Excellence in Practice 2021

The EFMD Business Magazine | Iss3 Vol.15 | www.efmd.org

Recognising Outstanding Learning and Development Partnerships

Excellence in Practice 2021 Special supplement

EFMD Global Focus_Iss.3 Vol.15 www.globalfocusmagazine.com

Excellence in Practice 2021

Contents Global Focus The EFMD Business Magazine Iss.3 Vol.15 | 2021

3 Excellence in Practice 2021 5 Daimler / ESMT Berlin / Coverdale / Brand-and-Story 9 TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset 15 Capgemini France / emlyon business school 19 Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester) 25 Live for Good / CEDEP Global Executive Education Club 29 International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education 35 Atos / Cranfield School of Management 41 Cargill / INSEAD

You can read Global Focus in print, online and on the move, in English, Chinese or Spanish.

45 CaixaBank Group / UPF Barcelona School of Management

Go to: globalfocusmagazine.com for these and an online library of past issues.

49 Global Reporting Initiative / CENTRUM PUCP Business School

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Excellence in Practice 2021 | Introduction

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More than 50 cases registered for the awards an all-time high... with entries from most continents and very diverse industries

he 2021 Excellence in Practice awards attracted an impressive set of submissions, despite the ongoing challenges due to the pandemic. More than 50 cases registered for the awards, an all-time high. As in previous years the diversity of applications is an asset in itself, with entries from most continents and very diverse industries ranging from knowledge intense services to traditional industries, structured as multinationals, SME’s, not-for-profits and governmental agencies. The richness of this portfolio might not always be apparent in the final list of award winners, but it clearly coloured the discussions of the jury members and the summary of observations below. We are truly grateful for the efforts that all of the applicants made to document this wide set of experiences, and hope this GF supplement does spark your interest and creativity. Which is also what we intend to do with the 2021 Executive Development Conference which builds on these current practices to explore the near future of Exec Ed.

One of the main surprises of this year’s batch of cases lies in the rise of submissions that address SDG-type challenges. The attention to social and ecological challenges we see rising in society in the slipstream of the COVID-19 pandemic is clearly echoed in the cases we received. Not only did the crisis bring us a novel cluster of SDG-development cases and subsequent awards, it was also present in quite a number of cases in the other clusters. In hindsight it is not a great surprise to see that three of the five gold award winners are part of the (auto) mobile sector, a sector in profound transformation. But quite a number of cases also came from the energy sector and large industrial enterprises. As someone noted: social/ecological issues and business issues are converging more than ever.

So besides the solid recurring cases of culture and organisation transformation to favour retention of young talent, foster client-centricity, focus on digital business agility, promote organisational integration and the like; we received cases with a focus on social entrepreneurship, diversity and inclusion, corporate volunteering, stakeholder recognition, sustainability reporting, and more.

Trying to do justice to the impact measurement efforts of this variety of cases will always be an incomplete attempt, but pointing at some solid and emerging practices might contribute to our shared impact awareness and capability. Hence the below selection is presented as food for thought and inspiration.

• First of all there are the traditional individual/ participant focused measurements. Mapping engagement, behaviour change, performance through surveys, learning evaluation reports, work-based learning reports on the qualitative side and measurement of onboarding and recently appointed management adaptation periods as well as certification programmes as ‘hard’ indicator attempts.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Excellence in Practice 2021 Introduction • Moving beyond this first layer, quite a number of organisational/team impacts were reported with, of course, the more common project-approach delivering in-programme tangible impact. Some named these ‘organisational experiments’ or worked with an internal consulting format. The roll-out of leadership frameworks and even performance management systems were also mentioned as by-products of an L&D intervention. Maturity measurements of projects and even an Agile Culture Index were interesting highlights of practice.

• Beyond these individual and organisational indicators of impact, a number of measurements were rather related to the positioning of the client organisation within its own ecosystem. Sustainability reporting of SME’s (to fit into their B2B supply chain), redefining Stakeholder Management, but also positioning in industry rankings can be cited as practices in this category.

• Some interesting business impact indicators were used across the submissions, including: customer retention, the number of start-ups or (social) enterprises created, and product launches and partnerships. One case even coined the concept of Social Return on Investment.

The sources of measurement also varied, which added to the strength and validity of the indicators used. Just using participants as a source of opinion or measurement (cf. Net Promotor Scores) is of course potentially biased by the recent effect and personal pride of being selected to participate. Learner-led narratives add to the story of success, but demonstrating impact could involve more than only participant statements. In several cases the direct hierarchy of participants were included in the measurement, from line managers to directors. Some even probed for customer feedback and a few cases used dedicated

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external providers for impact measurement.

The timeline of measurement has also been widespread, ranging from in-programme formative measurements (to adjust the programme in-flight) to indicators showing impact on behaviours from within the year, to up to a decade of continuing investments follow-up focused on both business and people.

The above and more serve as observations and input for further debate and practice exchange, starting with the Executive Development Conference on 21 September where the transition into a post-pandemic era is at the core of the reflections. Hope to see and hear you all there, and also at the 2022 version of the Excellence in Practice Awards. Stay tuned!

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Introduction

2021 Winners Category: Organisational Development

Category: Professional Development

GOLD

GOLD

Daimler & ESMT Berlin & Coverdale & Brand-and-Story

Audi UK & Alliance Manchester Business School

“Leading Transformation - Shaping the automotive transformation amidst turbulent times” SILVER International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) & Hult Ashridge Executive Education “Creating a transformative leadership culture” OTHER FINALIST: Absa Group & International Institute for Management Development (IMD) “Reimagining banking with Africanacity” Arm & Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) “Leadership in a complex ecosystem” Category: Talent Development

(University of Manchester) “Audi LEAD Programme: Future-proofing the Audi UK dealership network” SILVER CaixaBank Group & UPF Barcelona School of Management “Risk School experience” OTHER FINALIST: Mazars & Mazars University “Instilling a coaching culture at the top: The ReCoach Programme” Category: Social and Environmental Impact GOLD Live for Good & CEDEP Global Executive Education Club “Entrepreneurship for Good - Unleashing the potential of youth to impact and change the world”

GOLD

SILVER

TRATON Group & ESMT Berlin & Mindset

Global Reporting Initiative & CENTRUM PUCP

“Enabling intrapreneurship and critical data consumption – A blended journey to enable business success after a merger and in times of Corona” SILVER Atos & Cranfield School of Management “Driving customer retention and project success through professionalisation - The Atos and Cranfield Programme Manager

Business School “GRI - Corporate sustainability and reporting for competitive business programme in Peru” OTHER FINALIST: Eni & SDA Bocconi School of Management “Human Knowledge Programme”

Masterclass” OTHER FINALISTS: Ministry of Science and Higher Education of the Russian Federation & Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO “Rectors’ School: Training the next generation of transformational university leaders” Category: Leadership Development GOLD Capgemini France & emlyon business school “Making leaders - from training to transformation: pursuing a Promethean ambition” SILVER Cargill & INSEAD “Catalysing leadership in a digital world” OTHER FINALISTS: Hager Group & Vlerick Business School “Leading into the future together”

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Daimler AG / ESMT Berlin / Coverdale / Brand-and-Story

Leading transformation Shaping the automotive transformation amidst turbulent times I

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Strongly supported by the Executive Board, “Leading Transformation” was an intervention to match the ambitions of one of the world’s leading manufacturers of automobiles, vans, trucks, and buses.

The challenge: Mastering ambidexterity Daimler has maintained a position at the top of its industry for decades and has enjoyed a period of strong commercial success.

This strength, however, was no reason for Daimler to rest on its laurels. By 2020, the world of trendsetting technologies, outstanding products, and made-to-measure services was changing at breakneck speed. Domains ranged from technology to deeply held assumptions and values.

Particularly pressing changes comprised: a) propulsion systems and battery technology – the dominant paradigm of combustion engines was giving way to an electric first approach, requiring the reimagination of an entire product class and a new ecosystem of related products and services b) the importance of OS and related software – operating systems and other software applications more broadly were becoming a key competitive differentiator c) the related skill and workforce revolution – requirements in the workforce were changing rapidly, and winning the race for a workforce educated to solve tomorrow’s challenges was crucial.

PICTURE COURTESY DAIMLER

t was early 2020. The global automotive industry was in the middle of the biggest transformation in its history – exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In order to be able to respond more quickly and effectively to changing customer needs and complex market dynamics, Daimler also optimised its organisational structure towards more divisional independence.

In a context that requires not just the reimagination of products and ecosystems but also of the company itself, leadership development was considered of pivotal importance. Daimler Corporate Academy, together with partners from Harvard Business School, ESMT Berlin, Coverdale and Brand-and-Story, designed an innovative global learning intervention to provide leaders across Daimler with the tools, framework and capabilities to steer this change. Just as the programme was about to be launched, the outburst of COVID-19 added an unforeseen layer of complexity. How could leaders encourage and drive change during unpredictable and worrisome times when they themselves and their followers were so fundamentally restricted in the way they could interact?

The response was swift and comprehensive, and it changed the world of learning at Daimler for good. “Leading Transformation” was a global learning experience, designed following a ‘digital first’ approach, reaching leaders from all levels, business areas and locations across the world.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Daimler AG / ESMT Berlin / Coverdale / Brand-and-Story

These changes, in combination with further strategic developments, (e.g. the increasing focus on luxury vehicles for passenger cars), and the impact of COVID-19 presented a unique set of circumstances.

At the same time, the company was in the midst of its own transformation, both structurally and organisationally. This created a set of deep and relevant questions.

Just as the programme was about to be launched, the outburst of COVID-19 added an unforeseen layer of complexity. How could leaders encourage and drive change during unpredictable and worrisome times when they themselves and their followers were so fundamentally restricted in the way they could interact?

• What did transformation mean for different parts of the organisation?

• How could the leaders who were responsible for driving transformation initiatives enable and enact change?

• How could Daimler encourage both accountability and freedom in leaders across divisions, businesses, and regions?

• Most importantly, how could leaders build and maintain agency and mastery, be mobilized for change and drive transformation even in the most difficult times of personal and organisational turmoil?

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Daimler AG / ESMT Berlin / Coverdale / Brand-and-Story

Applying existing capabilities in new contexts and to new challenges can turn capabilities into a disadvantage. The need for new learning was emerging.

