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AQX Law Firm: Product Strategy and What’s Ahead

Anaqua

At Anaqua, client-led innovation and product strategy have been part of our DNA since our founding. Client groups involved in Anaqua’s product development approach include: an Executive Council which defines Anaqua’s 3- to 5-year product strategy, a Steering Group which outlines the roadmap for the next 12 months and Working Groups which comprise of clients who focus on specific IP product topics to develop requirements, validate solutions, and define best practices.

Roadmap 40
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A 5-Level Collaboration Strategy Approach

BrainZooming

We’ve written about the importance of signaling collaboration strategy preferences when you and team members are working remotely. Talking with someone who is struggling with identifying the best ways to signal the appropriate collaboration strategy approash, we hit on a variation on the Sergio Zyman decision levels. A 5-Level Collaboration Strategy Approach. C – The leader and team will collaborate from scratch to figure it out.

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Community Collaboration Workshops Come in All Sizes

BrainZooming

The week included: Large scale community collaboration workshops – Nearly eighty students from Southern Illinois University-Carbondale gathered Monday night and a comparable number of Carbondale, IL residents assembled on Tuesday for community collaboration workshops to imagine the community’s future with Gigabit Internet capabilities. Switching among so many ways we facilitate community collaboration and learning for organizations keeps us at the top of our game.

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Setting Industry Benchmarks Through Client Collaboration

Anaqua

Anaqua is taking us into the next generation of IP management with new levels of collaboration and productivity.” – Heidi Martinez, Chief IP Counsel and Associate General Counsel, Xerox Corporation. They defined a new class of enterprise software and set the stage for a company culture that empowers its clients with direct influence on product development. Simply put, if it is not in our clients’ best interest, then it is not in our product roadmap.

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15 Things to Look for in a Business Collaboration

BrainZooming

I mentioned upcoming business collaboration opportunities for Brainzooming yesterday , including co-presentations, creating content, and developing new workshop and training offerings. What to look for in a business collaboration? Shame on me, but I’ve never put the criteria I look for from a business collaboration into the type of strategic decision making tool we develop for clients. There is a mutual commitment to learning from the business collaboration.

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41 Surprising Things about Community Collaboration Done Well

BrainZooming

In nearly every Brainzooming community collaboration workshop, we conclude with a Plus-Minus-Interesting-Recommendation-Question exercise (a PMIRQ for short). Based on the large number of responses to the individual PMIRQ handout sheets at the Southern Illinois University and Carbondale, IL community visioning session workshops, we wanted to share what people found “interesting” about participating in a community collaboration workshop. Small unknown group collaboration”.

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4 Vital Characteristics of Collaborative Strategy Leaders

BrainZooming

What leadership skills are necessary to successfully champion a collaborative strategy ? A client fully immersed in developing and implementing a collaborative strategy asked that question. Since we’re involved at the heart of driving the process to develop a collaborative strategy, we navigate our way through the development process based on an organization’s specific culture enablers and quirks. 4 Vital Characteristics of Collaborative Strategy Leaders.

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5 Things Collaborative Strategic Planning Isn’t

BrainZooming

If you’ve been a Brainzooming reader for any length of time, you know we’re huge proponents of collaborative strategic planning. Collaborative planning implies a process that goes beyond the board room to include individuals throughout the organization in meaningful ways to provide insights and input to shape organizational strategy. Admittedly, collaborative planning processes aren’t all that common. 5 Things Collaborative Strategic Planning Isn’t.

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Team Collaboration – 14 Benefits from Pre-Meeting Outreach

BrainZooming

Learning what participants in an upcoming big meeting know, think, and believe before they come together in a large group is one tactic to strengthen team collaboration. 14 Team Collaboration Benefits from Pre-Meeting Outreach. Depending on the nature of the pre-meeting outreach you conduct with participants, it can promote team collaboration and help: Get to know participants better and figure out how to best work with them. In the new Brainzooming strategy eBook 321 GO! ,

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Strategic Planning – 3 Surprising Ways Online Collaboration Works

BrainZooming

When discussing a strategic planning or innovation strategy engagement with a client, we use the graphic below to design our recommended approach. We’re increasingly incorporating online collaboration workshops ( which we call Zoomferences ) to do more of the work typically done through in-person visioning workshops. Sometimes they proceed an in-person strategy planning meeting, but not always. 3 Ways Online Collaboration Works to Deliver Big Benefits.

