The Problem:A new senior executive is hired from the outside in a company that traditionally hires from within.His executive management team is skeptical. Numbers for the newly introduced product look weak.The new executive needs to quickly lead his team through several weighty decisions…fast.
The Solution:BNG used its New Executive Assimilation process to rapidly dissect issues in three areas:
•Shared Goals and Measurements
•Leadership Style
•Effective Communications
BNG held a series of short, customized workshops to explore each issue area from both the senior management team’s and the new executive’s vantage points.Key areas of conflict were surfaced and resolved through a process of aligning style, values and expectations. Team performance was kept high through a series of follow-on 1:1 coaching sessions.
The Results: Quickly and effectively, the senior management team and its new executive became effective in their shared leadership roles.They went on to successfully tackle the major product and market issues facing their business unit.
An Early-Stage Venture-Backed Pharmaceutical Company
The Problem:An early-stage, venture-backed pharmaceutical company was about to return to its funding sources for critical additional expansion capital.At 50+ employees, the company was struggling with discord associated with “who’s in charge” and the diverse set of opinions and strategies brought in by employees beyond the founders.
The Solution: BNG developed a workshop to help employees explore their dimensions of differences, the breadth and complexity of stakeholder positions and the decision-making tools and techniques needed to address key issues for going forward.
The Results: Even the most recalcitrant nay-sayers became skilled in tools and techniques that allowed for more effective decision-making. Moving forward was on the table again.
A Multi-National Fortune 50 Company
The Problem:The governance body of a major business within a Fortune 50 Company was ineffective in making decisions.The business had grown through acquisition. The acquired companies were based outside the United States and utilized different methodologies for decision-making. There were language barriers and large cultural differences in stakeholder position development and problem-solving. The ability of this board to make effective decisions was at a stand-still.
The Solution:BNG first measured team effectiveness in four areas: candor, team dynamics, communications and problem-solving.After presentation of its findings, the team decided which areas to tackle and in what order.The result was a series of workshops that addressed cultural differences in communications, the roles of empathy and trust in decision-making and the effective use of personality, style and cultural differences in problem solving. 1:1 executive coaching was used here, on a limited basis, to provide some team members with the ability to bring issues to the table through surrogates.
The Results: This team became aware that their struggles in decision-making were, in large part, the result of cultural, style and personality rather than substantive differences. They learned tools and techniques to enable more complete discussion of the issues and more effective communication of disagreements in the team’s decision-making process.
