Explore what system dynamics models can do for you
Practical mini-courses showing how strategy really works for different functions, challenges and real-world issues.
Each short course in this list:
... summarises the topic or function it deals with, and issues that arise
... outlines the value that dynamic structures and models contribute
... explains how to leverage digital-twin models for better plans and outcomes
Some include free worksheets and working models.
GENERAL
How to build a digital twin, dynamic business model
Build a working model, and learn the modeling process and technique with the friendly Silico app.
Function-focused courses
Accounting
Dynamic business models for strategic management accounting
The challenges of delivering truly "strategic" management accounting – and how dynamic models solve them.
Human resources
Strategic human resource management and "people analytics"
How dynamic models tackle complex changes in staffing numbers, plus skills and experience – supporting strategic human-resource plans.
Marketing & sales
Dynamic models for marketing and sales
How dynamic models bring to life the changes to customer numbers and quality, dealing with the marketing "funnel" and impact on sales growth.
Marketing models
The working models for marketing and sales
Access to the working models for Marketing & Sales, and how to adapt them for your own use
Information systems
Dynamic models for Enterprise Architecture (EA) and IS planning
How Enterprise Architectures can be quantified and brought to life with dynamic business models.
Systems engineering
Dynamic models for systems engineering
How model-based systems engineering (MBSE) can be extended to business management issues with working dynamic models.
Topic-focused courses
Competition
Understanding and managing competition
The 3 standard mechanisms by which competition plays out – and how you can win mastering them!
Improving performance
Planning and managing performance improvement programs
How to use the standard structure shared by all performance improvement programs – from data-security to health & safety to net-zero and more.
Intangibles
Managing and exploiting intangible business factors
How soft factors can be quantified, modelled and managed to enhance performance – morale, reputation, data, quality and more.
Environment & society
Environmental and social impacts - and 'Integrated Reporting'
How business models extend out into the environment and society, helping us manage and improve those impacts.
Non-business courses
General-purpose
How to build a system dynamics model – the Agile way
Follow a reliable, 4-step process to build a working model of any social, economic, environment issue (a crime & policing xample)
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Continuing professional development/education (CPD/CPE)
See the CPD/CPE hours of learning input for each mini-course in the details below.
Your professional association may allow you to 'self-certify' any CPD/CPE time you spend, or may only recognise accredited learning content. If you would like us to apply for accreditation, please email contact@strategydynamics.com with details of the institution/association and links to its CPD/CPE program.
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How to build a digital twin, dynamic business model
3 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
You may feel that building a working, quantified model of how a business system works must be a technical and complex task. But it isn't!
This course will show how a practical and reliable 4-step process - using a user-friendly, free app - can get you to a working model that matches a real-world plan or issue fast. ... and from there, you can explore any scenarios or strategies you want.
Dynamic business models for strategic management accounting
1.5 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Institutions urge accounting professionals to move beyond just reporting business performance, and provide leaders with truly strategic support.
But standard accounting and strategy methods cannot fulfil those needs. This short course shows how dynamic business models can do just that, and more!
Strategic human resource management and "people analytics"
1.0 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Staff are said to be “our most important asset”, so we need rigorous and powerful means to plan and manage that asset! This class explains the dynamic structures that drive the staffing system, and the models that can enhance workforce planning, talent management, and organisational capabilities.
Dynamic models for marketing and sales
1.5 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Making and implementing plans for marketing and sales - whether for long-term strategy or one-off initiatives - is complex. Costly and time-consuming efforts take time to play out, and their success is complicated by interactions with pricing, competition, customer-support and other factors. But we can capture all those factors, and the interactions between them.
The working models for marketing and sales
1 hour of learning content for CPD/CPE
Get access to the working models for course-9 - plus instruction on how to use them and adapt them for your own needs.
Dynamic models for Enterprise Architecture (EA) and IS planning
1.5 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
“Enterprise Architectures”, offering a process view of how a business works, provide a basis for developing organizations’ IT strategies and plans.
But dynamic business models can make EAs more powerful, by providing a "digital twin" that mimics, visually, how the real-world business actually works - with numbers!
Dynamic models for systems engineering
1.0 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Systems Engineers develop, test and guide implementation of solutions to many business challenges. This mini-course explores how dynamic business models can extend that capability to tackling business issues, not just physical systems. The course provides working models that demonstrate the power and practicality of these models.
Understanding and managing competition
1.2 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Businesses face competitive pressures in all aspects of their strategy, from launching new products, to fighting off aggressive rivals, to achieving their overall business plans.
See how to use just three standard mechanisms - working together - that capture how competition operates to drive growth of customers and sales.
Planning and managing performance improvement programs
0.5 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Many kinds of program aim to improve specific performance issues - from data-security to health and safety to energy use and carbon emissions - and many more.
But many such programs stall or fail. This course shows how managing a simple structure of some key factors can ensure progress and success.
Managing and exploiting intangible business factors
1.5 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
We all know that intangibles matter, so we try to measure them, and to keep them in good shape.
See how to specify intangibles in a way that enables you to manage them - and manage their often considerable impact on business performance.
Environmental and social impacts - and 'Integrated Reporting'
1.0 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
Every organisation has impacts on the wider society and on the environment in which they operate, and most want to act responsibly.
See just how a business system actually works and affects social and environmental factors, with a demo model of a manufacturing business.
How to build a (general) system dynamics model - the Agile way
3 hours of learning content for CPD/CPE
System Dynamics models are not only for business use. They capture how the real world works across a whole range of topics: healthcare, defence, environment, education, biology ...
This short but in-depth course shows how to use a practical and reliable, "agile", 4-step process to build a system dynamics model. The model you build - with a user-friendly, free app - captures the challenge of reversing the growth of a certain type of crime in a city.
Strategy Dynamics, as adopted by ...
Using these models in both Sun Microsystems and Microsoft, the results speak for themselves. It is a key tool for senior managers.
John Kapson
Now: Sr. Director, Analytics & Data Science, Toyota Motors N America
This class fundamentally changed how I think about our company’s future, so I will use what I have learned for the challenges we face.
Mark Holman
Manager Regional Coordination, PJM Interconnection
These business models provided just what we need to explore scenarios for competition in the global tax-technology sector and test our strategies.
Kevin Boettcher
Director, Emerging Business; Vertex, Inc
Start making stronger plans and better decisions with Strategy Dynamics. Starting today.
- Understand the system that drives changing business performance
- Make better plans and decisions to get strong, sustained results
- Get examples of working models based on real-world scenarios
- Access the course in the next five minutes
These courses from Strategy Dynamics are fantastic. They are so good that we are looking to hire people with these skills. Thanks!
Bob Lamb
Founder and CEO, Foundation for Inclusion
The approach exceeded my expectations. The material is very powerful and provides rich and deep concepts and insights for the future.
Ahmad Waleed
Strategy Director, ELM Saudi Arabia
You lay out the material so well that we can easily internalize the approach. The model almost had a mind of its own, totally changing my understanding of our challenge.
Stephen Green
Director, Continental Mills
As used by ...
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MORE FOR LEADERS ...
A crash course on standard strategy methods for CEOs and senior leaders
You need to develop strategies for your organisation. But you either missed out on training for how to do that, or you need an update.
This course explains the key strategy methods needed to develop and manage a strategy for your business. (The course does not employ our "dynamics" method, but is consistent with it).