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The Best Time to Engage Your Audience in Collaborative Strategic Planning

BrainZooming

Talking with one city’s representatives about strategies to sell-in a broadband recommendation with voters, they asked whether it is okay to engage its citizens after city leadership develops a recommendation. Engage your audience in collaborative strategic planning earlier than later. If you engage your audience early in the collaborative strategic planning process, you can make a legitimate claim to creating a collaborative vision.

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7 Collaborative Strategic Planning Process Impacts (Even if the Plan Sits on the Shelf)

BrainZooming

Talking to executives, you hear the expectation that an organization should implement a solid strategic plan strategy-by-strategy. 7 Collaborative Strategic Planning Process Impacts (Even if the Plan Sits on the Shelf). When you develop a plan from a collaborative, conversationally-driven strategy planning process , you see other tangible impacts. Looking at this list, you can see why we place such an emphasis on using a collaborative strategic planning process.

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3 Vital Employee Engagement Strategies for Winning Ideas

BrainZooming

One reveals an important lesson as you develop employee engagement strategies. 3 Vital Employee Engagement Strategies for Winning Ideas. The obvious lesson relative to employee engagement strategies is simple: Listen to, consider, and act on smart ideas from team members.

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Strategic Thinking Exercise – A SWOT Analysis to Push Thinking

BrainZooming

Yesterday’s post on using a new type of SWOT analysis to stimulate bolder strategic conversations in strategy meetings garnered quite a bit of attention. This helps a group inside of a strategy meeting work harder and more effectively to generate ideas. What are WEAKNESSES relative to: Delivering the product attributes and performance most important to customer s? Need to get your strategy developed quickly? Faster Strategy through Collaboration.

Analysis 102
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Abruptly Halting the Cluster F%@k of Business Meetings

BrainZooming

The thing is, there’s a different way to structure business meetings to help a group come together and collaborate in an innovative, productive way. We create these types of radically different (and beneficial) business meetings for clients , in large part, by bringing together the right people in the right settings with the right structure to allow them to be productive and successful participants. Actively engage more employees in strategy AND implementation success.

Meeting 73
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Strategic Thinking Exercise – Use a New SWOT Nobody Expects

BrainZooming

Going into a strategy meeting today that is sure to be a snoozer ? Even if you are going into the meeting with the same old people , the same old topics, and the same old expectations to just get a strategy done and put into a notebook on a shelf so you can go back to doing what you’ve always been doing, there is hope! Go into your next strategy meeting with a different spin on this important, yet tired old strategic thinking exercise.

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Leadership Skills – 8 Ways to Fake It Until You Make It

BrainZooming

Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders are looking for powerful ways to engage strong collaborators to shape shared visions. They need strategic thinkers who can develop strategy and turn it into results. This new Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons for leaders to increase strategic collaboration, engagement, and create improved results.

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113 Ideas for Strategic Planning Process Improvement

BrainZooming

To make it a little easier to track down ideas for how you can approach developing strategy this year, here are nineteen Brainzooming articles filled with 113 techniques and ideas for improving your organization’s strategic planning process. 4 Ways to Make a Strategic Planning Process Productive. 10 Signs of a Strategy Planning Meeting Nightmare. 11 Boring Details for Making Strategy Planning Fun. 9 Strategic Thinking Questions – Helping Teams Execute Strategy.

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Who Should Facilitate Strategic Planning? 10 Vital Characteristics

BrainZooming

Relative to the personal side of strategic planning facilitation, here are ten characteristics to look for in the person facilitating group collaboration-oriented strategic planning for your organization: Strong listening skills – to entire interactions and to bits and pieces of interactions, to what is being said and what isn’t being said. 10 Keys to Involving Employees In Your Strategy. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use.

Groups 96
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Strategic Visioning Exercises – 14 Articles for Creating a Vision Statement

BrainZooming

And by done well, we mean that the vision statement: Is developed broadly and collaboratively. Collaborating on a Vision Statement. Strategic Planning – All the Strategy Roles You Need. Strategic Visioning Exercises – Group Collaboration the Right Way. Creating Change and Change Management – 4 Strategy Options. 5 Questions for Creating a Collaborative Vision. Actively engage more employees in strategy AND implementation success.

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Creativity in Business – 48 Creative Appreciation Ideas

BrainZooming

People who collaborated for the first time. An idea aligning with the company strategy. Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders are looking for powerful ways to engage strong collaborators to shape shared visions. They need strategic thinkers who can develop strategy and turn it into results. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use. Actively engage stakeholders in strategy AND implementation success.

