Selling Yourself and Your Ideas (LDEVX-477-0)
It’s been said that humans are “meaning making machines.†More than 70,000 years ago, near the outset of the Cognitive Revolution, we created language to help protect and organizeourselves.1Over the ensuing millennia, we have developed myriad ways to communicate with each other. Present day, our communications take many forms, and so we find ourselves in conversations, meetings, presentations, and even as producers on social media. As business leaders, we move through these many forms of communication in the course of a week, and indeed we can even traverse each of them within one day.
At no time in history have interpersonal communication skills been as important as they are today. In the Agrarian Age, a farmer who ploughed the field a little better than their neighbors could not acquire significantly more wealth. In the Industrial Age, a factory worker who assembled widgets a little faster than the person next to them could not acquire significantly more wealth. Today, anyone, anywhere in the world, who is a little better at expressing their ideas can see a sudden, massive increase in wealth that is unprecedented in human history.
In the 21st-century knowledge economy, you are only as valuable as your ideas. Says Gallo, “The ability to convince others that your ideas matter is the single greatest skill that will give you a competitive edge at a time when the combined forces of globalization, automation, and artificial intelligence trigger a wave of anxiety across every profession in every country. In the next decade, your ideas-and the ability to articulate those ideas successfully-will count more than ever. Persuaders are irreplaceable."
Selling Yourself & Your Ideas is a course that will force you out of your comfort zone to help you develop the knowledge, skills, and disciplines you need to be a powerful and influential communicator, no matter the situation in which you find yourself.
Global Initiatives in Management (GIM) (INTLX-473-0)
Energy, Development and Climate Change:
"Electricity is a critical element of industrialized life—perhaps the most critical. Without it, nothing else works. Water, sanitation, food, healthcare, education, entertainment: without power these activities grind to a halt.
There are roughly 1.5 billion global citizens who have no electricity at all. There are another couple of billion whose access is inadequate. There is a strong relationship between energy usage and economic well-being. Reliable, cost-effective electricity is widely seen as a necessary precursor to economic development.
In the OECD—the coalition of 36, mainly Western, developed economies—per capita electricity consumption is around 8,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year. By contrast, in North Africa, this figure is closer to 1,600 kWh per year. And in sub-Saharan Africa, the average is a mere 500 kWh/year. These stark differences are mirrored by similar gaps in per capita GDP and income.
By 2050, the world is expected to need about twice the total energy we now consume. Almost all this growth is expected to take place in developing economies, and for this development to occur, electricity supply will need to be vastly expanded. In the past couple of decades, the economy of China has roared ahead. Chinese GDP and income per capita have grown, along with a vast expansion of energy supply, much of it in the form of electric power. Many developing nations aspire to follow the Chinese path.
A different drama is playing out in the developed world, but one that has implications for developing economies.
Electricity markets in the developed world are in the midst of a transformation that began in the late 1970s. At that time, nations and states began to change the ways in which electricity markets are structured and regulated, with the goal of increasing competition and reducing monopoly. Technology has evolved, and the development and deployment of new supply-side technologies (including renewables) is also a main driver of transformation. Innovations on the demand-side, such as energy efficiency, demand management, energy storage, and “smart†technologies, are also key agents of change. Finally, environmental regulations have altered the landscape, and efforts to reduce man-made greenhouse gas emissions have moved to center stage in the global political theater.
The most aggressive deployment of renewable energy has occurred in the developed world, best exemplified by Germany and several US states, including California and Texas. In the same vein, the most aggressive policies aimed at reducing emissions linked to climate change have also emanated from the developed West. There is often an explicit link assumed between these initiatives. Renewable energy is assumed to equal climate mitigation. There is also an assumption that international economic development must occur in a way that does not adversely affect global climate. In fact, there are advocates would argue that energy options for developing nations should be restricted to wind, solar and storage.
There is tension between the behavior and policy objectives of the wealthy west and the poorer, developing world; one of the key objectives of this course will be to better understand the dimensions of this tension.
We will visit two African countries to better understand the electricity-development-climate nexus.
Morocco, the westernmost country in North Africa is mainly reliant on fossil-fuel for electricity production,
Entrepreneurial Selling (ENTRX-454-0)
"Selling is a life skill. Revenue is a daily pursuit. Do you currently have what it takes to succeed in selling and revenue-generation? Are you willing to embrace the role as ""Owner of Your Business"" no matter what that means in your current context?
This course is designed as an adventure of discovery. You will be pushed out of your comfort zone as we move through a series of discussions and practice that will leave no room for guessing regarding your potential for impact. Whether or not you are directly tied in to the sales function of your business, you will be taught the daily expert moves that lead to magnetic sales interactions and will leave the course with a path forward for mastering these moves and bringing them to your company.
Whether you manage a multi-national company or are venturing out on your own, you can’t afford to waste time guessing at foundational habits. Starting at the individual level, you will begin activating high-performance habits that allow for immediate implementation and impact. The transformation will continue as you learn what it takes to widen the scope, and shift your mindset, to embed new practices within every client and team-member interaction – driving to objectively positive results.
The work we do in Entrepreneurial Selling: Own Your Business will serve you, your clients, and your team. Andrew Sykes and Craig Wortmann built this course specifically with you in mind and they can’t wait to get started and see what you do once you take it beyond the classroom.
Who should be taking the course: Revenue-responsible leaders, Managers of Sales Operations and Teams, Managers responsible for Growth, Entrepreneurs, Prospective Entrepreneurs"