Combining deep insight with superior client service, LRI helps its clients to address a wide variety of critical organizational challenges and opportunities.
A financial services client had made the decision to close a major customer care center and migrate the services to other centers. Announcement of the intended closure was made twenty-months before the event. The management team was faced with the challenging tasks of retaining its workforce, maintaining productivity, and sustaining morale during the journey to the center’s closure.
Working closely with center management, LRI helped develop a strategy for the entire transition period. Aggressive relocation/retention goals were set for the workforce, stretch goals for performance were identified, and no “stay” bonuses were to be paid (instead, a gain-sharing program was introduced). A process for facilitating the rapid development of team leaders and supervisors was introduced. Involvement of senior corporate leadership was key, and the other centers were engaged in the retention and relocation efforts.
Results were astounding. Record production and quality levels were achieved throughout the period, with the last two months being the highest-performing. Retention and relocation goals were far exceeded. The center leadership team (including LRI) received the company’s highest internal reward, and a Harvard Business School case was written about the center and its closure process.
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LRI was asked to guide the reorganization of a 3,000-colleague manufacturing division that was struggling with issues of productivity and product quality. Demand was growing, inventories were shrinking, and the number of products and manufacturing sites was about to increase. An assessment was performed by collecting manufacturing data and quality metrics while leaders and managers representing three tiers of management were interviewed to determine the causes. The results were reviewed by Senior Leadership along with a proposed structure designed to create greater focus and accountability. LRI provided a unique combination of strategic and operations planning, HR and Staffing skills, teambuilding and facilitation, change management, and executive coaching in this engagement.
Each new manufacturing “unit” required a new management team that was to be selected by the Senior Leadership Team. LRI partnered with internal HR to design and conduct an expedited selection process. Once the teams were selected, each intact team underwent a teambuilding process to create the structure for their area along with a vision, success factors, and detailed operational metrics. Once each of the teams was established as a unique unit; processes, communications, and mechanisms for improving cross-functional collaboration were created. Groups that supported all of the manufacturing units were organized into shared services in order to maximize efficiency and utilization of resources and expertise.
During the planning and design of the new organization, there was an emphasis on communication and transparency with the 3,000 colleagues who would be impacted by the change. A communication plan was created that detailed the information and updates that were regularly communicated in writing and messages were cascaded in team meetings. Those employees who were changing assignments or managers were assigned to a leader who was responsible for their successful transition. Simple and straightforward Service Level Agreements were created with customers and suppliers. An information response line was created to answer questions before, during, and after the change.
The change was designed and implemented successfully without ever having to shut down the manufacturing operation. An assessment of manufacturing employees was conducted two weeks after the change was implemented and employees were overwhelmingly positive about the change. An assessment of customers and suppliers was done three-months after the change and those results were also overwhelmingly positive. One-year after the change, product quality had reached its highest levels, inventory was at target levels, and there were significant increases in accountability and teamwork at all levels.
LRI began a consulting relationship with a national foundation dedicated to improving the quality of public life in the United States. From a programmatic perspective, the foundation had been extremely successful. However, the organization was facing some challenges around employee commitment and engagement; as well as a need to rapidly develop leaders to be ready to address growth challenges and institute strategic changes in how the organization delivered its services across the country.
The foundation partnered with LRI on a leadership coaching initiative, coupled with a climate survey and consulting on organizational design and systems. As a result, the foundation has significantly enhanced employee commitment and engagement, and retained, empowered, and unleashed key leaders, whose performance is measurably stronger. Further, they have developed systems and processes (e.g., policies, values-based performance review process, scorecard for hiring processes) that will support and sustain their projected growth and considerable civic impact for years to come. Consider the following statement from the foundation’s president, Martha L. McCoy:
"Our work with LRI has magnified our effectiveness and impact with external clients and with the whole civic field. Through consistently thoughtful and right-on-target coaching from CFM and others in the capable LRI team, we've been able to identify and successfully tackle problems in management systems, processes, and policies. Working with LRI has made it possible for us to retain and make the highest use of our best management talent. That, in turn, makes our whole staff more cohesive and productive. When I see other executive leaders in nonprofits struggling with similar kinds of issues, I tell them about LRI."
Along with his peers, a business-unit president was taking part in a year-long executive development process with LRI. He was building on his strengths, gaining skills to support his personal effectiveness, and better understanding the perceptions of key audiences he wanted to influence. His leadership task was not small – trying to turn around a low-margin business, rally geographically-dispersed employees around a new model of service delivery and growth, and focus a disparate team of direct reports. To help that process, the leader wanted to introduce his team to the models of leadership to which he’d been introduced through his own work with LRI. He wanted them to share his commitment to improvement, and share a common lexicon and common set of expectations for what being a strong leader means. As a result, he felt the team would more effectively embrace and drive the cultural and organizational changes he needed to see.