Faced with these challenges, “Leading Transformation” was designed to meet the following key objectives: 1. Establish a shared framework for understanding transformation while simultaneously encouraging Daimler divisions in their quest for distinct identities 2. Provide leaders with a set of tools and practices for leading transformation 3. Connect Daimler leaders with peers around the world to learn 4. Firmly root the generated learning in the flow of leaders’ everyday work The commitment: Practice what you preach Daimler Corporate Academy collaborated with partners from Harvard Business School (Jim Dowd, Amy Edmondson), ESMT Berlin (Harald Hungenberg), Coverdale (Ulrike Böhm and Thomas Weegen) and Brand-and-story (Terence Barry).

The combination of partners was a crucial element of the success of “Leading Transformation”. Harvard Business School faculty contributed content in the most relevant content domains and unparalleled executive education expertise. As the delivery context differed from an on-campus setting, the situation also required expertise in delivering “live” online to a very large audience. ESMT, a leading European business school located in Berlin and long-time partner of Daimler AG in matters related to strategic leadership education, contributed in-depth knowledge of the challenges Daimler and its leaders face as they develop culture to become nimble, agile, collaborative, and crosshierarchical. Finally, Coverdale focused on designing group interactions between sessions and how content could be applied in an intact team setting.

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The conceptual core of “Leading Transformation” consisted of five interconnected elements: Adaptive Leadership - Psychological Safety Strategy as Learning – Ambidexterity - Integrity of the Narrative Leaders at Daimler increasingly face adaptive challenges, which require leadership of a very different kind. Orchestrating the conditions in which collective learning can take place quickly and socially, unimpeded by fear, aversion to failure, or pressure to conform to hierarchy, was essential – but inventing the future would also depend on succeeding in the present. A compelling story that would maintain the extraordinary level of commitment typical of Daimler employees if conveyed in the right way.

Programme structure The four key learning objectives: establish a shared framework for understanding transformation, provide leaders with a set of actionable tools and practices, connect Daimler leaders with peers around the world, and firmly root the generated learning in the flow of leaders’ everyday work; were translated into three Acts as the building blocks of the programme.

All three Acts balanced theory and practice, and input from experts with contributions from participants.

As Daimler was putting increasing emphasis on divisional independence, each division was encouraged to initiate its local or regional roll-out of “Leading Transformation”. An essential pre-requisite for this was the early involvement of divisional and regional Organisational Development experts in the development of “Leading Transformation”, transcending the boundaries that can result from different divisions.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Daimler AG / ESMT Berlin / Coverdale / Brand-and-Story

ACT 1

PROLOGUE

ACT 2

ONLINE LIVE

ACT 3

INTACT TEAMS

ACT X

ONLINE LIVE

BEYOND

Invitation by CEO

Listen and reflect

Share and develop

Listen and reflect

Action

July 2020

July 27/29

Aug - Oct

Nov 2/5

Starting Nov

1

2

3

6

7

KICK-OFF MEETING

MEETING IN ACT 1

INDIVIDUAL WORK

MEETING IN ACT 3

FURTHER MEETING

Have your own Kick-Off Meeting to get your Transformer Group going

Have your own virtual CheckIn before and a Break-Out Session during the Program

Craft your personal Transformation Narrativ (narrative board provided)

Have your own virtual CheckIn before and a Break-Out Session during the Program

Keep the contact in your Transformer Group

4 FEEDBACK MEETING Get feedback from your peers on your personal Transformation Narrativ

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STREAM Transformer Group

INDIVIDUAL TASK

STREAM Intact Teams

1. Connect with your own (intct) team (see workshop desig) 2. Temperature Check

Fig 1: Four Key Learning Objectives

While the effects of COVID-19 are destructive, unsettling, and often tragic, the pandemic has given the development of learnercentric digital learning a substantial boost

PICTURE COURTESY DAIMLER

COVID-19

The impact: Making technology work for everyone The “Leading Transformation” design aimed to offer a social, emotional, and interactive learning experience. The combination of synchronous and asynchronous learning, and smaller group-based interactions provided the conditions for consensus building and alignment. For many leaders, their very understanding of leadership learning changed as a result of this.

While the effects of COVID-19 are destructive, unsettling, and often tragic, the pandemic has given the development of learner-centric digital learning a substantial boost. The immersive format of “Leading Transformation” supported a deep and sustainable mindset and behavioural shift by: • Enabling leaders to join the transformation journey, irrespective of physical location, hierarchical level or divisional allocation.

• Boosting organisational transformation even in times of uncertainty.

• Combining large scale cross-divisional creation of common ground with intact team intervention.

• Allowing room for critical self-reflection and exploration of the idiosyncrasies of regional and divisional teams and business units on the ongoing journey.

A range of KPIs indicated that the set objectives were met and often exceeded.

Participation was high, and dropouts were extremely low (constant audience level >95%).

Thousands of comments were added during sessions, and an interim survey (“temperature check”) added depth and richness to understanding participants’ challenges and responses. Leadership Learning at Daimler would never be the same.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

How TRATON uses training to accelerate its global champion strategy

T

he TRATON GROUP brings together four of the world’s leading truck brands - MAN, Scania, Volkswagen Caminhões e Ônibus and, most recently, Navistar. These four brands are now united in the mission to become the global champion of the transportation services industry and to transform transportation together (Fig. 1).

Fulfilling this mission rests upon these brands being able to discover and leverage synergies successfully. For the high potentials of the first-line management, the new Management Excellence programme was developed to enable these brand managers to drive business success through intrapreneurship, a disruptive mindset, and critical data consumption.

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The German business school, ESMT Berlin, brought world-class faculty to the table, and the Swedish training company, Mindset, offered 20 years’ experience driving application from learning

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Building the partnership Two things were clear for the TRATON Cross-Brand programme team from the outset; they wanted cutting-edge content that equipped the TRATON brand managers with the latest skills, tools and approaches for enabling cross-brand intrapreneurship and critical data consumption. Second, they would need a cutting-edge learning design that would support and guide learners to apply what they had learned in impactful ways (Fig. 2).

The Cross-Brand programme team found their winning combination of content and design in two partner organisations that offered the best of both worlds. The German business school, ESMT Berlin, brought world-class faculty to the table, and the Swedish training company, Mindset, offered 20 years’ experience driving application from learning.

The collaboration process started with a series of full-day workshops – there were meetings at TRATON in Munich, ESMT in Berlin and Mindset in Stockholm. Taking the time to host these full-day in-person events was key to building a foundation of trust. Much of the discussion at these first workshops was concerned with developing a shared vision of the programme, the objectives it should achieve and how those would benefit TRATON.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

CREATING A GLOBAL CHAMPION

Leader in Profitability | Global Presence | Innovation BRAND PERFORMANCE

COOPERATION & SYNERGIES

GLOBAL EXPANSION

CUSTOMER FOCUSED INNOVATION

Increase performance of brands with individual identity, strength and clear positioning

Increase cooperation and exploit synergies between brands

Leverage scale through global footprint

Transforming transportation

Creation of Sustainable Shareholder Value Fig 1: The Global Champion Strategy

CUTTING EDGE CONTENT

FEEDBACK DYNAMICS

GUIDED APPLICATION

CUTTING EDGE LEARNING DESIGN

The TRATON GROUP brings together four of the world’s leading truck brands - MAN, Scania, Volkswagen Caminhões e Ônibus and, most recently, Navistar

Fig 2: Combining cutting-edge design and learning content

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Excellence in Practice 2021

TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

LEARNING OUTCOMES

BEHAVIOURAL APPLICATIONS

PERFORMANCE OUTCOMES

ORGANIZATIONAL AMBITIONS

• Understands key characteristics

• Applies an intrapreneurial

• Increased identification of

• Restructure the very concept

of an intrapreneurial and

mindset and toolkit to drive

cross-brand (function) synergies

of transportation and become

disruptive mindset

financial value creation

• Increased cross-brand

the global champion of the

• Ability to lead cross-brand

• Explores all perspectives in

(function) collaboration

transportation services industry

(function) collaboration and

cross-brand (function)

• Increase in business-driven

• Be a leading global

innovation

scenarios to identify optimal

decisions

manufacturer of commercial

• Understands financial

solutions

• Improved business-driven

vehicles and best in class in

management principles

• Identifies cross-brand

decisions

terms of:

• Applies business analytics in

(function) synergies and

– Profitability

a VUCA world to create

takes responsibility for driving

• Increase in team involvement

financial value

the broader TRATON agenda

• Ability to make fact-based

• Employs a range of decision

decisions under stressful

making tools to include

conditions

and involve the team in

• Ability to facilitate group

the decision making process

decision making

in decision making process

– Customer innovation

• Increased initiative taking in

– Global presence

the team

– Employee satisfaction

• Improved open error culture in the team • Increased innovation • Increased operational efficiency

Fig 3: the impact map

The emergence of a results-focused, blended solution As the programme team worked together on the programme design, one of the first documents to be produced was the ‘Impact Map’, a four-column document that described how what was learned would be used on the job to bring about desired results (Fig. 3).

With the impact map in place, the programme team set out a 10-month journey that would provide participants with the necessary knowledge and skills, safe practice opportunities and guidance to use these skills in their work to bring about desired outcomes. As the programme team refined and developed the learning journey, a three-layer approach emerged (Fig. 4).

The ‘learning’ layer was modelled on the design thinking principle of convergent and divergent thinking. Before each of the synchronous interventions (‘labs’), participants were provided with a series of assignments designed to build a common knowledge 11

foundation (converging). The ‘labs’ then introduced multiple concepts and provided a safe environment to share perspectives and try out new skills under the watchful guidance of the ESMT Berlin faculty (diverging).

The ‘behavioural change’ layer was the link between learning and impact. The centrepiece of this layer was the ‘Application Challenges’, which provided participants with a choice of concrete ways to use the skills they had practised during the ‘lab’. Each participant was required to identify, carry out and report back on the three most relevant and valuable challenges in their role.

The third and final layer was the ‘support’ layer. If the participants were to really make the transition from learning to sustained application, they would need feedback, encouragement, and support to keep them committed to this journey.

This layer leveraged multiple relationships - faculty, programme peers, team members and supervisors – to provide the support, feedback and accountability needed.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

KICK-OFF

LEARNING LAYER

Program team

Plan your journey

Journey

Get to know TRATON brands

Participants OnlinePlatform

BEHAVIORAL CHANGE LAYER

SUPPORT LAYER

PREPARATION

LAB I

Learning nuggets

Teach-back

APPLICATION / PREPARATION

Intrapreneurial mindset

Create value assignments

Financial creation

Learning nuggets

Application assignments

Individual assignments

Kick-off with managers

LAB II

APPLICATION / PREPARATION

Critical data consumption

Create value assignments

Driving business success

Learning nuggets

Job-shadowing

Group assignments

GRADUATION

Spread your learnings Be an Alumni driver

Cross-brand knowledge sharing Support a peer

Weekly program team meetings on progress of participants and individual support.

