Strategic Decision Making Simulation that Works

“Whether it is a Strategic Decision Making Simulation or executive coaching, LSA Global focuses on understanding our business situation and helping us succeed.

I would highly recommend LSA Global as a top quality resource to anyone looking to greatly improve the skills of their leadership, management, and project teams.”
Bonnie S. Olson | VP Human Resources | Lutheran Social Services

“The best simulation for giving a birds-eye view of operations.”
Magnus Aniander | Senior Leadership Development | Toyota

“We required every Oracle USA sales representative to take this Strategic Decision Making Simulation. It was exceptional.”
Sales Manager | Oracle

“You know the program is effective when people from manufacturing, sales, and marketing become sensitive to each other’s needs and understand how the other operation works.”
Manager | 3M

Description
This proven 1.5 to 2-day Strategic Decision Making Simulation workshop helps team to pull in the same direction, build cross-functional alignment, and develop a big picture understanding for more effective strategic decision-making.

In this highly experiential strategic decision making simulation, teams manage their own capital-intensive companies and compete for the same customers in a rapidly changing marketplace. Participants act as finance, production, marketing, and corporate intelligence.

Teams of 4 to 6 must take over a company, grow with scarce resources, battle for positions, and improve profitability — in good times and bad. It’s a customizable and dynamic challenge of analysis, strategy, execution, and navigation to collectively make the right investments at the right time.

Most leaders call this comprehensive simulation a “micro-MBA” for their decision-making teams in the areas of strategic planning, teamwork, and business finance.

Strategic Decision Making Simulation for Leaders and High-Performance Teams

Objectives
With hundreds of operational and strategic decisions to make under heavy competitive pressure, teams are challenged to make tough choices with limited resources and demanding time constraints. In this proven decision-making simulation, participants gain:

Functional expertise of how financial decisions impact overall business — and how business decisions are reflected financially.
Higher productivity through better teamwork and communication.
Deeper understanding of strategy and tactical initiatives.
Improved decision-making and problem-solving for optimal allocation of limited resources.
Increased responsiveness to customer needs.
Stronger business literacy and financial acumen.

Typical decisions participants face include when to invest, how many markets to pursue, whether to develop new products or maintain existing ones, if it makes sense to be a market leader or an early follower, and when to enter markets.

Target Audience
Executives, senior leaders, high-potential managers, cross-functional teams, and emerging leaders responsible for driving business results who want to develop their business strategy skills, analytical thinking, decision-making, and financial acumen.

To speak with an LSA Expert and learn about business simulation program customization and delivery options onsite at your company, please contact us.

Related Information

Thank you for a great leadership development session today. The facilitator was brilliant. The team got a lot out of it (as did I).

I believe it will help us create an even higher performance culture by ensuring we have a common understanding of how to create higher performance and work toward clear and common strategic goals.

Simon Jefferson
Managing Director

LSA has been a tremendous asset at my current company and my past company.

As an HR leader, I am always looking for ways to find external resources that can provide impactful leadership and management development expertise. LSA consistently does that for me.

The tools and practices are crisp, business relevant, and easy to apply on the job.

Ken Boehm
VP of Human Resources

I continue to be impressed by the level of leadership development training and management expertise and quality of advice and facilitation that LSA has to offer.

What a smart and client-centric group of great people who really know how to help assess and develop high performing leaders.

Tracy Esposito
Director

LSA’s executive coach based his approach on understanding our business circumstances and strategy, as well as our leadership aspirations. The customized coaching covered all aspects of leadership; it was not simply a touchy-feely endeavor.

In fact, the focus on clear business outcomes and real life circumstances challenged me as a senior leader to develop my thinking and actions related to leading the business.”

Janet Pagano
Managing Director

We consider LSA Global the top outsourced learning and development partner.

We work closely with LSA to customize leadership and management development programs to meet our growing business needs.

I would highly recommend LSA to any company wanting to deliver high quality and practical learning solutions for their leaders and managers.

Terri Wright-Scheer
Vice President Human Resources

LSA has a tremendous ability to distil complex, multilayered challenges into meaningful, impactful, and clear strategies and action plans.

The time we invested as a leadership team to get aligned was well spent in gaining laser focus and identifying ways to prioritize what was meaningful individually and as a team. The facilitation and leadership style was direct, firm, and compassionate.

LSA provided the high level thinking and support for our team to co-create in a rapidly scaling business.

Bindu Garapaty, PsyD
VP, Talent and Inclusion, Diversity, & Equity

The customized leadership program was very practical and achieved our goals. LSA adapted very well to our group and the situation and helped us build trust and awareness of successful leadership styles. We look forward to the next steps.

