This leading robotic company was working on building its young talent force rapidly. For this purpose, they hired young professionals from manufacturing and automation industry background. Even though this bunch of young talent was technically competent, they did not come with an experience of leading teams. They were in team lead roles but weren’t skilled enough to deliver on the team management deliverables required by their role. Our client wanted to work with us to upskill the identified first time managers to lead teams effectively and also to make them future ready for larger upcoming roles.
Our Approach
- To give a customized solution to our client, a pre-program diagnostic was conducted with the leaders and supervisors to understand their expectations from these first time managers and their key challenges
- We recommended a 9-month long Leadership and Excellence Development Journey for this group of 15 First Time Managers (FTMs). The initiative began with a customized pre and post 360-degree assessment mapped to the IBM Kenexa HPB framework, to get multisource feedback about work performance and improvement areas of these individuals
- The other elements of this journey were interactive face to face workshops followed by group coaching sessions on key themes of managing self, managing others and managing business. During the course of this journey, engaging workbooks and application assignments were given to help them apply their learning back at work
- We strongly recommended our PEQM assessment and workshops on Emotional Intelligence for this group of managers to help them identify their strengths and areas of improvement that will help them work with their stakeholders effectively
- The initiative came to an end with a graduation ceremony where these first time managers were given certifications for successfully completing the journey. They gave a detailed presentation on their key learnings, application of tools and techniques and the impact they created in their teams with the help of the learnings from this journey
Outcomes
- The participants found the workshops quite insightful and gave an excellent feedback rating of 4.6/5. The Emotional intelligence workshop and PEQM assessments were highly appreciated and was a hit among the group of managers
- The Level 2 impact (learning) was evident when they shared their recollection of the tools and understanding of how they should be applied
- Level 3 impact (application) came through the impact of application that they shared
- Most participants indicated that the pre and post 360 assessments helped enhance their self-awareness. The feedback that they got from other various stakeholders helped them to understand the impact they have while dealing with others and how the stakeholders rated them on the stated competencies
- The journey was very well received by the organization, by the leaders and by the participants. The leadership decided to continue the initiative and the journey was rolled out for 2 more cohorts of first-time managers