Update your progress with manager

Mentoring with Executive Elite program

Fig 4: The three-layer programme design

The three-layer design paradigm created a seamless and cohesive 10-month journey woven into the very fabric of each participant’s job role.

To support the efficient delivery of this complex design, the programme team used the Promote® online learning platform as the vehicle to distribute learning nuggets (case studies, videos, knowledge packs etc.), support social learning, create participant accountability and get real-time information on programme success.

The pivot to virtual When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in March 2020, the Learning and Development community was forced to reappraise training delivery methods and delivery channels. For some organisations, the answer was to put training on hold. For TRATON and the Management Excellence programme, that notion was briefly entertained but quickly abandoned – the show would go on!

As we examined our pre-requisites, we discovered we had a good head-start for making the transition to a virtual learning journey. The online learning platform, Promote® provided a perfect means for distributing programme content (films, articles, case studies) as well as a two-way communication channel to broadcast programme updates as the pandemic developed. In addition, online check-in sessions had already been built-in as part of the original programme design. These sessions were painlessly re-purposed as virtual classes.

The virtual classes themselves took everyone (participants and faculty alike) on a steep learning curve. However, by rapidly employing participant feedback, break-out rooms, chat pods and Mentimeter polls soon became standard tools for delivering engaging virtual sessions.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

Programme impact Participant data gathered both during and at the end of the programme identified extremely high levels of training transfer in the targeted behaviours, not just single application try-outs but multiple application attempts. In particular, the behaviours of “Establishing an open error culture” and “Using elements of a good decision to combine rationality and debiasing” saw a high degree of transfer by every participant. Nearly 90% of participants agreed that although they may have been practising some of these behaviours before attending Management Excellence, they had not been doing so in such a conscious, deliberate, or proficient way as after attending the programme.

Some of the key results reported by the majority of the participants were improved business-driven decisions, improved open error culture, increased team involvement in the decision-making process, increased cross-brand collaboration and increased initiative taking in the team – all examples of outcomes the programme set out to achieve.

90%

Nearly 90% of participants agreed that although they may have been practising some of these behaviours before attending Management Excellence, they had not been doing so in such a conscious, deliberate, or proficient way as after attending the programme

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BRANDS

435

SOCIAL MESSAGES

19

PARTICIPANTS

835

ASSIGNMENT REPORTS

Fig 5: Management Excellence key figures

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93%

COMPLETION RATE

1055

ASSIGNMENTS COMPLETED

Excellence in Practice 2021 | TRATON Group / ESMT Berlin / Mindset

Reflections and lessons learned The programme team are extremely proud of their accomplishments from Management Excellence and the recognition of its success in the form of the EFMD Excellence in Practice Award. We end this article with a summary of the key lessons learned that we hope will be helpful to readers: Invest time to build trust at the front end. The initial workshops hosted by each of the partners were critical for building trust and respect for each partner’s strengths as well as a common goal for the whole programme. Once this trust was established, it led to fewer misunderstandings, faster resolution of programme adjustments and better programme results.

Use virtual classes to deliver ‘just in time’ learning. Virtual classes can be a useful way of breaking content down into smaller bite-size chunks delivered on a just-in-time basis – an advantage for the busy managers that make up the target audience of this programme.

Use weekly pulse meetings to build a strong culture and keep the programme on track. At first, the primary function of the weekly ‘pulse’ meetings with the programme team was to keep the programme and the participants on track. However, as the programme progressed, these meetings also became important opportunities for maintaining a ‘sense of team’.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Capgemini France / emlyon business school

Making Leaders I

n 2017, a global transformation plan at Capgemini (branded “LEAD” appropriately enough) combined with a need to manage talents differently, to pave the way for an ambitious leadership development programme.

For the first time in the group’s history, all French business units would be involved in a high-profile training programme with a single mission: renewing the managerial culture by developing the interpersonal skills necessary to meet the group’s organisational and people challenges.

In 2018, Capgemini and emlyon business school jointly designed and began delivering this initiative which became Making Leaders, a 10-month immersive learning journey on the road to Leadership 3.0, whose keywords are “mindset shift”, “cross-functional”, and “personal transformation”. Three years later, Making Leaders has become a trademark at Capgemini France with over 500 alumni from the top tiers of the company, a third wave in progress, and a genuine, tangible behavioural change on the ground in the teams.

Finding a dancing partner to jointly design an innovative leadership intervention Back in 2018, Franck Baillet, EVP for Learning & Development at Capgemini France, was very much aware of the new environment the consultants had to operate in. As he remarks, ‘We now have to cope with different types of demand, not only from our clients but also from our consultants, from our people. We recruit a lot of people every year. In France, it’s more than 4,000 people across our different businesses, many of whom are millennials’. Franck considered that Capgemini France ‘had to do

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something to better equip our managers to help them face these challenges and to inspire the younger staff, showing them that this is a company where we have a lot of freedom to do things and that we are positively challenged by our employees and our managers to grow, to develop ourselves’.

From the outset, Franck was clear that having an external provider, ideally with brand prominence, would be necessary to engage and retain the consultants in the face of the pressure to generate fees and deliver for clients. He set up a steering committee of HR Directors and Business Unit leaders from the different entities across France, and they ran a competitive two-round contest between leading French business schools. Ultimately, emlyon business school was selected owing to its ability to jointly create and co-design the emergent programme structure, with just the right blend of academic content and on the job practice key for impact.

Building a team of chefs to cook up an effective and palatable L&D experience Custom Training Solutions manager at emlyon, Thomas Misslin, was the initial point of contact at the school and remained heavily involved in the evolution of the resulting “Making Leaders” programme. The programme’s name, merging as it does the “Leader for Leaders” motto prevalent at Capgemini and emlyon’s tagline “Early Makers”, is tinged with a little irony, as the central tenet of the programme is not that leaders are “made” but rather that they are “grown”. With this latter metaphor, leadership is seen as a journey of evolution rather than a process of construction.

Thomas avers, ‘It’s like growing a plant. You water it, you wait for the sun to rise. Patience becomes a

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Capgemini France / emlyon business school

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Capgemini France / emlyon business school

virtue. You add some fertiliser. You pray, you hope, whatever it takes. And then things get going. All of this really is anchored in McGregor’s Theory Y of human development, which he described in detail in his seminal 1960 work ‘The Human Side of Enterprise’.

Early on, Thomas brought in Claire Moreau, a coach and affiliate professor with emlyon business school, to help design, build a team for, and run the programme with him. Claire’s objective was to get the participants to “experience” more than “learn” (read “pile-up knowledge”) in the programme, which she describes as being the “DNA” of the team’s pedagogic approach. This approach was drawn from the practice of Carl Rogers, one of the founders of humanistic psychology, combined with a dose of Seligman’s positive psychology and David Cooperrider’s Appreciative Inquiry method.

Making interactive, innovative, and inspiring leaders A central pillar of the programme was for participants, many who had grown up with the assumption that they had to fully understand an issue to crack it – a foundation of their consultants thinking – to be able to cope with increasing complexity and “VUCA” contexts. ‘We wanted them to feel that they had the ability to address uncertainty with their team whom they could trust to get the better of it’, says Claire Moreau. In the end, the programme focused on three leadership qualities that would enable participants to come out on top of VUCA; and Making Leaders came to mean Making Interactive Leaders, Making Innovative Leaders and Making Inspiring Leaders. This easy to grasp framework became a rallying cry of sorts when low-tech, high-touch experiential workshops took participants a tad too far out of their comfort zone. The very simplicity of this model also helped managers keep it front and centre amid their dizzying and demanding schedules.

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Each class was made up of a number of cohorts of ten managers; and within that, they self-organised by electing representatives who got together outside of the regular programme schedule to jointly design “leadership projects” that detail, in practical ways, what it means to be a leader at Capgemini in the 21st century, in line with the Group’s Leadership Model. The emlyon team describes, ‘this dual approach— inputs and practice on the one hand, and actual productive work around leadership on the other—finds itself woven into the programme, whereby the group as a whole, the class, has the responsibility for jointly producing something useful and relevant out of this program; something which is decidedly theirs. They get to actually get work done, together, putting to immediate use the learning gained in the programme. At the end, they feel as if the programme is theirs… which, funnily enough, becomes true because of that feeling’.

Claire Moreau, the programme director, concurs, ‘beyond training participants, an important and needed contribution to be sure, we’re creating the conditions so that managers get truly interested and start learning of their own volition, practising with their teams, and so on. In this way, they take responsibility for their own learning. During the final day of the programme, they jointly certify themselves as leaders… so letting the managers themselves recognise other leaders in their midst and how much they’ve changed in the programme.

There’s this spirit of it being jointly designed.

You fully participate. You can’t sit back and wait for knowledge to come. You have to do something, to be a fully-fledged actor. You have to take chances. In short, I think we “teach” them to be leaders by being leaders, by constantly placing them in situations to act the part: they are leaders already, and we take it as a starting point, not as an end-state result. And that makes a big difference’.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Capgemini France / emlyon business school

This easy to grasp framework became a rallying cry of sorts when low-tech, high-touch experiential workshops took participants a tad too far out of their comfort zone

Far from making life easy for the emlyon programme manager, this “hands off” approach to guiding the programme is a real challenge. As Thomas says with a tinge of trepidation, ‘There is more tension at our end because important parts of the programme cannot be planned for.

When things are scripted, the trainers are in control, delivering their presentations and running well-formatted workshop activities, but when they stand back and let participants engage and evolve the pace and direction of the programme, they need to be much more attentive and responsive. And surprises abound’.

With this approach, the programme becomes, to some extent, a journey of “unknown unknowns” for the programme designers as well. But this is seen as another “secret ingredient in the recipe” that creates the space for change in participants to take place. ‘They come up with things that you had no idea they might come up with. And then we get feedback from HR Directors telling us, ‘You know what?

We’re going beyond what we expected with this programme.’

A final key factor behind the programme’s success was Capgemini’s buy-in: senior business leaders did create the conditions for this initiative to work, both by contributing their time in the steering committee and by sharing honestly with participants their own learning path and challenges. When senior leaders are open and honest with their managers about their own leadership journey, bumpy as it sometimes is, this sets the tone for others to similarly be honest about theirs. ‘We can’t force people to say things, to make admissions… but our job is to create the opportunity, and sometimes a powerful yet simple question is enough. And when the CEO opens up, of course this allows others to share their personal fears and vulnerabilities.’

