Leadership Institute

Thunderbolt Thinking®: Building an Innovative Workplace

Learning Formats: Classroom

Order No. SRTT

Generating innovative ideas and solutions doesn’t have to be haphazard. Company success and survival depend on employees who can think about and address issues.

Thunderbolt Thinking® teaches leaders to use proven techniques to build a workplace that sparks and fosters innovation.

Do You Face Any of These Issues?

  • Do work groups have trouble coming up with ideas for solving problems?
  • Are leaders open to new approaches and suggestions that break from tradition?
  • Does “the talk” of thinking outside the box match “the walk”?

Performance Objectives

Helps leaders:

  • Implement the three stages involved in building an innovative workplace.
  • Develop strategies for managing an effective thinking process and fostering innovation.
  • Apply Thunderbolt Thinking® to ensure successful individual and team results.
  • Use flexibility, awareness, courage, humor, and action to develop new possibilities that break with tradition.
  • Bring new insights to decision making by applying innovative thinking tools and techniques.

Primary Competency Developed

  • Innovation

Secondary Competencies Developed

  • Decision Making
  • Facilitating Change

Course Overview

  • Preparation -- The Theory Behind Being Effective: Learners are introduced to the Thunderbolt Thinking®concept and discuss barriers to innovative thinking. The facilitator next explains the three stages of building an innovative workplace. Leaders discover the Lucky 13 strategies and select one to focus on in the preparation stage. Learners review creativity, analysis, and innovation and develop how-to actions to help them prepare work groups for the innovative thinking process.
  • Practice -- Becoming More Effective: The value of practice in the innovative thinking process is shown. Each leader again identifies a Lucky 13 strategy on which to focus, and they learn the Thunderbolt Thinking® model. The “Master the Conversation” step shows a way to leverage creative and analytical skills. Activities highlight the value of techniques to build work groups’ innovative thinking skills. Leaders develop how-to actions for creating practice opportunities for their work groups.
  • Performance -- Leadership That Leads to Innovation: Leaders choose a final Lucky 13 strategy on which to focus. They explore benefits and rationale of meetings as a starting place. They also design approaches to transform meetings into “communities for thinking.” Through action planning, leaders discover ways to build Thunderbolt Spirit.

Video Segment Summaries

  • No video.

Course Details

  • Target audience: Frontline leaders to mid-level managers.
  • Course length: 6 hours, or 3 hours, 30 minutes Fast Track.
  • Facilitator certification: DDI-certified facilitator required.
  • Prerequisites: None.
  • Series: Suitable for all environments.
  • Group size: 8 to 16 people.
  • Prework: No.

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