Cranmer, built in 1721, was once home to Wellington’s Engineer General and where Dr Edward de Bono wrote many of his books on Lateral Thinking. This is an important contrast.

We host workshops for teams to learn about strategic thinking. We provide frameworks and facilitation to help your team create strategies for your organisation and clients. We make strategy an accessible topic that is about open, exploratory conversations. Dr Edward de Bono and Dr Julia Sloan designed these workshops. The team size can vary from 7 to 20 people and the workshop spans three days.

From top-down command and control to inclusive and divergent thinking

The term ‘strategy’ originates from the Greek word 'στρατηγία' (strategia), 'the office of a general’. It was the art of leading military forces. In the 20th century, 'strategy' was adopted as a term in business, politics and other fields to describe a plan to achieve long-term objectives under uncertainty.

Dr de Bono was a pioneer in teaching thinking as a skill. He described the process of 'Lateral Thinking', which is defined in the dictionary as 'The solving of problems by an indirect and creative approach, typically through viewing the problem in a new and unusual light'. His Lateral Thinking tools are the practical frameworks that we will use in the workshop to give structure and confidence to shape strategic conversations. Our agenda is to encourage and empower participants to change their perception – to reframe how the context for your strategy is considered to generate alternatives and to respectfully and constructively challenge. We
help organisations escape from the continuity trap created by outdated success. Our approach to strategy is that it is an inclusive process. Organisations need good leaders, and good leaders encourage ideas from everyone as part of the strategy process. Good ideas are not enough; they are only delivered by teams who believe in the likely success of those ideas.

An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that
exists only as an idea. Dr Edward de Bono​​​​