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

Future-proofing the Audi UK dealership network E

lectric mobility, driverless cars, automated factories, and ridesharing—these are just a few of the major disruptions that the automotive industry is facing. Maintaining a market position in the premium car market presents an ongoing challenge. Automotive providers operate in an increasingly complex and volatile market, characterised by increasing competition from non-traditional new entrants, shifts in political and consumer attitudes towards climate change and the environment, increased urbanisation, rapid digital disruption and changing customer buying behaviour.

Partnering on development Audi is part of the Volkswagen Group (VWG) and is one of the world’s leading producers of premium cars. The company controls sourcing, marketing and distribution of all Audi vehicles and parts in the UK and provides a host of support services to its dealers and customers.

Audi recognised that the evolving dynamics in the automotive sector provide both a threat and opportunity in maintaining the relevance and sustainable profitability of the brand and Audi Centre network in the future.

Audi also identified a number of internal management challenges that had the potential to restrict future business growth and sustainability. To address these internal challenges and respond to the broader challenge of maintaining and growing market position against the backdrop of rapid change, Audi recognised the need to develop the leadership capabilities of its frontline leader population – its Audi Centre “Heads of 19

Business” and “Aspiring Leaders”. They recognised that, ultimately, it is these current and future frontline leader populations who face the challenge of continually adapting to change, driving innovation, and delivering long-term, sustainable Centre growth.

Like in any customised corporate education tender process (given the product is not developed until after contract award), the key challenge for Alliance MBS was to respond with a coherent and compelling conceptual programme definition to meet these requirements. The nature of Audi’s requirements and the detail of the desired design in the specification made this challenge more difficult (how we could add value to an already welldeveloped concept?).

To transform our conceptual design into a definitive, tangible programme, we followed the tried and tested “Manchester Approach” to design and development. Based on this process, our starting point was problem diagnosis.

Following a typical needs analysis process, this involved: depth interviews with key organisational leaders, stakeholders and gatekeepers (to identify the diversity of perspectives on desired business outcomes and barriers to change); focus groups with a representative sample of delegates and their regional managers (to understand individuallevel role challenges, expectations and desired learning outcomes), and; analysis of the Audi competency framework and in-house capability assessment against these competencies (to identify capability gaps and target learning objectives to address these gaps).

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

In line with our principles of co-creation and ensuring joint ownership of the final “product”, Audi lead sponsors and organisational subject matter experts were involved in reviews and design sign-off at each development phase. The programme design continually evolved as we progressed along the tendering, commissioning, and subsequent design and delivery journey.

Audi and Alliance MBS developed a greater understanding of each other’s needs, capabilities and culture.

Delivery of the programme To achieve the identified business and individual outcomes, Alliance MBS and Audi developed a highly customised and highly innovative 6 to 8 month “blended learning” programme, structured around three core modules and delivered through a combination of intensive face-to-face workshops (one for each module in a 2+2+2 day format) and a range of online work-based learning and applied project work before, during and after delivery. These modules followed the key content themes set out in the specification – “Business Leadership” (sense-making and strategy), “Personal Leadership”, and “Team Leadership”; to provide the necessary balance of strategic context setting, concept knowledge and behavioural skill development to meet identified objectives. They were structured to take delegates on a logical “journey to application” - from understanding consumer change and the “big picture” dynamics and characteristics of the global automotive sector (and the Centre level and personal leadership challenges this presents); to acquiring the essential strategic business planning, innovation, personal and people management skills to address these challenges (to transform ourselves and our teams to support the long-term improvement and sustainable growth of our Audi Centres).

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In line with our principles of co-creation and ensuring joint ownership of the final “product”, Audi lead sponsors and organisational subject matter experts were involved in reviews and design sign-off at each development phase Our architecture was also based around a practical, blended learning approach to executive development which combined a range of learning approaches and focussed on the application of knowledge/skills/concepts to realworld business challenges at all stages of the learning process.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

360º

A bespoke 360-degree “leadership competency” assessment... to assess pre and post programme leadership competencies against the programme objectives and Audi competency framework

Key features included: • A programme virtual introduction and range of pre-programme start-up activities to build curiosity and engagement before formal delivery.

• A dedicated half-day pre-programme “Immersion Event” and an end of programme “Graduation Event” to provide clear signposts and start and end-point milestones in the learning journey.

• Individual Work-Based Challenge Projects to integrate key programme themes and facilitate post-programme application and impact at the Audi Centre level. These focused on developing creative solutions to real-life business problems and improvement priorities with each Audi Centre.

• A Hogan psychometric leadership assessment diagnostic to enable delegates to better understand their innate leadership characteristics (their leadership DNA).

• Individual and group coaching sessions.

Individual sessions focused on personalising the learning and supporting individual development plans/action planning.

• Award pathways to Chartered Management Institute (CMI) qualifications.

• Debate space within module design to support knowledge sharing and peer-to-peer learning.

• Online micro-topics webinars with theme experts to provide pre-work and priming content for each module and follow-up extended content on each theme.

• A bespoke 360-degree “leadership competency” assessment to supplement Hogan profiling and assess pre and post programme leadership competencies against the programme objectives and Audi competency framework.

• A dedicated, programme specific virtual learning environment platform (VLE) to support the entire learning journey and maintain delegate engagement outside of formal delivery.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

The impact Over the three years, the programme has equipped more than 100 managers across the Audi UK dealer network with “best in class” leadership capabilities – enabling them to improve the capability of the business to adapt to change, and ultimately, support the long-term sustainable growth of the Audi dealership network.

In terms of delegate satisfaction, the programme achieved ratings of 90% or above in every quarter across the delivery lifecycle and a cumulative (overall programme) satisfaction rating of 96.5%. On this measure, it performed significantly above the industry average (as defined by the FT customised executive education rankings) and made the Audi LEAD programme one of the best ever performing corporate education programmes at AMBS. The satisfaction ratings increased as the contract progressed. This was not an accident. It was because: (1) we measured programme service quality performance across the full range of

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In line with the programme objectives, indicators suggest that the programme had a significant impact on individual delegate leadership capability

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Audi UK / Alliance Manchester Business School (University of Manchester)

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Over the three years, the programme has equipped more than 100 managers across the Audi UK dealer network with “best in class” leadership capabilities

criteria in the FT Customised Executive Rankings (not just delegate satisfaction), and; (2) we used the outputs of this service quality monitoring as the inputs to our continuous improvement process. This allowed us to get a very detailed picture of ‘performance’ and continually make adjustments to content and delivery as we progressed through the contract.

Measures of learning effectiveness were derived from assessments of individual ABC projects, CMI assignments and online quizzes.

Based on this measure, all KPI’s were achieved.

Indicators of business impact were derived by measuring the monetary value of ABC project outcomes. Although the collation of these outcomes is still in progress, to date, the direct sales revenue gains from these projects are estimated to be in excess of £2 million per annum.

In short, all impact indicators suggest that the programme performed extremely well. In line with the programme objectives, indicators suggest that the programme had a significant impact on individual delegate leadership capability (demonstrated by improvements in leadership competency and effectiveness), on organisational

leadership processes and practice (demonstrated by improved cross-functional working) and on the broader Audi Centre level business change and business improvement objectives (demonstrated by the outputs of the integrated “work based challenge” projects). In other words, both our quantitative data and qualitative, “human scale” feedback suggests the programme has proved to be genuinely transformational at both the individual, group and business levels. As such, both partners are extremely proud of the Audi LEAD programme and believe it represents a best practice benchmark in leadership development within the automotive industry and beyond.

Karen Boulton, Network People Business Partner at Audi UK, said, ‘The success of this development programme has been built on the foundations of a fantastic working relationship with Alliance Manchester Business School, who not only understood our brand strategy and values but the importance of developing our leaders in our retail network. It’s wonderful to see how our people have grown since taking part in the programme and the value they are delivering to their businesses and our brand’.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Live for Good / CEDEP Global Executive Education Club

Entrepreneurship for Good

B

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In just three years, their co-designed programme accompanied nearly 160 young social entrepreneurs, from an idea to the realisation of their venture, with fast and impressive impact: • 85% have filed their articles of association, i.e. over 100 social enterprises created since 2018.

• The business survival rate is 77% up to 3 years after their passage through the programme (i.e. 12 points higher than the national average).

• According to an independent impact measurement firm (Citizen), the Entrepreneur for Good programme generates €5.1 in economic gains (or “Social Return on Investment”) for every €1 invested.

• 1/3 of the beneficiaries are either from rural/urban priority areas, have few or no qualifications, or are disabled.

• No one is left behind: 90% of the beneficiaries who stopped their project have found a job in a related field.

• In addition, multiple bridges were built with all stakeholders involved: faculty, learning partners, and corporates.

What is the reason for this success?

Ecosystem engagement, a comprehensive programme, and community building are key elements to the success, but not the only ones.

The partners apply a whole new mindset that reduces barriers to entry during the learning process, and provides the conditions to learn from collective intelligence and at an individual level.

© NATHALIEOUNDJIAN

ound by strong humanist values, Live for Good, a not-for-profit association committed to youth and an expert in positive impact entrepreneurship, and CEDEP, the Executive Education Club share a common vision of business - that of a more positive, more responsible and more virtuous company for society and the environment.

Since 2018, these two organisations have partnered to develop a programme that provides a unique safe space and development structure for young social entrepreneurs coming from all walks of life. They can explore, develop, implement and succeed in the translation of their initial idea into a sustainable and successful social business venture.

Examples of successful projects are Clarisse (FaBRICK), who designs building material made from recycled clothing; Mathieu (GobUse), who organises selective sorting and collection of masks by disabled people prior to recycling; and Stéphane (BioDemain), who developed an ethical brand that supports and fairly remunerates farmers during the difficult period of organic conversion.

Live for Good brought its knowledge of the start-up world, a new network of entrepreneurs, and their positive vision of how business could be conducted for the benefit of society.

CEDEP, known for its agility in co-designing programmes for highly demanding organisations, brought its academic credibility, learner-centred pedagogical design experience and magnificent physical campus in the forest of Fontainebleau, France.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Live for Good / CEDEP Global Executive Education Club

77%

The business survival rate is 77% up to 3 years after their passage through the programme (i.e. 12 points higher than the national average)

Engaging the ecosystem Live for Good animates a wide range of stakeholders. It has developed an impressive number of local public and private partners to identify and source entrepreneurs, manages a network of coaches and the community.

CEDEP, its board, corporate members and learning partners spontaneously accepted to partner as their contribution to help transform society, thereby reinforcing CEDEP’s strategic move to act for the greater good. The contribution took the form of faculty donating sessions, reducing costs of hosting the programme, allowing the design of sessions for corporates and entrepreneurs in programmes, being willing to test and progress on pedagogy, etc.

