Strategy and Business Magazine has just published an excellent in-depth article "The Dueling Myths of Business" based on the work of scenario planning expert Betty Sue Flowers who worked with Royal Dutch Shell PLC and the world of big government where she helped draft many influential scenario planning reports.

Carlton Reeve has written an excellent series of five articles in Play with Learning which compares and contrasts the 5 main theories of learning (Behaviourism, Cognitivism, Constructivist, Experientialism and Social Learning) which underpin personal learning. Carlton also identifies different computer games founded on each theory. I have produced a short synopsis here with links to the 5 original articles which are well worth studying.

Each of these 5 theories (or modes) has its place in learning. In fact the most effective learning will likely contain some element of each mode. For example, this blending of learning modes is used in our portfolio of Business Simulation Games to develop highly effective Leadership and Management skills when combined with facilitation and learning in teams.

Gamification, the use of game play mechanics for non-game applications, is a very topical area with many enterprises exploring how they might use it to generate new levels of engagement with their staff or customers (current and prospective). In this article I review some popular gamification approaches/techniques and provide a reading list for further study. I cover 4 key aspects of Gamification: Objectives, Frameworks, Building Blocks and Implementation Risks/Mitigations.

There are about half a dozen basic dilemma stereotypes which underpin almost all of the operational and strategic issues which challenge leaders today. These are so prevalent and pervasive I call them the META DILEMMAS because they are present in virtually every leadership situation.

I develop custom business games for team-based experiential learning workshops which usually have a significant computer element. This whole area is strewn with pitfalls, good intentions and misconceptions and there is a huge risk that the game becomes too complex or an end in itself or the graphical aspect of the user interface becomes all consuming at the expense of the learning.

One of the challenges for teams is that the achievement of some of their goals are not fully under their own control - they need to be achieved in partnership with, or even in spite of, external parties (stakeholders) who are working to their own agendas and priorities. The Stakeholder Collaboration Game allows teams to simulate increasingly complex scenarios involving multiple goals and multiple stakeholders.

A serial bank robber was once asked why he robbed banks? He replied "because that's where the money is!" Why have I developed a new discipline called Process Physics? Same answer - because that's where the money is (in a process). "Process Physics" is the discipline of using mathematical process models in conjunction with simulation technology to spot the "money left on the table" in any business processes . My new screencast provides a short hands-on introduction.

Sometimes the most obvious business process improvements are totally overlooked and the 'no-brainer' process improvements we confidently implement only make things worse. In today's challenging economic climate understanding the hidden physics of your enterprise's business processes could be the trick which delivers timely and significant performance improvement in your key revenue generation processes.

The huge interest in Serious Games, where gaming technology is used for serious or business purposes, has made it feasible for far-sighted organizations to gain enduring competitive advantage by creating their own business simulation labs to regularly present their senior teams with possible future business scenarios to improve decision-making and to allow the big mistakes to happen in the simulator and not in the business. My new white paper explains how.

I am sharing my set of powerful web-based interactive business simulations with their real-time graphs, dashboards, sliders, guages and avatars. I developed these over a number of years using the excellent ithink simulation environment as essential tools to support what-if analysis, management learning games, experiential learning, balanced business scorecards and scenario planning.

What is the best way to introduce bioteaming into any organization or network? I recommend an Experiential Learning approach which allows you to evolve your own unique take on bioteaming which takes full advantage of the hidden learning and experiences you and your organization already have about 'natural teams'.