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7 Organizational Harmony Principles from Dayton Moore

BrainZooming

This Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons leaders can use to boost collaboration, meaningful strategic conversations, and results. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use. Actively engage stakeholders in strategy AND implementation success. Brainzooming - All Posts Collaboration Communication Implementation Performance Strategic Thinking Tools leaders

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12 Resources to Lead a Strategic Planning Process When You’re New

BrainZooming

Someone downloaded a free Brainzooming strategy eBook, noting his biggest strategy challenge is “how to do a strategic planning process when you are new.” While leading strategy development in a new company poses challenges (including needing to learn a tremendous amount as you go), it has a comparable number of advantages (Including not laboring under preconceived ideas about how the organization does things). Four Must-Know Ways to Read a Strategy Document.

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Strategic Objectives – 3 Questions to Decide What’s Strategic

BrainZooming

We are working with a client to develop a content marketing strategy for multiple business units in the organization. With that information, we will be in a strong position to identify a content marketing strategy specific to each business unit’s needs. Brainzooming - All Posts Collaboration Strategic Planning Strategic Thinking Strategy Tools strategic initiatives strategic objectives

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Employee Engagement Strategies – Pigs, Chickens, and What Great Leaders Do

BrainZooming

The thing is, unsuccessful employee engagement strategies are not an employee problem. It is a LEADERSHIP problem when purported employee engagement strategies are not working. We see great leaders among our clients successfully taking steps that meaningfully involve employees in shaping strategy and implementation. If you want to go deeper on a viable strategy to improve employee engagement, download our Results eBook.

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Innovation Strategy – Here, There, and Everywhere

BrainZooming

While there’s more to come in the months ahead, here are highlights of a couple of innovation strategy presentations this week to very different groups. Innovation Strategy in Your Organization – An Innovative Workplace Culture. Innovation Strategy across a Community – Forward to the Future. On Monday, I discussed the community collaboration process we facilitated for Carbondale, IL in September 2015.

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9 Strategic Thinking Questions – Helping Teams Execute Strategy

BrainZooming

Many organizations are in the early stages of executing new strategies for this year. That is when you discover whether you have a solid, implementable plan or something that (maybe) looks good on paper, but doesn’t work well when you try to execute the strategy. 9 Strategic Thinking Questions for Helping Teams Execute Strategy. Do you personally believe in the strategy? Were serious, strategic people involved in creating the strategy?

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Branding Strategy – 3 Keys to Engaging Your Internal Brand Team

BrainZooming

I’ll be presenting a Brainzooming workshop on internal branding strategy at the Brand Strategy Conference in New York, April 6-8. The workshop, while drawing on material from my Fortune 500 work, springs from multiple conversations at the 2015 Brand Strategy Conference. The discussions focused on when employees should be brought into branding strategy decisions. Download Your Free Internal Branding Strategy eBook!

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Creative Thinking Skills – Protecting Yourself from Creative Thinking Challenges

BrainZooming

Creating Strategic Impact” Senior executives are looking for employees who are strong collaborators and communicators while being creative and flexible. In short they need strategic thinkers who can develop strategy and turn it into results. This new Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons for senior executives to increase strategic collaboration, employee engagement, and grow revenues for their organizations.

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Strategic Planning Exercises – Two Types of Structure, One Works

BrainZooming

You can provide people with strategic thinking exercises, creative thinking tools, strategy questions, and ways to collaborate with one another, using structure to help imagine better strategies. This means there is no opportunity for productive collaboration to devise the plan. Productive Structure for Strategic Planning Exercises. After this strategic collaboration, a full-time strategic planner (i.e.,

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9 Strategic Thinking Questions to Start Strategic Conversations

BrainZooming

Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders need high-impact ways to develop employees that can provide input into strategy and then turn it into results. This Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons leaders can use to boost collaboration, meaningful strategic conversations, and results. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use.

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Leadership Training – Walmart Hopes for Big Impact

BrainZooming

That does not mean everyone determines and forms strategy. Instead of simply knowing something is working or not, strategic frontline employees can provide valuable feedback on early warning signs when strategy that appears fantastic in the boardroom is not working in the field. Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders are looking for powerful ways to engage strong collaborators to shape shared visions. Actively engage stakeholders in strategy AND implementation success.

