One Way Chess Launches in Chicago, Champaign

 

Former ICA Board Member At Large and two-time Collegiate Final Four participant Michael Auger has developed a chess training company with some associates.

While conducting private lessons online to students around the country, the in-person lessons are mostly being offered in the Chicago and Champaign areas.

Michael was kind enough to respond to some questions posed by the ICA which appear below. We wish Michael well in his new endeavor. Details can be found at https://www.onewaychess.com/schools/sneakpeek.html

How has your experiences in consulting helped in the development of your chess training company?

• We decided to build our program because we recognized a problem in chess instruction. Chess teachers are too busy dealing with day to day instruction to go above and beyond for their students. Instructors don’t have the time to do A/B testing with their lesson plans, to maintain individualized profiles on their students games, tournaments, and lesson history, to develop software to supplement their over the board instruction and to take the time to look at all their students in the aggregate. We came into this with a consulting mindset, planning to do all of these things and more.   

How is your approach different than what has been seen before?

• We set ourselves apart by taking a data driven approach to chess instruction. We track everything, our students online games, their ratings, their performance on our chess instruction application, tournament frequency and more to determine what the perfect combination of effort is to capitalize on our students potential. We handle all the hard work that goes into becoming a great chess player, so that our students can just have fun!

Are some of your unique creations available for licensing by other groups?

• Our company goal is to break down the boundaries in the chess world and if an organization thinks they can help us accomplish that we would be happy to discuss opportunities for licensing our technology.

How are you intending to work with non-profits (if at all)?

• We would love to work with any and all teachers or organizations volunteering their time to help capitalize on the benefits of this great game. Please email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and we will do our best to set you up with the tools you need to be a great chess instructor!

Who should be contacting you?

• Specifically, we are looking to put our program into action. If you would like private lessons, group lessons in your school or group lessons outside of school we’d love to hear from you. Outside of that we’re actively looking for teachers and anyone else that can help us grow the world of chess.

Are there samples of what you are up to available for viewing?

•  We have samples of our chess instruction app, our student profiles, a sample lesson plan form our curriculum and more at https://www.onewaychess.com/schools/sneakpeek.html

What were some of the ways that your chess background helped you with your consulting?

• Consulting and chess are two different instruments for the same type of thinking. At Booz Allen our tagline is “Solving our clients toughest problems” and often you can approach these type of problems with the branch-like thinking that goes into chess. While I can’t say knowing the Grunfeld thirty moves deep has benefited my consulting career, I can say that when facing a difficult consulting problem I have asked myself how I would approach this if I was at a chess board.