Move to Greatness
Focusing the 4 Essential Energies of a Whole and Balanced Leader
–Program Participant
Novartis
–Program Participant
Novartis
Focus Blog
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Client Case Studies
Case #1 Managing Extreme Growth
The Situation:
A thriving non-profit was growing to national prominence…Its visionary and charismatic CEO pulled the organization toward unprecedented growth, even as she feared it could reel out of control…A senior leadership team, committed but overwhelmed, needed to increase their effectiveness…
The Challenge:
How could the CEO and her leadership team come up a level to manage this increasingly complex organization – without burning out?
The Engagement:
We listened, through stakeholder interviews, and identified the 3 most important areas to address in coaching the CEO, and the top 3 areas to address in the organization.
We coached the CEO around redefining her role to be one where she worked mostly up and out and developed her team. Key to her success was learning to manage her impulsivity and bringing in a strong #2 in operations.
We developed the leadership team in a feedback-based, action learning program, where they delivered on important projects, including securing a $1M increase in contributed income. They also learned skills for better managing their people and the complexity of the growing organization. Discovering their energy patterns through the FEBI, as well as the patterns dominant in the organization,they developed a map and language for communicating the balance they needed to find in themselves, and how they needed to move the organization.
We helped the organization address its greatest vulnerabilities by beefing up its infrastructure, leadership capacity, and culture of accountability.
The Outcomes:
The organization is growing successfully, keeping its passionate, fun culture, but adding enough accountability to reliably deliver on commitments.
The CEO/COO have become a powerhouse team driving bold vision and orderly execution; senior leaders have coalesced into a well-functioning Executive Management Team.
The organization’s finances are managed better than ever, making upgrades to its infrastructure possible, as well as the recruiting of national talent
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Case #2 Building a New Leadership Team Around a New Strategy
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The Situation:
Cost pressures threatened the future of a clinical data operations division in a large pharmaceutical firm… As part of a cost reduction, two divisions were merged and charged with finding synergies… The combined organization needed to set direction amidst fears of being outsourced… Its senior leadership team came together for their initial strategy session.
The Challenge:
How could the senior leadership unite as a team and set a realistic direction for the organization?
The Engagement:
We integrated strategic plans from the predecessor divisions to get a starting point for combined discussions.
We assessed the energy patterns among the senior leadership team through the FEBI™. The team got to know one another, and we discussed the implications of their dominant (Organizer) and weak (Visionary and Driver) patterns. Thinking like Visionary-Driver entrepreneurs who could run this operation whether it was outsourced or not prompted the group to identify more than a dozen changes that were necessary to move the organization to greatness.
We facilitated the team through identifying the vision, mission, values, strategy, and near-term actions of the combined organization, keeping this entrepreneurial focus in mind.
The Outcomes:
After 2 ½ days, the senior leadership team came away with a new vision, mission, strategy, and actions for the combined organization, as well as a way of communicating them.
Surprising to some, agility emerged as a key differentiator, and leaders identified how they could develop greater agility and synergies in the organization.
The division remains a part of the larger pharmaceutical firm, demonstrating its value-through-agility and keeping costs low.