Erik Okholm
Director of Software Development

LSA’s approach and ability to bring the right leadership and management expertise and approach to eBay has been a great asset.

They really focus on helping us succeed in any way they can and definitely lifted up our leadership and management development capabilities.

Mike Normant
Learning & Development

What a refreshing change from the half-baked psycho-babble you normally get from training and consulting organizations. LSA gives you the practical and results-oriented assistance you need to define and reach your goals.

Their leadership, management, and sales expertise has been invaluable. They think strategically and provide a results driven plan – not just a temporary fix.

They are great to work with, and even more importantly, they “get it!”

David Fiano
Director of Merchandising

LSA exceeded all my expectations.

We interviewed 7 potential training and consulting partners and selected LSA due to their expertise, flexibility, and breadth and depth of leadership solutions.

We were able to design a highly customized, focused, and relevant management training program that fit our unique needs.

Our leaders and managers galvanized as a team and are better prepared for the rigors of a leading their teams in a very competitive and fast-changing market.

Mitch Mandich
CEO

For our go to training outsourcing partner, LSA provides exactly what we want and need – which is not an easy task.

As always, they design and deliver outstanding leadership development results and high quality management training programs that totally align with our unique business and talent strategies!

Elizabeth Siebert
Director, Organizational Excellence & Development

The quality of LSA’s Leadership Training Programs and facilitators is always top notch. We recognize and appreciate the hard work LSA always goes through to align to our unique culture and meet our specific requirements. Thank you for regularly going above and beyond. Your support and dedication, both on the strategic and tactical side, have been outstanding!

Anna Meyer
Leadership Development

We selected LSA Global over 5 other companies to help our key executives improve their overall communication and executive presentation capabilities. LSA exceeded our expectations.

I highly recommend LSA to any executive team looking to better organize and more effectively deliver key executive-level messages — especially when the stakes are high.

Todd Power
Office of the CEO

At the onset of our engagement with LSA, I was skeptical that an outside firm would be able to understand and dissect our organization’s highly complex and technical business challenges.

However, through the leadership team interview and strategy retreat processes that LSA utilized, they provided a fresh, innovative, and practical perspective that created tremendous strategic value and focus for our executive leadership team.

As a result, I would highly recommend LSA Global to any leader struggling with building the strategic alignment and high performance teams necessary to generate sales growth, in a way that fits their unique corporate culture.

Robert Laudati
Managing Director

At a time of change in our marketplace, LSA Global did an exceptional job helping our executive team create strategic clarity by helping us to define, clarify, and prioritize our corporate vision, mission, values, differentiation, target clients, strategic priorities, success metrics and key roles.

They beautifully navigated a very difficult and fuzzy situation, respectfully cleared out all of the cultural elephants, and shared impactful insights and leadership development theories along the way. They have transformed our business.

Laurie Sewell
President & CEO

FAQs

A strategic decision making simulation is an interactive business exercise that places participants in realistic leadership scenarios where they must analyze data, evaluate tradeoffs, collaborate under pressure, and make critical and enterprise-wide business decisions. Unlike traditional classroom learning, experiential simulations allow leaders to practice strategic thinking and decision-making skills in a dynamic, risk-free environment that mirrors real-world business complexity.

Strategic decision making simulations are especially valuable for executives, senior leaders, high-potential managers, cross-functional teams, and emerging leaders responsible for driving strategic business results. Organizations often use simulations to strengthen strategic alignment, improve enterprise thinking, accelerate leadership readiness, and help teams navigate uncertainty with greater confidence and agility.

Participants strengthen a broad range of leadership and business capabilities, including strategic thinking, prioritization, risk assessment, financial acumen, collaboration, communication, scenario planning, and decision-making under uncertainty. Simulations also help leaders recognize how short-term choices can impact long-term organizational performance, customer outcomes, and competitive positioning.

Strategic clarity accounts for 31% of the difference between high- and low-growth companies. Research consistently shows that experiential learning accelerates skill retention and behavioral change more effectively than passive learning alone. Strategic decision making simulations help leaders practice applying business frameworks in realistic situations, which improves judgment, execution, and cross-functional collaboration. Organizations often use simulations to align leaders around strategy, improve adaptability, and increase organizational agility during periods of growth, transformation, or market disruption.

Traditional training often focuses on concepts and theory, while simulations immerse participants in realistic business challenges that require active problem-solving and decision-making. This experiential approach increases engagement, strengthens critical thinking, and helps leaders immediately connect learning to real business situations. Simulations also create opportunities for reflection, feedback, and team-based learning that reinforce lasting behavior change.