At an offsite meeting, LRI provided foundational skill building for the group’s full leadership team. Through interactive sessions and proven assessments, LRI introduced the drivers of leader credibility and provided accessible, high-impact tools and skill-practice sessions to improve each leader’s effectiveness. In the training session, LRI also observed patterns of behaviors and norms that were standing in the way of this leadership team’s effectiveness. By “calling it” as the team of LRI consultants saw it, and being both wiling
and able to divert from the set agenda, the LRI team was able to
provide not only quality training, but also high-value consulting.
In addition to providing common frameworks, language and tools, LRI pushed the leadership group toward joint operating principles and accountabilities, individual and team commitments, and ongoing ways to improve their communication and collaboration to drive strategic goals for their business. In partnership with the business-unit president, LRI encouraged the team to generate agreement on a set of goal areas to speed their turnaround efforts in the coming months, and to drive those goals to completion. Just six-months later, the leadership team had accomplished their multi-million dollar savings goals. They were generating excitement among front-line employees about the long-term vision for change, as a result of working more effectively and strategically as a team.
A senior executive of a major financial services company exhibited great commercial capabilities and success. He had a very strong external reputation, and broad and deep relationships with top-flight clients; he generated high revenues for his firm and was considered one of the most knowledgeable, energetic and able professionals in his field. He was quoted frequently in the financial press as an expert and a leader in major business transactions. Internally, however, junior professionals did not want to work with him; peers did not trust him; and top management in the firm did not believe he could advance further or lead a large group. There was even some concern that he might not be retained in the firm, despite his superb external performance, because of these issues.
A LRI consultant began to work with him as his executive coach. The consultant conducted structured interviews with numerous juniors, peers and seniors to elicit their candid views of the executive. The consultant synthesized the results of the interviews into themes, which he then discussed with the executive. By the executive’s own account, for the first time he had a clear and specific picture of how he was perceived by others in the firm, and the concerns others had about him. The consultant and he drafted and agreed upon an action plan to help him turn around his internal performance and image in the firm. The plan included a small set of development objectives, specific actions to address them, and metrics for determining success. The consultant continued to coach the executive in a series of meetings over a period of many months to support his efforts to implement the plan.
The executive was able to achieve his objectives, to an extent far beyond the expectations of his firm and himself. He made concerted efforts to foster the development of junior people who worked with him, and provided them with outstanding opportunities to prove themselves. As a result, he was able to help several of his people achieve major, well-deserved promotions. He developed a reputation as one of the senior executives that high-potential people in his area most wanted to work with. He greatly improved his manner of dealing and relationships with colleagues. Some of them expressed amazement at his willingness to address the significant issues they had with him, and his ability to change both his mindset and his behaviors in ways that gave him credibility he formerly lacked with them. Top management recognized his positive changes as well. Soon he was heading a much larger group. Together with members of his group, he was making far greater -- in fact, disproportionately high -- contributions to the firm’s revenues and success in the business.
LRI worked with a client organization to conduct and analyze its employee survey results and identify a few key areas of focus for the coming year. One of the areas of focus was “leadership effectiveness,” due to the fact that both the survey’s quantitative results and written comments indicated that this was an area where there was slippage. The organization’s General Manager and Human Resources Director approved LRI’s proposed engagement that involved having an LRI consultant serve as a leadership coach to the entire senior leadership team for the subsequent year. The goals were: First, to help the members of the team to maximize their effectiveness as leaders; and second, to help them to help their direct reports to be more effective as leaders, which presumably would have a positive ripple effect throughout the organization.
LRI gathered data on all members of the senior leadership team, via interviews with direct reports, peers, and managers, as well as via existing data such as recent 360° reports. The LRI consultant presented each member of the team with a feedback summary, and he worked with each leader to develop a set of “leadership goals” for the coming year. He also had three-way meetings with each participant and his/her manager, to ensure that the plans were seen as “on-track” by participants’ bosses, and also to allow those bosses to weigh in and help the participants revise their plans, as necessary. Further, the whole team met on two occasions during the year to share their plans with one another, in order to get additional feedback and support. One-on-one coaching sessions periodically during the year were held in order to ensure accountability and offer additional counsel. There was also a leadership workshop that was tailored to a specific issue from the leaders’ feedback that LRI facilitated for this group.
The engagement was seen as a success, as the following indicators suggest. First, leaders on the team actually sought the LRI consultant out for guidance on specific challenges between scheduled meetings. Second, the leadership development process ended up being cascaded down to another group of key leaders at the vice-president and director level. Finally -- and most importantly -- one of the “positive findings” from the subsequent year’s employee survey was that “leader credibility” was seen as having improved dramatically; some respondents actually alluded specifically to these leadership development efforts in explaining the improvements that had been observed.
A fast-growing banking services company engaged LRI to assist a group of senior executives in overcoming dysfunctional communication styles and cross-division interaction problems. These issues were limiting performance and reducing morale. The typical interactions between executive team members were often destructive, inefficient, and limiting business success.
