Title: Business Acumen & Cross-Functional Awareness
Submission window: 2 weeks
Format: Reading → MC quiz → Written assignment
HOW TO SUBMIT: Submit your assignment (Word/PDF) via email to [email protected] by Wednesday, March 11th.
Why this matters for Middle Management
As an MMT leader, you don’t need to be a finance expert — but you do need to understand how the business works well enough to make stronger decisions.
Business acumen affects:
1. Better prioritization (what matters now vs what feels urgent)
2. Smarter trade-offs (speed vs quality, short-term vs long-term, cost vs value)
3. More credible cross-team collaboration (Sales, Finance, Product, Tech, Support)
4. Clearer ownership (who moves which numbers — and what you can influence)
5. Stronger Rocks execution (because “impact” becomes measurable, not abstract)
This module helps you connect your team’s work and your personal Rocks to the business outcomes behind them — so decisions become more aligned, faster, and easier to explain.
After completing this module, you will be able to:
1. Explain the difference between revenue, cost, and margin — and why margin matters for sustainability
2. Identify the key business drivers that influence performance (e.g., volume, retention, cost drivers)
3. Translate operational problems into business impact (time lost, money lost, customer impact)
4. Apply business acumen to decision-making in your own domain: what to prioritize, what to stop, what to escalate