Leadership Training Through Experiential History
Leadership Across the Board: Developing Talent & Tactics Through the Wisdom of Chess
Duration: Full Day
Instructor: David Maddox
Audience: Leaders wishing to broaden their influence and improve their strategic thinking.
It is the world’s game, enduring for over a thousand years and still as popular as ever- played in every corner of the globe by men and women, old and young, rich and poor. What accounts for this longevity? What does it still have to teach us? For leaders, the wisdom of this ancient game can give us insight into these essential skills:
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Each chess piece possesses a range of strengths and limitations. Members of our teams also share these characteristics. Chess teaches players how to maximize the strengths of their pieces while minimizing their limitations. These same lessons can be applied to leader’s efforts to develop and effectively use the talents of each member of their team.
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The chess board presents a transparent overview of the landscape, nothing is hidden. It takes solid strategy and strong tactics to defeat your opponent. Leaders can use the core strategies and tactics of chess to overcome the obstacles that they face in meeting their goals and protecting their core mission.
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Throughout history, chess has been used as tool to further agendas and communicate ideas. In both small groups and large nations, the game was used to influence strategic outcomes. Stories of these efforts create lessons for leaders that they can apply to their own challenges.
Presented using fast-paced, engaging team activities and compelling stories, Leadership Across the Board targets leaders at all levels and you don’t need to know anything about the game to fully participate! Want to be a better leader? The next move is yours.
Your Finest Hour: Leadership Lessons from the Apollo Space Program
Duration: Full Day
Instructor: David Maddox
Audience: Leaders who want to create visionary leadership at all levels of their organization.
What does it take to turn tragedy to triumph? How do you turn your worst day into your best? For the people of NASA, President Kennedy’s challenge in 1961 to put a man on the moon “before this decade is out” would test their minds, their hearts, and their nerves like never before. Achieving this goal would require incredible discipline, courage, knowledge, and resourcefulness. But in the unforgiving realm of space, disaster could strike quickly. The difference between success and failure would be measured in a fraction of a second.
What was once thought to be impossible became mankind’s greatest achievement. The essential element of that achievement was leadership. NASA’s leaders prepared their teams to take on any challenge. Their stories are amazing, the lessons are timeless.
Our own challenges aren’t all that different. Our wins and losses are often separated by the slightest margin. The difference is leadership. Are you prepared for the inevitable obstacles you will encounter? Will you and your team be at their best when nothing short of your best will suffice? Come find out what it takes to be ready when your hour comes.
Conquering the Unknown: Leadership Lessons from Lewis & Clark
Duration: Full Day
Instructor: David Maddox
Audience: New leaders or those who are considering the leadership path.
Before the members of the Lewis & Clark Expedition set off on their epic journey, they thought they were ready. These young, fit, adventurous, outdoorsmen thought they knew about rivers. They thought they knew about mountains. They thought they knew about bears. What they discovered can be best summed up in the words of Satchel Paige- “It’s not what we don’t know that hurts us, it’s what we know that just ain’t so”. Their success, their very survival, hinged on their ability to learn, unlearn and relearn.
The incredible story of the Corps of Discovery is a study of leadership in an unknown, ever-changing, new landscape.
How different is your own story? Are you prepared to lead and succeed through tough times? Do you have right skills, the right team? Can you tell the difference between a vision and a hallucination? Come find out.
The Saddest Affair: Leadership Failures at the Battle of the Crater
Duration: Half Day, with full-day battlefield tour option.
Instructor: David Maddox
Audience: Leaders looking to avoid complacency and stay focused on organizational goals and opportunities.
Missed opportunities rarely come around a second time. Chances for success should never be taken lightly, especially when the stakes are high.
That was the case in the summer of 1864, outside of Petersburg, Virginia. The Civil War was well into it’s third year and had turned into grueling trench warfare near this vital transportation hub, just 24 miles from the confederate capital of Richmond.
General Ulysses S. Grant and the Army of the Potomac had an opportunity to end the long siege and possibly the war. What happened instead was best described by Grant himself, who called it, “the saddest affair I have witnessed in the war”- a stunning disaster. How does a failure of this magnitude happen? The decisions made: comical, puzzling, and tragic, will astound you.
Sometimes on our leadership journey, we can learn more from failure than success. The formula for failure in this story in not unique to the war. Any of us could fall into it if we are careless and unaware.
Come put yourself in the shoes of these leaders and discover how their actions led to tragedy and how their lessons can help us avoid the dangers of our own workplace.
True Moral Courage : Leadership Lessons from Shackleton & The Endurance Expedition
Duration: Full or Half Day
Instructor: David Maddox
Audience: Leaders facing a quickly-changing landscape.
British explorer Ernest Shackleton’s plan to cross the continent of Antarctica was an ambitious and perilous undertaking. He and his team were confident of success, if everything went well. It didn’t. A voyage of discovery quickly became a terrifying battle for survival against time, the elements, and their own growing despair.
Shackleton knew they were on their own. If they were going to survive, they would need to maximize every available resource. It seemed like a losing proposition, but if anyone could pull it off, it was Shackleton, right?
Shackleton's ability to manage shrinking resources in a constantly changing environment and sustain crew morale are skills we still need today. How about you? Do you have the agility to lead a team through ever-changing situations? Do you have the emotional capacity to insure that your actions bring out the best in others? Come find out.
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