Designing a comprehensive learning journey The “Entrepreneur for Good” programme, the backbone of which is the 11-day residential campus programme at CEDEP, individual follow-up with coaches, a digital platform, and the Gabriel Award offer a very comprehensive journey of transformation over nine months and even beyond. It allows for collective and individual long-term follow-up.

Community building To have a lasting impact, Live for Good realised early in the process that it needed an infrastructure capable of supporting dozens of entrepreneurs, thereby creating a community of mutual support.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Live for Good / CEDEP Global Executive Education Club

The residential campus, composed of three periods of three to four days, is undoubtedly one of the most powerful moments for the young people, both in terms of learning and psychology.

Immersed in the campus for three weeks alongside 49 other young people, they live a unique human experience that amplifies their transformation journey and their project’s success.

They strengthen their self-confidence, create a real sense of belonging to a group and strongly encourage their commitment throughout the programme. Peer-to-peer learning, friendships, collaboration on projects, development of synergies become real assets on which each entrepreneur can draw.

Community building is then sustained by a number of activities led by the Live for Good team.

100+

over 100 social entreprises created since 2018

© GILLES ROLLE

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© NATHALIEOUNDJIAN

A new mindset Reducing entry barriers was key. The model itself of CEDEP played a role, not being a business school or university. Many young people do not recognize themselves in traditional models, which are often too remote from reality, with no immediate application of the knowledge acquired. Supporting people with few or no qualifications, for example, requires banishing all forms of top-down teaching and not focusing exclusively on the technical know-how of business creation (e.g. finance, legal workshops, etc.). Accompanying these groups requires reinventing oneself, innovating on the pedagogical level by focusing, for example, on “soft skills” (creativity, cooperation, emotional intelligence, self-confidence and self-care etc.).

They need a pedagogical model that breaks with abstraction, which is anchored in the reality of the field, inclusive, that allows the immediate application of learning on projects, where one is an actor in one’s own learning.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Live for Good / CEDEP Global Executive Education Club

The learning journey on campus The programme is based on an innovative pedagogical approach with two axes: - Developing the entrepreneurial posture and positive leadership capability of young people by providing them with a foundation of life skills.

- Supporting the creation and acceleration of their positive-impact entrepreneurship project by providing them with a foundation of know-how and all the necessary resources.

The programme starts by creating the conditions. The human side of the campus with the care of every actor in the system, from the receptionist to the faculty, acts as a trust builder.

Johana Dunlop, CEDEP programme director, Christophe Conceicao, Live for Good Managing Director, The Courtois founding family and the entrepreneurs on campus

The learner is then put at the centre: Peer learning happens thanks to methods developed at CEDEP like project insight fairs and workshops based on neuroscientific advances applied to the field of knowledge acquisition that allows participants to learn through questions, the eyes of others, intensive listening, and openness to others, with a presentation exercise repeated and applied to their individual project.

This allows entrepreneurs to understand their project in-depth, rethink or reposition it, sometimes even pivot entirely and acquire a method of reflection that will be useful for any future project.

Using real-world projects, the social entrepreneurial venture becomes part of the pedagogical material of the programme. This facilitates tackling one complexity, which is to be able to support a diverse target audience with projects at different stages of development.

Another originality of the curriculum is the way the learning materialises by flipping classroom dynamics in two stages: first, the teacher starts, and as soon as possible “flips” the classroom, so that the participants feel at the centre of their own learning; then, they do the same to themselves - becoming the teachers of each other through collective intelligence mechanisms.

The role of the programme director is central: present at all sessions, she takes into account the emotional maturity of the entrepreneurs to push ideas or wait and recalibrates the internal elements of each learning module as appropriate.

Learning benefits for the ecosystem Both partners are learning along the way, and the programme is constantly evolving. Making sense and accompanying the entrepreneurs is what matters.

Faculty learn to work with the younger generation, who give more direct feedback and are thus more challenging. Their concentration time is shorter which forces a reinvention in creating deep learning. They also bring a strong moral dimension into business and a lot of positive energy!

Corporate Members get to know these young talents and their aspirations. They can potentially partner on social innovations. Some members are in discussions to host campuses of young social entrepreneurs within their organisation.

CEDEP is taking a longer-term view through this social and environmental dimension and has integrated a new type of stakeholder that greatly enriches its ecosystem.

Live for Good is becoming a successful and renowned platform for social entrepreneurs to launch their ventures.

The young entrepreneurs have access to content, support and build a lifelong community.

All benefit from the highly positive energy!

For more information, visit https://live-for-good.org/fr https://www.cedep.fr/ Reference “Strategic Challenges as a Learning Vehicle in Executive Education”, by de Vries et al, International Journal of Management Education 18 (2020)

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Excellence in Practice 2021

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

Creating a transformative leadership culture E

stablished in 1863, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) is an independent, neutral organisation operating worldwide, helping people affected by conflict and armed violence and promoting the laws that protect victims of war. Based in Geneva, Switzerland, it employs over 20,000 people in more than 80 countries.

In 2014, the ICRC partnered with Hult Ashridge Executive Education to create the Humanitarian Leadership & Management School (HLMS). The HLMS is building inclusive, authentic leadership at all levels by developing leaders to deal with humanitarian challenges in the most effective way. Its purpose is to contribute a new transformative and inclusive leadership culture in the ICRC, bringing together diverse leaders from across the organisation to learn with and from each other.

Over the past seven years, almost 1400 managers of 104 different nationalities and various metiers and hierarchies have attended at least one of the three HLMS Modules, with boundaries broken and new connections forged.

The programme continues to the present day, evolving with the needs and evolution of this unique organisation and those of its talented and increasingly diverse workforce carrying out such an important role in the world.

‘We all need to focus on building a healthy and inclusive working environment where everyone feels valued, empowered, and encouraged to challenge the status quo. Genuine and seamless collaboration – across hierarchical and geographical boundaries – also needs to be incentivized and strengthened, to allow for creative thinking and new ways of problemsolving.’ - Robert Mardini, ICRC Director General

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Changing humanitarian landscape The world is becoming more volatile, complex and ambiguous, increasing the complexity and nature of armed conflicts and humanitarian needs. As such, for ICRC to maintain its strictly humanitarian response to the affected people’s needs, the ICRC had to evolve while remaining true to its mandate.

The ICRC has been experiencing a few years of transformation, reflecting the rapidly changing landscape of conflict and humanitarian work, the diversification of its own makeup, and the challenges of implementing change within a large organisation with a rich heritage.

The ICRC has been on a journey to effectively leverage the rich diversity throughout the organisation. However, this has not always been reflected in its leadership roles and practices.

For example, career progression into leadership was historically restricted to the 20% “mobile” expat staff, and the leadership practices and approaches have not embodied the full diversity of the workforce. The organisation needed to tap into the potential of its entire employee base to increase engagement at a local level and providing visible pathways to development.

To better serve people affected by conflict, it was identified that knowledge, communication and expertise were being constrained within silos, whether geographical, technical or hierarchical.

At times, this left room for better collaboration and effective use of collective intelligence.

Alongside all of the above, it was key to transform the organisation while still honouring its rich history and aligning with its wonderful intrinsic DNA. ‘The HLMS has a big role in bridging gaps and hierarchies in the ICRC.’ - Gherardo Pontrandolfi, HR Director

Excellence in Practice 2021 | International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

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Excellence in Practice 2021

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

Commitment to development The organisational and senior stakeholder commitment to the transformation effort has never been in doubt, with its aims carefully inscribed in strategy documents and voiced by senior leadership.

ICRC selected Hult Ashridge as a partner due to their focus on the human, interpersonal and reflective approaches to learning, teaching and research, which is aligned with the ICRC vision and goals. Ashridge Executive Education also had the experience of partnering with ICRC to design and deliver an earlier leadership programme and therefore understood the culture and challenges at play.

It has been crucial for the project to bring the expected results that both ICRC and Hult Ashridge facilitators design and deliver the programme together. This was judged to take advantage of the latest academic research and best practice combined with the real experience of the ICRC humanitarian context and the ability to encourage leaders to fully apply the learning in practice. This had a major impact on adoption and engagement with the programme.

The transformational nature of the programme faced resistance from some managers that perceived it as a challenge to the “good old” ways of doing things. The challenge was not just in the “new” concepts and their applicability for leaders in the ICRC but also for the concept of “leadership at all levels”, breaking otherwise comfortable boundaries. Through active and continuous feedback-seeking and adaptation, the programme’s evolution facilitated their adoption of what it offers. The programme’s evolution increased its relevance to the ICRC reality, the applicability of attitudes, behaviours and mindsets to the evolving leadership culture in the organisation.

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Excellence in Practice 2021 | International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

1400

Over the past seven years, almost 1400 managers of 104 different nationalities and various metiers and hierarchies have attended at least one of the three HLMS Modules, with boundaries broken and new connections forged

Learning together The approach has been to strengthen the focus on leadership, relationships, and collaboration across the ICRC. This has been achieved by having leaders learning together in diverse groups which span hierarchy, function, nationality, and experience. The programme focuses on balancing the “how” of leadership and not just the “what”. As such, the HLMS had to focus on transformative attitudes, behaviours and mindset, and to introduce a common leadership language to contribute to a wider transformation across the organisation.

The diversity of the participants, the cultural change it promotes, and the resistance and uncertainty it creates required an engaging and stimulating design for all participants despite their differences. It had to apply to people of different educational, cultural and technical backgrounds as well as their different seniority levels. It also had to align with other transformations within and outside the organisation.

The co-designed and co-delivered, threemodule programme aims to develop strong and passionate leaders who manage, empower and inspire a diverse and high-performance workforce and set the example for effective leadership. Participants must start at the beginning and complete each of the three modules to progress regardless of experience or seniority. They must apply for a place by way of a “Letter of Motivation” to ensure they are ready to embark upon this journey.

Each module consists of distinct phases: • Distance learning: 20 hours of reading, assessed e-learning and coaching.

• Face-to-face: A 5-day programme of experiential learning, exchange & reflection.

• Action Learning Sets: conducted during the face-to-face week, participants work in smaller groups to discuss challenges and go through a peer coaching process.

• Work-based Learning: 30 hours of applying the learned skills in a workplace setting.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

Pre-COVID, teaching was delivered in Kenya, Jordan, Thailand, Senegal as well as Switzerland. During the pandemic, the programme has successfully transitioned to a virtual platform and has grown to become a truly global, blended programme. Evaluations post-programme reflect a positive rating of the virtual experience by the participants, significantly above expectations.

