Final presentations are the perfect opportunity to learn how students' understanding of course concepts has evolved throughout the simulation experience.
Jordan Novak, Strategic Management Professor at DePaul University, noticed that while his students understood their company's strengths and weaknesses, they struggled to identify the opportunities and threats in the market. That's why he started probing teams with one specific question.
Watch Jordan explain his approach.
Hi everyone, my name is Jordan Novak. I've been teaching strategic management at Paul for a better part of a decade. I don't do corporate facilitation; I've been doing that for twice as long as that.
In my class, we have presentations at the very end, and I ask them one question. No matter what, I asked them, "Did you pivot? When did you pivot? Why did you pivot?" Everything around that.
In my class, students go through eight competition rounds, and their understanding of strategy is drastically evolved over the time. That's why I asked that question about a pivot. I have them connect that theory to practice. They struggle with it. I find that students really have these blinders on; they have tunnel vision.
They're great at understanding their company's strengths and weaknesses, recognizing opportunities and threats that are available to everyone else. That's where they struggle. When we talk about the theory of it, I use Fang companies. I like Netflix as an example because they have really clear pivot points, and all my students know Netflix really well. They started as a company shipping DVDs and they pivoted to offering streaming services. Then, they pivoted yet again because they couldn't license everyone else's content; they had to create their own and stay competitive. So, talking about those pivot moments with a large company like Netflix, where they get those concepts, they can start to find those opportunities to plug it into the simulation themselves. For me, it comes up in two classic ways.
One, the mass exodus example. Students are rushing out of certain segments, and also, it creates a vacuum of opportunity out there. Do students pivot and seize that opportunity? The other example is when students set out to be that broad differentiator. They want to make premium products; they want to be the Apples of the world or whoever. A couple of years progress, and they realize, "Wow, I did not differentiate at all; still broad, but my products are poorly positioned." This is another one of those pivot opportunities. You can quickly go from being a broad differentiator to a broad cost leader. All they need to do is start implementing those cost-leading tactics, even if they don't recognize the opportunity upfront, or if we have to get to a hindsight moment during the presentations.
This is where I always ask students at the end of their presentation, "Did you pivot? Why? Why not?" This question is broader than just to the presenting students; it's the entire classroom about this. "Did this team pivot? When should they have pivoted?" That's when I get the flurry of shuffling papers. Students are going back to different reports, different rounds, looking at the information, and they have to realize, "Wow, like I can't just think about my company; let's look at it from their perspective." It's a great little case at the end of the course.
I encourage you to give that pivot question a try, and if not the pivot question, find something that's central to your course and ask them a question on that. Connect the dots for them at the very end. It really sparks that light bulb moment in students and creates a great discussion in the class, and it's always ended on a high note.