The team building process was launched with the conduct of comprehensive assessments of each executive, which involved online 360° feedback collection, in-depth interviews with each executive’s supervisor, peers, and direct reports, and a battery of psychometric assessments. The 360° feedback was used to analyze strengths and development areas and was also used in the aggregate to inform the team-building process. A three-phase conflict resolution training was then conducted in support of improved team dynamics.
Results of the initiative produced immensely improved interactions between executives, enhanced productivity of communication between different functional units (at all levels), and resulted in better customer service to major clients – all within six months.
A large in-house Legal Department was challenged with the simultaneous achievement of substantial internal efficiencies while continuing to defend the corporation against burgeoning external threats. One of the consequences of adapting to change was a decline in colleague engagement among a highly skilled and experienced colleague base. Composite colleague engagement had sunk to 50%. The group’s dynamic leader championed an ambitious year-end goal of dramatically improving colleague engagement, while still forging ahead with a host of sweeping change imperatives.
Supporting the Department’s leadership team on both an individual and organization-wide basis, LRI helped plan and execute on a variety of integrated initiatives defined by a deep understanding of drivers of colleague engagement within the unique enterprise, legal practice area, and departmental sub-cultures. Carefully applying data gleaned from engagement assessments, LRI partnered with the group’s leadership team members to devise unique work distribution and professional development strategies for specific cohort/interest groups; strengthen team bonds; enhance underlying organizational health conditions; and engage every group member in consistent, regular, and transparent communications. Key to the success of the execution plan was the assumption of personal accountability for raising engagement indices by the groups’ leaders – who each became champions for a particular initiative.
In less than one year, every performance and change objective was achieved or exceeded. Most importantly, during a period of great change and uncertainty, colleague engagement increased from 50% to 71%.
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A business support group within a client organization was undergoing substantial growth challenges. The organization itself was growing in substantial ways, and there were concomitant opportunities with regard to the way the group supported its internal clients. The head of the support group consulted LRI to determine if there were ways that the level of client service could be enhanced while -- at the same time -- meeting the growth challenges without additional people resources.
LRI recommended that the business support group engage in a two-fold approach designed to organize itself and its work in the most client-centered and efficient way possible. Using a variety of methodologies, including client feedback, work-process examination, and other methods, LRI consultants were able to recommend reorganizing the business support group to ensure maximum alignment with the clients that the group served. LRI also partnered with the group to assess whether the group was focusing on the highest value-additive activities, and was able to assist them in off-loading or eliminating many activities which did not generate substantial value for the organization.
The outcome of the process was to improve the satisfaction of the clients for the business support group in substantial and measurable ways. At the same time, the new organizational structure created opportunities for ready-now leaders to assume greater responsibility, contributing to overall engagement of the business support group colleagues. Finally, there was an increased focus on the activities which generate the most value, making the work productivity of the group much greater.
A large entertainment company, which has experienced a number of owners, administrations, etc., was taken over by an entrepreneur, who put in place a CEO that LRI had supported at another client organization. The CEO wanted to first learn about the organization, and secondly infuse the organization with a Mission and set of Values that would help define the aspirations of the new leadership and serve as a guide and reinforcement to desired behavior and performance.
LRI conducted a series of interviews with key executives from the past administrations as well as the new executive team to assess the variance in views, perceived priorities, values, expectations, and aspirations. The data was synthesized and presented to the new executive team, with LRI’s analysis as to what new Values and Mission would resonate and have credibility with the organization. LRI assisted with the development of the Mission and Values Statement, which also served as the backbone of a performance evaluation process, and an enterprise-wide 360° degree feedback instrument.
The organization (particularly the management) now has a sense of what is expected of them, along with clear measures that are driving desired performance. The assessment component provides management with useful data as to where to focus resources for leadership development. Leadership effectiveness has increased (as determined by increase in 360° ratings), employee satisfaction has improved, and overall company performance has improved significantly.
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An energy client that had gone through tremendous growth wanted to ensure that the culture of the organization was clearly articulated and the behavior of all employees represented the “customer-focused” direction that needed to occur to sustain growth. The challenge was exacerbated by the existence of a strong labor union and a history of resistance to any changes.
LRI developed a strategy that first tasked the Executive Team on identifying and clarifying the desired outcomes, along with strategies to handle the different countries and cultures that were represented in the total corporate operation. Secondly, starting with the Executive Team, programs were held to identify the desired behavior and direction and each leader was measured against the desired, future behaviors. Further, meetings were held with both labor leadership and local labor executives to talk about the future of the company, identify the obstacles, and solicit their support in the change process.
One year later, the company had gone through transformational change. While it was only the start of a much longer journey, leaders were now focused around the long-term direction and had made significant progress toward changing their style to more closely reflect the company they wanted to be. The union played a strong, collaborative role and for the first time in over 50 years, a more positive labor environment existed within the company. The success within the client earned them the highest Human Resource Award presented in the United Kingdom.
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