Leadership and cultural impact The programme has contributed significantly to the wider organisational transformation ongoing across the ICRC, and all staff have a very positive view of the HLMS regardless of whether they have attended the programme or not.

It has been shown to bring people together, breaking down silos and enabling more effective collaboration in various ways. It unites people through a common leadership language, attitudes, behaviours and mindsets as well as providing transformative tools and practices.

It creates a network of leaders across the organisation that contribute to wider organisational transformation.

‘I feel there has been an impact on the ICRC leadership culture, and this impact is also reflected in the staff barometer data that came out where we realized that people who have done the HLMS Modules are more positively assessed by their teams.’ - Balthasar Staehelin, Former Deputy Director General of the ICRC The HLMS is creating impact culturally and behaviourally in both anticipated and unexpected ways. The programme is helping to support ICRC’s credibility and performance in

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the future through the development of relevant leaders in the evolving Humanitarian field. The programme has now been accredited to support an optional ongoing journey of a Master’s Degree in Humanitarian Leadership from the University of Lucerne.

Participation in the HLMS programme is now an essential commitment for leaders in the ICRC and a prerequisite for senior management positions in the organisation, demonstrating the importance of these teachings in shaping the leadership practices for the organisation.

The leadership culture and practices the HLMS is building in the ICRC are not just on an organisational level. Most of the participants highlight the bigger impact it had on them in their personal lives and their roles in society.

The quality of the transformational learning of the HLMS and what it teaches today attracted participants from different National Red Cross and Crescent Societies who are starting to attend the programme. The transformational nature of the programme itself and its capacity to impactfully touch these diverse participants is exceptional and one that is gradually but surely making a difference.

‘I feel I have grown as a manager, but also as a person, a father, a husband and a colleague. I have been the sceptical one that needed to be convinced, the critical challenger during these modules, often sharing strong opinions and doubts. You provided a safe space to learn, to exchange, to motivate me to continue to believe in the beauty of the ideals for which we work.’

- Manager in the field

Excellence in Practice 2021 | International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) / Hult Ashridge Executive Education

The transformational nature of the programme itself and its capacity to impactfully touch these diverse participants is exceptional and one that is gradually but surely making a difference

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Atos / Cranfield School of Management

Driving customer retention and project success through professionalisation A

tos is a global leader in digital transformation with 105,000 employees and annual revenue of €11 billion. It is the European number one in Cybersecurity, Cloud and High-Performance Computing, providing tailored end-to-end solutions for all industries in 71 countries.

Atos delivers digital transformations, and project failure is costly. Successful mergers and acquisitions had brought differing companyspecific standards. They recognised their Career Framework lacked an offering for Senior Project Managers to help them progress to Programme Managers. Programmes are inherently more complex than projects, hence at higher risk of failure; therefore, well-developed programmemanagers are key to reducing failure and retaining customers.

Atos’ senior leaders recognise that successful project delivery, i.e. hitting all the metrics whilst engaging and retaining the client, is only possible with a combination of technical ability (defined as the “What”) and inspiring leadership (the “How”). They recognised the “How” aspect was missing.

In summary, Atos recognised they needed global performance standards, complete career pathways, and development that retained their highest-level talent. In order that Senior Project Managers would live and breathe the “How” in a way that was focussed on business outcomes, Atos wanted the development to be totally grounded in Atos’ business reality.

Their task was to find a learning partner who could rise to those challenges.

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The approach Cranfield University is the UK’s only wholly postgraduate university, creating leaders for technology in aerospace, defence & security, energy, environment and agrifood, management, manufacturing, transport systems and water, and features in the UK top ten for commercial research, consultancy and professional development.

Cranfield Executive Development (CED) has access to university expertise and hence provides a unique blend of leadership facilitation, consultancy and technology-based solutions that move businesses to future desired states.

CED utilises data-driven Design4Impact™ methodologies that ensure the clients’ business reality is at the heart of every solution.

Cranfield demonstrated the “How” could be addressed with a unique Grounded Experiential Learning (GEL) process. At its heart, GEL is a custom-built business simulation, so closely replicating an organisation’s realities that it feels real. Combining ideas, implications, experience, and reflection, delivered in a cyclical cadence creates behavioural shifts in participants, thereby shortening the gap between transfer of learning to the workplace.

Grounded: Cranfield offered to create from scratch a unique Atos business simulation comprising an unfolding (fictional) client story, weaving in Learning about world-class programme management, Atos’ processes, systems, and language.

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Atos is the European number one in Cybersecurity, Cloud and High-Performance Computing, providing tailored end-to-end solutions for all industries in 71 countries

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Atos / Cranfield School of Management

Learning

C on c

Shift from teaching to facilitating a learning experience.

Valuing tacit, experiential knowledge.

Stories Lectures Experiences

Debriefing Reviews Discussion

Cases/ Examples Discussion Exercises

Ref

Comprising performative aspects of work.

lications/Applica tio n

Collaborative effort with organisational insiders.

Imp

Embedded in learner’s organisational reality.

ns Synthes lectio is

Fostering personal reflection, discovery, realisation, assessment.

Grounded

epts/Ideas

Simulated meetings/events based on crafted ‘teaching’ case in a safe learning environment.

Directed observation, peer reflections and feedback - options rather than answers, highlighting biases and heuristics.

s

Experiential Simulations Role Plays Observation

s Acti ons/Experience

Fig 1: Grounded Experiential Learning Summary

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Atos / Cranfield School of Management

ORGANISATIONAL CAPABILITIES Learning, Change and Operational

DIRECT CONTRIBUTORS

INDIRECT CONTRIBUTORS

Participants, Sponsors and Tutors

Non-participanting Senior Leaders, Peers and Subordinates

Knowledge, Experience and Behaviour

Knowledge, Experience and Behaviour

LEADERSHIP DEVELOPMENT Bringing Change to: Skills & Knowledge Sensemaking Conversations Engagement Alignment Relationships

ORGANISATIONAL CHANGE Learning Capabilities Change Capabilities Operational Capabilities

ORGANISATIONAL PERFORMANCE

Fig 2: Design4Impact

Experiential: The business simulation would mirror Atos’ typical project life-cycle, posing a series of challenges/dilemmas addressed by role-played meetings with key stakeholders played by Cranfield faculty. Participants would prepare the meetings; some would participate in the role-play; others observe and offer feedback during detailed debriefings. Debriefs would provide feedback on participants’ actions/ behaviours, explicitly linked to classroom learning content. This would further ground the learning within reality to shorten the transfer of learning gap.

The solution The programme focussed on critical Atos competencies, identified by examining global alignment: notably Financial Management, Managing customers and stakeholders, General Management skills and Relationship Management.

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Cranfield interviewed a “diagonal slice of the business”, i.e. horizontal with a range of departments/functions to ensure breadth, and vertical with a range of levels including senior leaders, potential participants and those who would report to participants.

Cranfield’s Design4Impact™ methodology, a unique, systemic approach to impact management developed from Dr Wendy Shepherd’s doctoral research into ‘Organisational Level Impact of Leadership Development’. Design4Impact™ centres on five key drivers of impact that transform individual Knowledge Skills & Behaviours (KSB’s) into organisational level outcomes.

The KSB’s mapping against the Design4Impact™ Drivers and granular understanding of Atos challenges and culture enabled Cranfield to develop a bespoke GEL business simulation that replicated Atos’ reality.

This ensured that every conversation within the simulation was aligned to Atos business impact.

105k Atos is a global leader in digital transformation with 105,000 employees and annual revenue of €11 billion

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Atos / Cranfield School of Management

The final design comprised face-to-face modules, intervening webinars, online learning, 360 feedback and coaching. While the design was totally grounded in Atos’ reality, the world did not stay still around Atos, so it was regularly updated to stay aligned with business realities.

Senior leaders attended sessions, sharing insights and experiences from current challenges, e.g. Atos’ involvement in the 2016 Olympics.

We ran team-based evening activities to encourage networking for collaboration, including Scavenger hunts, “Cook your own dinner”, quizzes and motor racing using Cranfield’s Formula 1 Simulator.

And then COVID-19 appeared… When the pandemic hit, the programme had been running successfully for five years. The interactive nature of the delivery, and the real-life feel of the GEL simulation, were described as two key reasons for its success, so a switch to online was potentially detrimental. But to reflect Atos’ global nature, one GEL simulation already deliberately replicated the virtual world, testing participants’ ability to engage stakeholders when working remotely, so its inclusion in the original design was prophetic. Cranfield was able to swiftly re-design the whole programme to an online format without decreasing engagement or impact.

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Participants

84%

Enhanced Conversations & Communication

100%

Interviewees saved projects from failure and improved customer retention

26

Countries

78%

Enhanced Sense making & problem solving

360

The final design comprised face-to-face modules, intervening webinars, online learning, 360 feedback and coaching

Fig 3: Statistics Summary

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Atos / Cranfield School of Management

The impact Long-term evaluation results demonstrated high adoption of the 5 Design4Impact™ Behavioural Drivers that create organisational change. Several themes emerged from each Driver: Sensemaking and problem solving • More innovative, out-of-the-box thinking • Ability to resolve and reduce project “escalations” • Deeper understanding of issues Conversations and communication • Stepping up to difficult conversations and politically sensitive situations • Working with diverse cultures • Bringing unconscious behaviours into consciousness Engagement and motivation • Mentoring/coaching/developing others, sharing best practice • Using a wider range of techniques to achieve “buy-in” and tackle dis-engagement

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Alignment and priorities • Strategic, big-picture thinking, customer focus • Better work/life balance • Taking ownership and accountability Relationships and networks • Effective voice in senior/C-suite meetings/forums • Building value-driven stakeholder/customer relationships, partnerships and networks In a long-term evaluation study involving in-depth interviews, every participant shared examples of projects saved from failure and improved customer retention, each citing £100,000’s worth of revenue.

Participants are from 26 countries, covering every major business unit and continent, creating collaborations across merger/acquisition lines.

76% of programme applicants enrol because they have seen previous participants’ successes.

49% of evaluation respondents were promoted after the programme. Those not promoted saw their career positively impacted by increased range and level of responsibilities.

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Participants are from 26 countries, covering every major business unit and continent, creating collaborations across merger/acquisition lines

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Atos / Cranfield School of Management

The programme is now recognised across Atos as a career-defining programme that conveys a mark of proficiency and credibility. It is seen as the key piece for the transformation of Senior Project Managers into Programme Managers. Managers continually put forward employees, and some specifically to develop their successors.

The long-term evaluation study included managers who reported increases in project success and improved customer retention.

Those who had previously been participants themselves described shifts in attitude and behaviours reminiscent of their own change post-programme. And the commonality of experience and vocabulary they now share enables more effective collaboration through greater understanding and trust.

