Strategic Thinking Skills

By: Stanley K. Ridgley, The Great Courses

Narrated by: Stanley K. Ridgley

Start making savvier decisions and outsmart your competitors with greater confidence and ease with this simple and comprehensive guide to the skills, tactics, techniques, tools, case studies, and lessons behind strategic thinking. Professor Ridgley has crafted these 24 lectures as an accessible way to engage with thinking that will help you think-and act-more strategically in business and in your own life, whether you're the CEO of a Fortune 500 company or you're preparing to embark on a new career path.

These lectures are loosely organized around several key topics central to effective strategic thinking, including: principles of conflict (in which you'll follow the development of strategic theory from its roots in great military campaigns to its modern applications in business); competitive intelligence (which plays an increasingly important role in strategic thinking); and tools of strategy and analysis (which can aid your understanding of the forces that shape our future and can help you make sense of a rapidly changing world).

Central to these lectures are the tools and tricks that strategic thinkers have used to better approach problems and seek lasting solutions. Among those you'll learn how to use are the indirect approach (which offers you a much greater utility in achieving your objectives without approaching your opponent head-on); the value chain (a method that divides your team or organization into its value - producing activities so you can better inform yourself on its internal strengths and weaknesses; and the four actions framework (in which you ask yourself four questions to challenge your established logic in an effort to gain a stronger competitive advantage).

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2012 The Teaching Company, LLC (P)2012 The Great Courses

Strategic aspects to be considered when thinking

Where does Strategic Thinking Skills rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

in between the 20 first books

What was one of the most memorable moments of Strategic Thinking Skills?

The scenary and systemic thinking

Have you listened to any of Professor Stanley K. Ridgley’s other performances before? How does this one compare?

not yet

What’s an idea from the book that you will remember?

Intuition

Any additional comments?

It has an analitycal perspective of the different aspects involved in a strategy and how to think through it

Applying warfare to life

This book offers a completely different way to go about strategizing everything in life from relationships to careers from the mindset of some of the most influential and impactful people throughout history. I would recommend this lecture to anyone looking to reorder their life in a way that promotes consistent growth and success.

good info

good examples and inclusive ideas. Biased toward military but have experienced both Mil and Corporate. Therefore agree with bias.

Engaging

Good book on developing a strategical mind told through stories with good ways to improve strategy in your life.

want others in the series and by author

you should check this out if you have an interest in learning strategies at your job and personal advancement. Professor is knowledgeable and gives examples of strategies and people who used them.

I enjoyed it.

I listened to it while working to motivate and educate myself and found myself stopping and repeating quite a few points.

Good stuff!

Good information. I wish that more companies would actually do the things mentioned in this book and that lower level employees could have more opportunity to participate.

Good listen

Good summary on strategy for the beginner. Did a good job tying military history to corporate scenarios. Definitely worth a listen.

Very engaging and educational

An engaging listen with great applications to a variety of experiences. Used a few too many war examples for my liking but enough examples overall to teach and entertain.

Great topic and good content

I wanted a good overview on strategic thinking to prepare me for a strategy class I'm planning to take. This book delivered that. I like how the content was divided into theory, examples and application.