For many business professionals adapting to the new normal, the sense of time has changed dramatically. There are still many days stuck together where Monday is Tuesday and Tuesday morphs into Thursday with the only real way of telling the date and time is to keep a calendar open on your desktop.

I think I shocked the participants of the high-potential leader program I was leading this week. “Rob, what is the most important Business Acumen Skill we will need going into 2022?” was the question in the virtual classroom. I am sure they were thinking I would answer something related to strategy, competitive analysis, or ways to drive increased shareholder value.

My answer, better forecasting skills, isn’t as sexy but in actuality contains all of the above in the impact it makes. You can only execute your strategy, understand your competition, and make the best decisions to drive shareholder value if you are forecasting well and effectively.

Over the past several weeks, Advantexe has conducted 14 virtual learning programs for 393 participants.  The topic areas have included Business Acumen, Business Leadership, and Strategic Business Selling.

Mistakes happen. Everyone makes them. From the best athletes in the world who spend 6 hours a day training, to the CEOs of the most successful companies like Apple, Tesla, Amazon, and many others. 

One of the core mantras of leadership development is to encourage people to make and learn from mistakes. Much of the modern thinking around leadership, change, disruption, and the “new normal” is about creating an environment and culture of innovation where mistakes are encouraged, and key learnings embraced. Like many entrepreneurs, Mark Zuckerberg believes, “Don’t even bother avoiding making mistakes, because you’re going to make tons of mistakes and the important thing is to learn quickly from the mistakes you make and not give up.”

The high intensity of delivering ten 4-hour virtual connections over a two-week period to 56 participants working remotely and in offices throughout Europe and Asia at 2:30 AM eastern time felt vaguely familiar.

At some point during the 4^th and final round of the customized business simulation, when participants were figuring out their final attempts to execute their business strategy and maximize their Enterprise Value, I heard in my head the voice of my favorite Peloton instructor (Sam Yo) say, “This is where it gets sticky and you are going to get a little breathless. If you can, and you know you should, raise the resistance by 1-3.”

And so, the participants did. The teams, running their own global manufacturing business gave it everything they had by analyzing the markets, assessing their competitors, and making their decisions in pricing, marketing, manufacturing, supply chain, and finance. And we (participants and me the instructor) were all breathless when the intense workout was over.