There is now executive-level recognition within Atos of the positive business impact of Learning and Development. The programme is regarded highly within Atos as a key development for connecting, growing and retaining talent. All of this has been made possible by the commitment to collaborative working by L&D professionals from both Atos and Cranfield.

We created a video featuring Cranfield and Atos stakeholders describing the programme.

Atos participants (on their final module) share their experiences, describing how the learning has already made an impact. You can view this at www.cranfield.ac.uk/video/atos

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Cargill / INSEAD

Cargill catalyst: “Paying it forward” with INSEAD

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Excellence in Practice 2021 | Cargill / INSEAD

PICTURE COURTESY CARGILL

The challenges and opportunities added up to a need to transform on a vast scale – fast. And the implications for leadership development were clear

How do you transform an agricultural and industrial giant with 155,000 employees in 70 countries? Simply take the top 1,700 leaders, give them a new mindset… and get them to pass it on.

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argill has a proud 155-year history in food, agriculture, nutrition and risk management.

Today, it is the largest privately held corporation by revenue ($114.6 billion in 2020) in the US. But in 2017, its senior leaders recognised that the evolving competitive landscape presented big new challenges. Consumer, supplier and employee needs were changing, technology was advancing, and social and business issues were converging – all at high speed.

Change was also bringing new opportunities.

There was huge potential for Cargill, from healthier salmon farming and vegan “meat” to sustainable cocoa and digitised supply chains.

The challenges and opportunities added up to a need to transform on a vast scale – fast.

And the implications for leadership development were clear. Julie Dervin, Head of Global Learning and Development, explains, ‘We were asked to entirely reimagine our programmes. Not that the previous ones had gotten it wrong--we just needed something in addition to strong personal leadership skills if we were to accelerate up to the waterline’.

In short, there was a need for a fast-acting catalyst to change mindsets and innovate in processes and products. Much more than a leadership programme, Cargill needed a call to action.

Choosing INSEAD As one of the world’s leading graduate business schools, and one of the most international, INSEAD (with campuses in France, Singapore and Abu Dhabi) was an obvious choice for a global corporation. But Dervin and her colleagues wanted more than excellence and global perspectives. They had identified that in order to scale up leadership transformation at high speed, learning had to move from a traditional, in-person approach to a more digital approach – effectively modelling the innovation required throughout the business.

‘Several other top schools insisted that senior leaders could not adapt to digital learning experiences’, says Dervin. ‘We needed a partner who was willing to innovate and experiment with us, and we discovered that INSEAD was on that same journey.’

Among the fellow travellers at INSEAD were Affiliate Professor of Strategy, James Costantini, and Mary Carey, Regional Director of Executive Education. In August 2017, they both boarded planes to Minneapolis and embarked on a three-day design workshop in the basement of Cargill’s headquarters in Wayzata, Minn.

Costantini’s analysis was simple: ‘If the top 1,700 leaders all take a small step in the same direction, the centre of gravity of the whole organisation will shift. If they all take a larger step, they will reach a tipping point – and individual change becomes organisational transformation.’

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Mapping the desired impact The Cargill and INSEAD team started by defining the desired business impacts. They then systematically mapped paths back through the required behaviour changes to arrive at the learning objectives. Finally, Costantini and Carey interviewed around 100 top executives, including the CEO and the entire C-suite. ‘I don’t think I’ve been involved in a programme where so many people were consulted on the design’, recalls Costantini. ‘By now, James and I were living and breathing Cargill’, adds Carey.

Back at INSEAD, they enlisted some of their most eminent colleagues, including Nathan Furr, co-author of the bestselling Innovators’ Method and Deputy Dean and Peter Zemsky, leader of the school’s digitalisation initiatives.

The carefully mapped learning objectives were finally translated into an ambitious series of programmes, cascading from the 120 top executives to the next most senior 240. The four modules or “experiences” would cover: • a new leadership mindset for a new world; • leading strategy in digital disruption; • activating organisational structure and networks; • cultivating corporate culture to drive innovation.

Learners as teachers: executive sponsors The clever twist, however, was the concept of “executive sponsors” to pay the learning forward. Put simply, each cohort of 40 managers would be accompanied through their learning by a pair of more senior leaders. Part participant, part mentor, these sponsors would actively participate in all sessions, playing three essential roles:

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• Validating the importance and relevance of the programme content to real-life Cargill practice; • Acting as a transparent communication channel up (and down) the hierarchy; • Coaching participants through their “application challenges” (real-life strategic projects anchored in the learning).

The first 120 participants would be “sponsored” by two executive team members, while subsequent cohorts would have a combination of executive-team and less senior “alumni”. They would pay forward until a tipping point was reached.

The perfect blend of digital and face-to-face Learning takes up valuable business time, and paying it forward takes even more time. But Catalyst was ingeniously designed. The first and third face-to-face modules were kept short and intense at just three days. The intervening second module was delivered fully online and part-time, as was the fourth and final “experience”. Traditional lectures were chopped up into short, punchy videos with added quizzes, online discussions and interactive exercises for the digital delivery.

PICTURE COURTESY CARGILL

Cargill / INSEAD

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Cargill / INSEAD

The positive feedback encouraged the CargillINSEAD team to press on with developing the next 1,300+ leaders. However, it was not financially viable to roll out the programme on such a scale. Instead, the bold decision was taken to do an entirely digital version with just three modules and 350–400 learners per intake.

This required further programme design but reduced the required investment by 80%.

Crucially, the concept of paying it forward was maintained. The cohorts were divided into diverse groups of 50, each with two sponsors, who regularly interacted with participants on scheduled calls.

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Crucially, the concept of paying it forward was maintained. The cohorts were divided into diverse groups of 50, each with two sponsors, who regularly interacted with participants on scheduled calls

The standout discovery from the early cohorts was that digital learning – INSEAD-style – really does work for senior executives. Cargill’s top 360 leaders particularly appreciated the combination of flexibility (working at their own pace) with discipline (shared intermediate deadlines). Xavier Vargas, Group Leader of Protein and Salt, summed up the general feeling of surprise, ‘I actually enjoyed the online experience more than the in-person experience!

The content is really good, it’s interactive, and the short videos are better than long classes.’

A new, shared language In 2020, as the rest of the world began to shut down, Catalyst simply went ahead as planned (with some extensions of deadlines). By now, it was more than a programme and a call to action; it was a powerful learning community with a shared language. Costantini sums it up, ‘Any one of the top 1,700 leaders knows that all of the other 1,699 have had exposure to the same concepts’.

Better still, the shared language has enabled participants to pay the learning forward to their teams. One business unit has enlisted two major restaurant chains as customers by creating a “minimal viable product”. Another has used the same concept to gain an estimated $10 million in new revenue. An R&D team has increased its ROI from 9% to 20%, while two leaders of country operations who met at Catalyst have achieved a 70% cost reduction by working together.

During the last fiscal year, amid the global pandemic, Cargill posted its best-ever financial results. As Dianne Russo, Global Lead, Executive and Leadership Development, puts it, ‘Our leaders embraced, applied and executed Catalyst and, above all, paid forward to create powerful impact’.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

CaixaBank Group / UPF Barcelona School of Management

Risk school experience Tailored training to master risk 3.3%

A

school to restore professionals’ confidence in granting credit risk, increase quality credit investment and reduce arrears. These are the objectives of the Risk School created by CaixaBank and the UPF Barcelona School of Management (UPF-BSM).

Setting up a school to train the workers of one of the main financial institutions in Spain in the post-2008 context was a titanic challenge.

A change and a mission that required commitment and leadership from the highest levels of the organisation.

In this context, CaixaBank created a school for the bank’s employees to train the entire workforce in risk matters, with the aim of supporting expert advice, bank risk management, and asset growth through credit operations. In addition, the organisation anticipated the demanding European regulatory requirements regarding knowledge and competence applicable to personnel, which the European Union would later require, where the granting of credit in a prudent, rigorous, and responsible way is increasingly important. This was all in addition to trying to have a favourable impact on the business.

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In addition, the NPL ratio has shown a constant reduction throughout the same period, which indicates a continuous improvement in the quality of the loan portfolio, decreasing to 3.3% in 2020

‘In 2015, CaixaBank opted for the creation of a risk school for the training of its employees. It was an ambitious bet and done in anticipation of future regulatory requirements regarding knowledge and skills (which we can see has come about with the Real Estate Financing Law or with the EBA Origination and Follow-up Guide)’, comments Sergi Sala, Director of Business Risk Development. ‘The objectives that have been achieved thanks to the creation of the school are multiple, such as the transmission of the culture and risk management policies of CaixaBank of particular importance in the integration of acquired entities, practical training linked to the business, definition of the necessary knowledge that each function must have, the offering of quality training certified by a prestigious university, and building a training itinerary for the development of talent in risk.

The school has provided support for the training of critical professional skills, as well as a boost to the model for decentralisation in risk management’, said Sala.

Excellence in Practice 2021 | CaixaBank Group / UPF Barcelona School of Management

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Excellence in Practice 2021

CaixaBank Group / UPF Barcelona School of Management

The organisation collaborates in this project with a regular partner in the training of its staff, the UPF Barcelona School of Management.

UPF-BSM’s specialisation in training for the banking sector, its 15 years of experience in developing joint training actions with CaixaBank, and the existence of shared visions and values were key to starting the challenge together.

‘Participation in this project has allowed us to display our vocation for social impact through a training itinerary that adjusts to a challenging context’, stated José M. Martínez-Sierra, General Director of the UPF Barcelona School of Management.

And so, the journey began. Today, the Risk School has four levels of difficulty and training and is adapted to the different profiles of CaixaBank employees according to their functions and professional needs. It is basically developed with virtual content through the online platform that the organisation has for training its employees in other subjects and is complemented with some face-to-face sessions given by internal trainers.

It is in this way that training and tools for professional development are provided.

The non-performing loan (NPL) ratio reduced The results are palpable and positive. The implementation and development of the Risk School since 2015 has meant a set of improvements and benefits in the evolution of the organisation, as well as the fulfilment of the objectives for which it was created. With regard to the increase in quality loan investments, from 2015 to 2020, CaixaBank’s healthy loan portfolio (without arrears) has increased annually, from 184.3 billion euros to 235.7 billion euros.

In addition, the NPL ratio has shown a constant reduction throughout the same period, which indicates a continuous improvement in the quality of the loan portfolio, decreasing to 3.3% in 2020. In this sense, the organisation managed to eliminate the existing gap with its peers: at the end of 2020, BBVA closed with a rate of 4%, while Banco Santander’s rate amounted to 3.21%.