Training 100
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Creative Thinking Skills – 9 Fundamentals to Turn Talk into Strategy

BrainZooming

The challenge in a client meeting was developing the strategy for a later meeting intended to build support for a biennial community event. The team leader asked, “How is it possible to listen to us talk and turn it into a strategy so quickly?”. 9 Creative Thinking Skills to Turn Talk into Strategy. Listen for smart things people say , even if they are snippets, and incorporate those right away into the strategy.

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Strategic Thinking – Job Descriptions Don’t Define Innovation Potential

BrainZooming

This Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons leaders can use to boost collaboration, meaningful strategic conversations, and results. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use. Actively engage stakeholders in strategy AND implementation success. We were working with a team responsible for a highly focused internal process that includes a customer-facing aspect.

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12 Questions to Jump Start Your Strategic Planning Process

BrainZooming

If you need help to speed up the process, actively involve more employees, or make planning more productive than it has been in the past, contact us. 10 Keys to Involving Employees In Your Strategy. Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders need high-impact ways to develop employees that can provide input into strategy that turns into results. Increase focus for your team with productive strategy questions everyone can use.

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5 Ideas for Simplified Strategic Planning this Year

BrainZooming

Prioritize the time you invest in creating specific product/service marketing plans based on each one’s expected contribution to revenue and profit growth. Look at how many strategies and tactics you actually implemented this year, and use that as the threshold for how deeply detailed your plan for next year should be. If you have a bunch of unimplemented strategies and tactics for this year that are still sound, simply use those for next year’s plan.

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Strategic Thinking Exercises – 3 Responses to New Ideas

BrainZooming

Since all the companies competed with one another, each one needed to determine its own business strategies. And if it’s bad, use other strategic thinking exercises to gently bring the ideas back to something smarter and more productive. – Mike Brown. This Brainzooming mini-book, “Results – Creating Strategic Impact” unveils ten proven lessons leaders can use to boost collaboration, meaningful strategic conversations, and results.

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5 Keys to Streamlining Strategic Planning

BrainZooming

Most executives can’t write a strategy plan, so don’t make them. Since strategy planning is an infrequent activity, it is difficult for executives to master it. We learned that if we asked executives a series of questions leading to the information needed to complete a strategy plan, they became productive strategy planners. Strategy Implication: Remove the tedious aspects of strategy planning, replacing them with efficient alternative approaches.

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11 Boring Details for Making Strategic Planning Fun*

BrainZooming

And the asterisk on fun acknowledges we’re stretching the definition of fun to cover things nerdy strategic planners think are fun such as “mental stimulation,” “highly collaborative groups,” and “people that want to be involved in strategic planning the next time it happens.”. Creating Strategic Impact” Leaders need high-impact ways to develop employees that can provide input into strategy and then turn it into results.

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 4 Ways to Make a Strategic Planning Process Productive

BrainZooming

4 Ways to Make a Strategic Planning Process Productive. What can you do to make strategic planning more productive before, during, and after? Instead of requiring people complete complex strategic planning templates unrelated to daily business, we use productive interactions to change the strategic planning process from completing complex forms into conversations, events, and experiences people engage in and learn from as they participate.

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5 Keys to Engaging Employees in Innovation Strategy – Our Buy-In Manifesto

BrainZooming

Reviewing the innovation strategy challenges business executives identified when downloading Brainzooming eBooks , they frequently mention gaining “buy-in” for significant change initiatives. There are so many ways to botch involving employees (and community members, if that’s your audience) in developing and successfully implementing an innovation strategy. Here are five keys we’ve found for successfully engaging employees in innovation strategy.

eBook 66
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Strategic Thinking Exercises – 11 Things Running through a Facilitator’s Head

BrainZooming

We facilitated a two-day innovation strategy workshop for an industrial company. The company wants to make significant changes to a major production process. During the innovation strategy discussions, we addressed the production process changes from five different perspectives. In each of the five mini-innovation strategy workshops, we had a group of core team members, plus people familiar with each perspective.

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9 Ideas on How to Involve a Team in Group Strategy Exercises

BrainZooming

Whenever possible, we try to help clients select a mix of people to participate in group strategy exercises. We are also proponents for reaching beyond familiar people that are always involved strategic planning meetings and drive the outcomes of group strategy exercises. 9 Ideas on How to Involve a Team in Group Strategy Exercises. Turn strategy into a game and let the team assign roles to specific team members.