to develop strategies and analyse the organisation as a system.
- Use superordinate goals to reorder priorities.
- Establish a vision for the organisation.
- Understand how power affects the perception of a leader’s message.
As they work to accomplish the above tasks:
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Midders and Greemers discover that the Top Performers have the power to make the rules for the simulation.
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The Midders and Greemers must decide how or whether they are going to participate.
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Top Performers realise that they can’t progress without the cooperation of the Midders and the Greemers, so they often try to give the power away, i.e., escape the responsibility of being leaders, or become patronising and tell the Midders and Greemers, “We’re going to give this to you. Aren’t you happy?” Eventually all of the participants understand, “We’re all in this together.” They then identify the things they can’t change and try to change the things they can. They are then challenged to manage the change together through their leadership and change the organisation together in ways that create a healthy productive work culture.
Learning Outcomes
As a result of the simulation, managers and employees learn:
Who is the simulation ideal for?
- Any person who needs to know how to lead change, resolve conflicts, develop higher order thinking skills, develop one’s personal leadership style, and understand which behaviour and attitudes make him or her effective.
- New and experienced managers and supervisors.
- Technical people who have been promoted into leadership positions without managerial training.
- Managers who have lost their motivation to be effective leaders.
- Participants who are power averse and need to understand what behaviour changes are necessary to use power effectively.
- Participants who are power prone and need to understand the pitfalls of using power and, more important, how to use power effectively.
- Participants who need to understand that leadership requires much more than just being nice to people or working hard to achieve personal goals.
Logistics
A three winged board is used to simulate an office environment. It’s a board that sits on a 6 foot round table. The three wings create three separate areas similar to cubicle walls. The Top Performers sit behind one set of barriers, the Midders behind another, and the Greemers behind another. They cannot communicate with one another except by written messages passed through a hole in the barrier. The board is meant to represent the barriers to communication that exist in an organisation.
Contents
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Facilitators Guide
- Workbooks for participants
- 3 Winged Board and Pegs
- Tokens for Trading Game
- DVD/Cassette
Trainer Helpline
We know that games and simulations can bring fun, learning and challenge to the programmes you deliver. Therefore, we would welcome the opportunity to talk you through any of our wide range of activities to ensure that you obtain the maximum benefit from your purchase. Please
contact us or call us on
+44 (0) 1202 729823.
Need Help Facilitating?
From as little as £500 we can send you an experienced consultant to help facilitate this simulation game.
Contact us to find out more.
Client Feedback
"I found the Power of Leadership to be a very powerful and well designed game. We first used it at our own Management Team offsite and were so impressed that we are now using it as a learning tool with a number of our partners. The game does much more than the name might suggest, it doesn’t teach about leadership in an MBA fashion, but simulates a very real environment where people have different levels of control, and different amounts of information available to them. Despite these circumstances, they must work together in a systematic way in order to achieve mutually beneficial goals.
We found that it very effectively teaches important lessons but in a fun environment:
- For change leaders and agents (or people actively trying to bring about change) – the game shows what people go through when they experience change. It reminds us that change doesn’t need to be imposed on people, but can be brought about by working with them. It also reminds us of the natural defence mechanisms that can kick in.
- It also helps to develop a culture where everyone takes ownership for making change happen. As change managers and leaders it is easy to fall into the paradoxical trap of ‘asking people to initiate’. The game however is effective in demonstrating that all areas in an organisation depend on each other to make change happen, and everyone takes part in initiating change
I recommend this game without hesitation. What better way to learn about change than through experience, without putting real projects as risk!"
Dennis Vergne Change Manager/Head of Business Consulting Agilisys Professional Services
Duration: The simulation takes 3-4 hours to run, including the debrief.
Group Size: The Power of Leadership is designed for groups of 12 to 25 participants.
The price below includes the directors kit and 10 participant booklets. To order more participant booklets click
here.
