ABSEL MEGATREND ROOTS Developments in Business Simulation & Experiential Exercises, Volume 11, 1984 81 ABSEL MEGATREND ROOTS Stanley C. Vance, University of Tennessee ABSTRACT While ABSEL has been on the scene for barely a decade, there are obvious megatrend patterns which we have already experienced and accepted. These are our mega-trend roots. Our predecessor game players had to contend with skeptical and sometimes hostile attitudes even within our own academic departments. This negativism should be minimal in the future. Our predecessors saw the potential in computer technology. Hopefully, we will continue this affinity. Our predecessors also had a good sense of humor and effectively utilized the fun aspects of business games. We must not subordinate this essential stimulant, particularly as we move toward maturity and academic sophistication. Oklahoma Christian College’s initial experience in serious education in the “dismal science” through an amusement theme park, Enterprise Square USA, could serve as a megatrend prototype for us. Our charge in our games, simulations and experiential learning designs is to find the proper mix: a balance of the innovative, academic, research rewarding, yet interesting and sometimes even amusing. We have excellent megatrend roots; let’s cultivate bountiful educational crops. ABSEL ROOTS Last year, on May 27, our perceptive past-president, Jim Schreier, wrote to some of us presenting a unique program possibility: an adaptation of John Naisbitt’s best seller, Megatrends. Just two months later, the White House, having taken note, enlisted the aid of author Naisbitt to spot emerging issues for President Reagan to emphasize in forthcoming speeches. I commend Jim for being months ahead of the White House strategists in proposing that we introspect potential ABSEL megatrends. For starters: ABSEL’s megatrends, like those of any institution, must first be considered in terms of antecedents; then in light of the present milieu, and f i- nally with a long look at the horizon. Considering first the antecedents, it is safe to assume that all ABSELs are direct descendants of ancient medicine men, high- priests, and soothsayers. These dabblers in prognostication, the Neanderthal decision makers, could uniquely chart courses of action by analyzing animal entrails, or by tossing sacred bones or stones and reading the future from their patterns and positions. Somewhere, somehow, a good-humored shaman saw the potential for less-than-serious implications in this ritualistic hocus-pocus. This imaginative ABSEL ancestor put distinctive markings on stones and bones; drew lines, rectangles, circles or, perhaps, even tic-tac- toe squares on a clay floor and, thus, civilization made one of its biggest strides--dice, dominoes and related games of chance. Incidentally, this historical glance is not purely speculation. Archeological findings from Sumerian Ur, Egyptian Queen Hatasu’s board games, and much more, support this inference. In a very broad leap to the present, note that in 1955, only 29 years ago, several vice-presidents from American Management Associations had the first ABSEL-related vision of a megatrend. This was accomplished while they were enjoying martinis at a cocktail bar in New York. Reflecting on World War II’s gestation of operations research and military simulations, they saw the potential and even the inevitability of learning about business through business models and simulations. For those of us privileged to have participated in this period of gestation, and the subsequent rapid rearing of business game playing, those were hectic yet euphoric days. They were hectic because of the many skeptics; they were euphoric because every bit of progress was a tremendous percentage gain over a near-zero starting base. On the hectic side, some of the early obstacles might seem preposterous at this time. It is like referring to “the good old days”. One of my youthful nieces, overhearing several of us oldsters reflecting on the good old days before television, blurted, “But we always had television” Comparably, most of us ABSELs have always had computers, 256K microchips, and other fascinating gadgetry. It was in 1960, when upon going to the University of Oregon, I tried to initiate a game routine in my production management course, and smacked into an academic stone wall. The mathematics department had a stranglehold on the university’s one and only primitive computer. Before I could get my graduate students sanctioned to use the computer, the math people insisted that they take, and pass, a frightening sequence of advanced math courses. I argued that math was peripheral to computer comprehension and effective usage. I argued that the computer was a logic machine. In fact, this is how Charles Babbage, 150 years ago, viewed his Analytical Engine, the first attempt at a versatile computer. So, if computer science must be locked into any other department, it belongs in Philosophy, not in Math, or in Business. We got around that obstacle with a bootleg or unauthorized course. ABSEL Megatrends Now back to megatrending: We do not need 20/20 vision to see fantastic technical possibilities for you and the next generation of ABSELs. When I consider the very limited horizons of my own McGraw-Hill hand-scored game, gestated in 1958, and computerized in 1961, I marvel at what tools are presently available. But, as is obvious, it is not entirely a matter of tools and technology. It is imperative that we continue in the adaptation process. Here we need to blend even more fun and frolic-- maybe initiate a “Sesame Street” ABSEL to accelerate the learning process and to generate dedicated gamesters. As we all will agree, if we want to see game-playing dedication, just make a stopover in Las Vegas. On a recent rendezvous, I was struck by this young man at the Tropicana, who never seemed to budge from some weird game in one of the hallways. During my five days, while I made numerous trips carrying my winnings to my room, this young character demolished Pac Man, Galactic Gus, Frisky Frog or whatever. If we could inspire such 24- hour-day, infinite-week dedication in our associates, we would have an indomitable ABSEL. I have stressed this fun factor as an ABSEL megatrend for obvious reasons. Not only are video arcades all around us, they have even invaded some of our gourmet eateries such as Pizza Time Theater and Showbiz Pizza. Developments in Business Simulation & Experiential Exercises, Volume 11, 1984 82 But we have an even better example of blending education and electronics. As you know, ABSEL