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Excellence in Practice 2021 | CaixaBank Group / UPF Barcelona School of Management

...the collaborative development of the project has meant a significant transfer of knowledge, based on more than 25,000 enrolments, combining practical experience with academic rigour

Training works In 2018, CaixaBank carried out a quantitative analysis of the impact of the aforementioned training on the default rate of operations.

They compared the default rate of operations authorised by employees who had undertaken or were taking training with operations by the rest of the employees who had not undertaken any training.

The result showed that default rate of operations of those who took or were taking the programme were 2.1% and 2.6% for the group that had not taken it.

Thanks to the training actions carried out by the Risk School, it has been possible to transmit the organisation’s risk culture to a large number of professionals whose functions are related to contributing to business.

‘At UPF-BSM, we understand training activity as a multidisciplinary meeting between diverse people and institutions that mutually enrich each other to make a valuable contribution to society. And in this context, the collaborative development of the project has meant a significant transfer of knowledge, based on more than 25,000 enrolments, combining practical experience with academic rigour, which has had a direct impact on the quality of credit management and the development of the capacities of these professionals’, summed up the former dean of UPF-BSM and rector of UPF, Professor Oriol Amat.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Global Reporting Initiative / CENTRUM PUCP Business School

Corporate sustainability and reporting for competitive business programme in Peru

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Excellence in Practice 2021 | Global Reporting Initiative / CENTRUM PUCP Business School

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ENTRUM PUCP and Global Reporting Initiative are honoured to receive the 2021 EFMD Excellence in Practice SILVER Award in the “Social and Environmental Impact” category. This article presents the key issues of the case study on the Corporate Sustainability and Reporting for Competitive Business Programme in Peru.

The Challenge On the part of GRI, “the Programme’s main challenges are increasing the productivity and competitiveness of participating companies, generating jobs, and contributing to better integration of SMEs in global value chains through sustainability reporting,” says Daniel Vargas, GRI Peru.

In this sense, CENTRUM PUCP was invited by GRI in 2018 to contribute to the Programme and be aware of its social responsibility as a business school; the decision was made to collaborate to fulfil the challenges set out. The contributions as an academic institution were in the specific area of learning and development, and two challenges were identified. The first challenge relates to the transfer of knowledge and its application by SMEs in implementing sustainability reporting effectively. These challenges lie mainly in the group’s heterogeneity and geographical location, as the participants have quite different educational backgrounds and are located in other provinces of Peru. Several teaching tools were used to reach the desired achievements and overcome the challenges, such as face-to-face workshops, materials development, online courses, and consultancies. As learning methodologies, group dynamics, case studies, and practical exercises were used. As a result, SMEs actively participated in the courses and applied the learnings appropriately, as attested in sustainability reports.

The second challenge was to get teachers and students involved in the Programme. The first awareness-raising strategies were to invite some professors to attend the first GRI workshops, bring GRI Peru’s director to meet them at CENTRUM PUCP, and ask them to participate in the activities. Concerning MBA students, meetings were held to present the Programme and invite them to participate. As a result, the involvement of seven professors and more than 100 MBA students was achieved.

Regarding the implementation process, it all starts when implementing partners and anchor companies invite their suppliers (SMEs), which belong to a local cluster, to participate in the Programme. In 2018, the Programme started in Peru with 72 SMEs, and by 2020, there are almost 1,000 SMEs and more than 30 anchor companies.

The Programme is structured through various training and capacity-building activities such as workshops, seminars, consultancies, and online courses. It promotes the use of sustainability reports for decision-making by key actors in society.

In summary, “the challenges were overcome by an adequate commitment and involvement of stakeholders. This cohesion is also due to the transparency in communication which was always open and participatory,” states Luciano Barcellos, CENTRUM PUCP. The Commitment Considering the complexity of working with heterogeneous groups and in different geographical locations, the parties involved’ commitment was essential for the Programme’s success. For the SMEs, this commitment can be seen in their attendance at events, implementation and improvements in management, and the elaboration of sustainability reports.

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Excellence in Practice 2021

Global Reporting Initiative / CENTRUM PUCP Business School

The L&D Initiative The first initiative was the development and implementation in 2018 of practical workshops to train 140 SME representatives in sustainability management.

The second initiative was the development of learning materials for sustainability reporting conducted in 2019. These learning materials supported SME representatives to improve their understanding and report their sustainability performance and impact.

Another initiative was the Conference “The road to a more competitive Peru” held on 4 June 2019 at CENTRUM PUCP’s premises. The event was attended by 800 people.

In the same vein, a press conference was held at Diario Gestión on 28 June 2019 on “Sustainability: the new challenge for large companies and their suppliers”.

The production of five online courses linked to GRI standards was another initiative developed in 2019. Five professors from CENTRUM PUCP participated in this work, which indicates the teaching staff’s involvement in the Programme.

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These courses were recorded and attended by 500 SME representatives.

Of particular note was the sixth initiative implementing a planning and engagement workshop held on 13 September 2019 in the CENTRUM PUCP auditorium. Two professors led the event and attended by 300 SME entrepreneurs participating in the Programme in Peru.

The initiatives also involved MBA students in 2019 and 2020. In this case, students carry out research projects linked to the Programme through their master’s theses, generating new knowledge that can benefit both the SMEs and society. The theses include specialised management consultancy services and are carried out under the academic supervision of the professors. So far, 27 groups, represented by 108 MBA students, have participated in this initiative.

Regarding the workshop to raise awareness and train 127 journalists in Social Responsibility and Sustainability. The five courses were taught voluntarily by five CENTRUM PUCP professors and Director of GRI in 2020 through the digital platform.

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The first initiative was the development and implementation in 2018 of practical workshops to train 140 SME representatives in sustainability management

Excellence in Practice 2021 | Global Reporting Initiative / CENTRUM PUCP Business School

Finally, the last initiative highlighted participation in elaborating the publication “GOOD PRACTICES FOR SUSTAINABILITY IN PERUVIAN MSMEs. Case study: The Competitive Business Programme” launched on 3 December 2020 and shared more than thirty cases from SMEs. The Impact According to GRI, “in four years of programme implementation, more than 1,100 SMEs have been sensitised and trained on sustainability reporting since 2018. 568 SMEs from 16 departments published more than 800 sustainability reports. In 2020 alone, Peru experienced a 25% growth in the number of published reports with 408 reports, despite more than 100 days of mandatory quarantine during a global pandemic,” declares Daniel Vargas.

CENTRUM PUCP also contributed with two workshops for 140 participants, two seminars attended by 370 people, five online courses for 500 participants, one conference for 800 people, and the sensitisation and training of 127 journalists through five online courses. Another important outcome was the involvement of seven professors (Luciano Barcellos, Lisa Bunclark, Iván de La Vega, Sandro Sánchez, Rubén Guevara, Julianna Ramirez, and Santiago Carpio) and more than 100 MBA students with the Programme.

“The results of the workshops indicate that the sustainability reporting process enabled SMEs to improve their strategic vision, strengthened the relationship between the SME and their respective benchmark companies, and helped SMEs become more competitive and access new markets,” says Luciano Barcellos.

The consultancy diagnostics outcome identified SMEs’ challenges and opportunities by linking each solution to the GRI standards with SDGs. In this way, the case study reinforces that the GRI contents are helpful to improve the management of companies, and at the same time, contribute to the SDGs, also benefiting society.

Conclusions As opportunities and challenges, it can be highlighted that SMEs are receiving support and training to strengthen management and respond to the problems identified. On the other hand, sustainability reports serve as a critical management tool. They allow to identify and manage the social, environmental, and economic impacts of activities, reduce risk and increase competitiveness. Also, the reporting exercise enables the organisation to define a competitive strategy based on shared value and the ability to innovate, contributing to the SDGs’ achievement.

In synergy with the GRI, CENTRUM PUCP, through these practices, promotes and contributes to the achievement of sustainable development in Peru to foster better integration of SMEs in global value chains the development of more detailed and sector-specific sustainability reports.

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Excellence in Practice Award (EiP) Gold Winners since 2017: Abilitie / Alliance Manchester Business School / ArcelorMittal / Ashridge Executive Education / Association of Entrepreneurship Development “SKOLKOVO Community” / A.T. Kearney / Audi UK / Bob Aubrey Associates / Brand-and-Story / Capgemini France /

Education Club / Chola MS General Insurance / Cisco / Complex Adaptive Leadership / Coverdale / Daimler / Diabetes UK / DSM / Deloitte Consulting / EF Education First / emlyon business school / Endo Pharmaceuticals / Epiqus / ESMT Berlin / Fundação Dom Cabral (FDC) / Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS) / Hanken & SSE Executive Education / Henley Business School / IMD / INSEAD / Live for Good / LIW / Mars / Monocities Development Fund /

Group Management Development Centre / Nokia / Novo Nordisk / Pertamina / Siam Commercial Bank (SCB) / Standard Bank / Telenor / Telstra / Tjitra and Associates Consulting / TRATON Group / Tribal Resources Investment Corporation (TRICORP) / Unilever Brasil Industrial / University of Cape Town, Graduate School of Business / University of Victoria, Gustavson School of Business / Valmet /

Information session webinars Tuesday 14 December 2021: 12:00pm CET Thursday 13 January 2022: 1:00pm CET Tuesday 1 February 2022: 5:00pm CET For registration: https://events.efmdglobal.org Contact eip@efmdglobal.org

Vlerick Business School

Writing this case has been a great learning opportunity for ESMT Berlin, Enterprise Ireland and IMS to reflect on the key success factors of a programme. I am grateful to be part of a community where experience is exchanged and knowledge is openly shared Nan Guo Programme Director, Executive Education ESMT Berlin, Germany

Design by www.jebensdesign.co.uk

Center for Creative Leadership (CCL) / CEDEP Global Executive

Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO / Mindset / Murugappa

Next Deadline for Submission 15 March 2022 For more information on the assignment, submission guidelines and FAQs visit https://efmdglobal.org/EIP

Phone: +32 2 629 08 10 Fax: +32 2 629 08 11 Email: info@efmdglobal.org

Excellence in Practice The EFMD Excellence in Practice (EiP) Awards recognise outstanding and impactful client-supplier partnerships in the domains of Leadership, Professional, Talent and Organisational Development.

Case studies can be submitted by an organisation either together with its in-house Learning & Development unit or with external L&D providers.

The winners are selected based on the review of four key areas: a properly documented challenge, an effective partnering commitment, the appropriate L&D initiative, and a proven business impact.

EFMD aisbl Rue Gachard 88 – Box 3 1050 Brussels, Belgium

Call for entries 2022