Discovery Leadership Masterclass Series with Frank Adu Anim: Value creation (2)

• Published date: 10 February 2023
• Publication title: Business and Financial Times

Business people make countless decisions every day. Some are good decisions that move the business forward towards value creation. Others are poor decisions that hurt the business and reduce its value. To rethink value creation is to develop the leadership mindset to create an environment that supports and improves decision-making. Leaders with critical thinking abilities are open-minded and can effectively engage in problem-solving and understand the important use of quality information to inform business decisions.

Peculiar to today’s business environment is the conflicting variables of discontinuity and disruptions. Dealing with these non-financial factors increasingly plays a critical role in value creation. What’s needed is a new enterprise value approach in which organisations balance decision-making within a broader construct of how to exchange value with all stakeholders through critical thinking. A new continuous value creation process enables organisations to listen, assess, act, measure, adjust and evolve their decisions to create sustainable long-term value and impact.

Meanwhile, the increasing demand to foster critical thinking in our corporate space in order to enhance value creation is no doubt a critical issue of business concern. This is because the innovativeness of creative thinking aids implementation of a new knowledge that supports good decision-making and eventually value creation. Creative thinking is central to the innovative drive – the determinant factor for sustainable organisational competitiveness.

Although critical thinking improves efficiency, effectiveness and the ability to compete for value creation within organisations, it is important for all business leaders to be cognisant of the broad value creation ecosystem, given its profound implications for the creation or destruction of enterprise value. The opportunities for organisations that understand and manage all their value levers in a responsive and coordinated way are mirrored by deep pitfalls for those that fail to do so.

Arguably, everyone in business – no matter what their position – makes many decisions every day; and each is an opportunity for a win or a mistake. Therefore, teaching the people to think more deeply, solve problems better, communicate, collaborate,and innovate more effectively makes companies run a lot better. Thus, the bottom-line result is the goal of critical thinking becoming a culture for the organisation.

Why is critical thinking essential in the workplace?

Critical thinking’s ultimate goal is ensuring one has the best answer to a problem with maximum buy-in from all parties involved; an outcome that ultimately saves business time, money and stress...