A manager took over a large division of about 3,000 employees. He worked to get his leadership team in place and up to speed. After he had the basics in place, he asked us to work with them to get to the next level of performance. We assessed each team member with the LSI Stylus® 360° feedback instrument as well as the Forté Survey and conducted a series of interviews with a sample of people throughout the organization. We also held individual feedback sessions with each manager to identify some key areas for development. The group then scheduled an off-site at a local resort to review the results of the assessments and interviews.
During the off-site, the group discussed the overall results and received leadership training along with specific homework assignments. As the group became more comfortable with the data, they began sharing parts of their own assessment. (Note: All individual data is considered confidential. We disclose to no one.) As they discussed some of their individual results, everybody seemed to relax and ideas and issues surfaced easily. By the end of the off-site, the team had developed a strong commitment to working on the group’s weaknesses as well as individual areas for development. |
Thirteen months later, the manager asked for retesting and feedback as well as a report on the progress of the group. He noted that the organization’s performance results were on or above plan and the team seemed to be working together well. We retested all participants except those who had transferred or left. Then we compared the pre-and post-test and found that 10 out of the 11 people initially tested had shown strong improvement. Most had improvements of 20-40%.
The results of the second off-site were nothing less than stellar. The group felt that the initial testing had given them a lot of hard data upon which to base behavioral change. Besides, having the whole group go through the process at the same time allowed all to use the same language and support change in one another. The manager asked for an anonymous assessment of how much he had changed in the areas he had focused on. The group recorded their estimate of his change in four areas. The consensus was that he had improved 60-70%.
We asked when they could determine that the group was actually improving, the consensus was that they could tell the group was performing better after only 60 days. |