was conceived at Oklahoma Christian College by our energetic first president, Bernie Keys. A little over a year ago, Oklahoma Christian College sponsored another tremendous break-through. Its president, J. Terry Johnson, had an idea, namely, to get average Americans to understand capitalism and to convince then it is a good system. Mr. Johnson got the support of some of our biggest corporations and philantropic individuals, and built the $15 million Enterprise Square USA. This is an EPCOT Center, and Opryland, pegged to business and economic concepts. But, typical of so many of us serious academics, Johnson has put too much emphasis on the Wall Street side of economics and not enough on the Sesame Street side. On June 30, 1983, The Wall Street Journal, in a feature item, pointed to a number of flaws; paramount among which is that visitors come to the amusement park for fun, and find technical complexity and irritating propaganda. I do not mean to sound critical; actually, I want to compliment Mr. Johnson and Oklahoma Christian College for being in the forefront. Not only did 0CC provide us with Bernie Keys and a propitious birthplace, but now we have the College pioneering another great and related education-through-simulation adventure. I am sure that in the very near future Enterprise Square USA will find the proper mix of fun and frolic, electronics and education. And here is a fine megatrend parallel for us ABSELs. As we get increasingly more complex and effective technology, we need to find better means to make all this heavy stuff more palatable. In summary, as I see some of ABSEL’s megatrends: (1) We need to adapt to an increasingly more complex and more rewarding technology. (2) We also need to emulate enterprises like Pizza Time Theater and Showbiz Pizza. Our “ABSEL pizza” should not only be bigger and tastier, its solid substance should be flavored with the spice of fun. Table of Contents Volume 11, 1984 Simulation Gaming as a Means of Researching Substantive Issues: Another Look A Further Test of the Group Formation and its Impacts in a Simulated Business Environment Impact of Economic Patterns on Student Performance in Computer Business Simulation Games Majority Fallacy Game with Independent Student Simulation and a Case Introducing the Marketing Channel Laboratory A Comparative Evaluation of a Marketing Game A Study of Comparative Effectiveness of Problem-Solving Technologies The Impact of Hierarchical and Egalitarian Organization Structure on Group Decision Making and Attitudes Risk-Free Decision Making The EX-STRA Export Strategy Game Computer Education for Management Students Developing a Computer Game/Job Simulation to Teach Functional Literacy Skills Experiencing Socialization First Hand: An Experiential Exercise in Organizational Socialization Networking Distributive Versus Integrative Approaches to Negotiation: Experiential learning Through a Negotiation Simulation Managerial Education and the Real World: Foudations for Designing Educational Tools Diagnosing Group Climate to Improve Supervisory Effectiveness Student background as a Factor in Simulation Outcomes: The Collective bargaining Example The Use of Pre-Plays in Management Education Experiencing the Process Debrief: A Workshop ABSEL Megatrend Roots MEGATRENDS for Business Simulation and Experiential Learning The Effects and Consequences of the Megatrends on Simulation Gaming: One View Opportunities for the Future: ABSEL's Role Experiential Learning-Based Discussion vs. Lecture Based Discussion: A Comparative Analysis in a Classroom Setting An Evaluation of the Minitab Package in Teaching Business Statistics Concepts A Path Analytic Study of the Effects of Alternative Pedagogies Developing and Using Weighted Application Blanks: An Experiential Exercise Building Airplanes Individual vs. Group Grade: An Exercise in Decision making A Marketing Plan Exercise: Development of Interteam Cooperation Using a Coordinated Experiential Approach Using Student Experience as the Basis for a Consumer Behavior Learning Exercise Student Evaluations of Instructors: What do Students Believe? A Description of the SOFTCAT Computer Assisted Teaching System Comparisons of Practitioners' and Professors' Perceptions of Business Policy Content and Learning Methods The Perceived Relationship Between Pedagogies and Attaining Course Objectives in the Business Policy Course The Use of Simulation in the Teaching of Business Policy A Research Study on Strategic Decisions in a Business Simulation Strategic Management Decision Making Researched Via Simulation Gaming Using Simulation to Investigate Factors in Competitive Bidding Combining Experiential Learning and management Assistance A Model for Teaching Management Skills Putting Experience Back into Experiential Learning: A Demonstration The Teaching and Behavioral Measurement of Managerial/Organizational Competencies: Developing Experiential Exercises and Simulations A Simulation Game Model for Conglomerates QCLAB - A Microcomputer Laboratory in Quality Control CTSS: A Commodity Trading Simulation System Problem Solving: An Exercise on Learning, Coaching, and Operant Conditioning A Demonstration of the Effects of Feedback as a Category of Reinforcement The Assessment of Feedback and Disclosure in Interpersonal Relations: An Experiential Exercise A Study to Determine Whether the Teaching of Basic Grammar Skills in Business Communication Classes Improves Students' Business Letter Writing Corporate Maladies Through the Eyes of the Memo Writer: A Seldom Used Experiential Tool Executive Bailout at Shake & Spear, Inc. The H.E./L&P Merger Intercultural Nonverbal Communications: An Experiential Exercise The Evolving Business Policies Course - Is Management Gaming the Logical Pedagogy? The Use of Decision Simulations in Management Training Programs: Current Perspectives Humanizing the Business of Medicine: The Use of Simulated Patients to Train medical Students Systematic Integration of Simulation Methods in a Graduate Management Curriculum Modeling Non-Price Factors in the Demand Functions of Computerized Business Using Spacial Relationships to Estimate Demand in Business Simulations Two Algorithms For Redistribution Of Stockouts In Computerized Business Simulations Leadership And Strategic Behavior A Comparison Of Two Business Strategy Simulations For Microcomputers Incorporating Decision Support Systems Into Management Simulation Games: A Model And Methodology Using Micro-Computers To Support The Analysis Of Complex Cases: It's As Easy As 1-2-3 Strategic Formulation Consistent With Pims: A Micro-Computer Application