Cornell CXO Leadership Program

Thinking Strategically

The session helps in building strategies for competitive advantage and generating superior value for customers.

Takeaways: 

• Understand the components of an effective strategy
• Evaluate how an organization can respond successfully to change and devise appropriate strategies to do so
• Understand the core ideas underlying strategic planning processes
• Tesla case study to comprehend its business model

The Future Digital Dimensions

This session focuses on the best practices applicable to several product and service designs; business model transformation, and sales transformation templates to devise ideas for new products and services.

Takeaways: 

• Discover more about blockchain
• Tools to identify the best ideas for digital transformation
• Understand processes to create platform business models
• Understand metaverse, virtual reality and the future of tomorrow

Entrepreneurial Mindset

The session helps formulate business models and develop processes to maximize entrepreneurial abilities. It also helps you to adopt design thinking and innovation as a strategy in your organization and helps you apply design thinking frameworks and strategies to develop innovative solutions for complex business problems.

Takeaways: 

• Introduction to five stages of the design process
• Connect design and entrepreneurial thinking to innovation

Getting Things Done

This session is designed around a set of levers interleaved into a larger framework for ‘Getting Things Done. The framework will drive your performance by making your implicit skills explicit, and help you implement ideas back into your work world.

Takeaways: 

• A framework of simple but effective levers that have been shown to improve performance considerably
• This session has three goals: to make you more effective, to equip you to teach others to be more effective, and to give you a framework that will help you implement tools and concepts to get things done

Systems Thinking

In this session, you will learn to integrate systems thinking concepts, principles, and practices to improve existing processes, operations, and thinking patterns, ultimately developing a more three-dimensional mindset toward problem-solving.

Takeaways: 

• Learn about the DSRP model
• Understand mental models – What you think vs What is real
• Engage the ecosystem around you to generate new innovation possibilities
• Understand the relationships and systems that create new possibilities

Managing Complexity

The session helps gain insights into how the brain learns, how to learn more quickly, why we frequently make terrible judgments, and how to learn from both successes and failures. Learn to make more deliberate and informed decisions while potentially doubling your learning capacity.

Takeaways: 

• Learn how to systematically think back on your experiences and draw lessons from them
• Learn to manage the decision process rather than just the decision to add more value

Leading with Disruptive Innovation

This session takes you through an in-depth understanding of disruption, innovation, and disruptive innovation’s impact on business. Learn more about various methodologies and approaches in innovation and real-world use cases that provide deeper insights into the state of innovation and disruption today. Explore best practices in innovation, human-centric design, lean methodologies, and a multi-horizon portfolio approach to innovation.

Takeaways: 

• Key factors driving disruption
• Innovation engineering: Key principles
• Multi-Horizon portfolio approach to innovation strategy
• Looking forward: Industry 4.0 disruption – The next wave

Dynamics of Decision Making

The session helps to understand the importance of credibility. Learn through shared examples of leaders who created a better organizational culture by demonstrating credibility. Learn why we need to consider integrity as a personal discipline.

Takeaways: 

• Learn through real-life scenarios where our credibility will be tested
• Learn to manage your credibility to be more effective
• Understand the importance of leader integrity and its relation to organizational success

Emotional Intelligence

The session teaches you, new skills in reading others and framing your interactions more effectively. It also helps in becoming more adept at speaking to the mood around you.

Takeaways: 

• Measures to assess your emotional intelligence
• Learn techniques for managing and using emotions as a leadership tool

Social Intelligence

Learn to effectively navigate interactions with others, build trust, and engage with differences to achieve impactful outcomes that surpass individual capabilities. Participants will develop a deeper understanding of how others respond to their actions, gain insights into how others perceive them, and refine their responses in moments of difference. This enhanced awareness and skill in managing interpersonal dynamics will empower leaders to foster a more collaborative and innovative organizational environment.

Takeaways: 

• Understand the concept of social intelligence and its importance in leadership
• Learn about the key drivers and elements of Social Intelligence
• The session will provide insights into leading diverse teams, fostering an inclusive environment that leverages diverse perspectives for greater innovation and performance.

Power and Influence

The session helps in assessing social capital and enhancing it to achieve goals. It also teaches you the art and science of power and influence in organizations.

Takeaways: 

• Understand network density and how networks must be broad, connective and dynamic
• Understand the characteristics of influential leaders
• Importance of networking and how to leverage networks and influence authority

Communication and Story Telling

The session attempts to help you project confidence and competence when communicating at the workplace, by helping you gain better awareness of your communication behaviors that build or hinder leadership presence.

Takeaways: 

• 3 components of executive presence – Gravitas, Communication, and Appearance.
• 5Cs framework to project executive presence from the book ‘Composure’
• Learn the top 5 self-sabotaging behaviors that could affect one’s executive presence, non-verbal cues to avoid
• Understand the common narrative arc and tools for effective storytelling
• Translate key messages through sticky stories and communication

Advanced Negotiation Strategies

The session improves the negotiation abilities with the help of relevant tools, terminology, and practical negotiation tactics.

Takeaways: 

• Learn about negotiation vocabularies like BATNA, Reservation Price, Trip Wire, Bargaining Zone and Target
• Learn about the two dimensions of negotiation – the distribution and integration side (how to divide and expand the pie)
• Understand the concept of logrolling
• Create more situations where win-win is a possibility
• Manage your emotions more effectively in negotiation situations

Financial Acumen

The session helps in harnessing key financial strategies for success. Also, it helps in the use of financial frameworks to enhance investment choices.

Takeaways: 

• Margin vs turnover, Operating Leverage & Financial Leverage
• Understand how to evaluate capital investments; key cash flow concepts; decision making tools, payback period and its cut off rule
• Fundamentals of understanding the income statement & balance sheet, return on assets, sales revenue and net income
• Application of financial ratios, understanding the company’s financial position, performance, and prospects

Leading in Crisis

The session demonstrates how you as leaders must understand and counteract the impacts of the VUCA world to lead more effectively.

Takeaways: 

• Leading in a VUCA world
• How to continually evaluate, adjust and build an offensive mindset in the modern environment
• Demonstrating clear strategy and guidance to the organization
• Keep an eye on the future by Assessing; Adapting and Sustaining Momentum
• How to align systems processes and build the ability to communicate

Leading Innovation

The session focuses on the reasons and mechanisms why crisis causes you to resort to your most ingrained behaviors—behaviors that are the antithesis of innovation.

Takeaways: 

• Understand and eliminate barriers to innovation
• How to drive innovation in your organization