Case Study

Learning Journeys

Specific skill building across several soft skills: Learning journey with a focus on capability building and office hours to ensure that learning “sticks.”

The Project

Our client, a private sector company in Saudi Arabia, wanted to double down on specific soft skills for its first-time managers. These skills included “Emotional Intelligence,” “Influence and Negotiation,” “Feedback and Coaching,” and “Finance for Non-Finance Colleagues,” for example. The journey focused on workshops to build capabilities and practice as well as office hours to receive feedback on actual deliverables.

The Results

Average participant satisfaction score of 4.8 out of 5 across all modules delivered

Greater than 80 percent of participants’ line managers agreed they could see changes in behaviors on the job of their direct reports

Training has been repeated for four cohorts since we kicked off three years ago

The journey

Each skill was delivered along a one-month journey:

WEEK 1
LEARN

Context Setting

  • Leader session: 90-minute discussion with entity’s senior leader around relevance of topic

  • In preparation, participants read 1-2 articles, and watched 1-2 short videos introducing the module and thought of questions to ask leaders

WEEK 2
LEARN AND APPLY

Framework and Concepts

  • Workshop: highly interactive with theory and group work; 1-2 days per module

  • Selected modules included a simulation as part of the workshop

  • In preparation, participants read one case study

WEEK 3
APPLY AND REFLECT

Application Exercise

  • Application exercise: 2-3 hours of individual or group work to apply learning on the job

  • 90 minutes of live virtual application exercise debrief and module wrap-up

  • Commitments and Action Planning

WEEK 4
REFLECT

Small group discussions

  • Group discussions to review Commitments and Action Planning and serve as accountability buddies

    + “Office hours” to give feedback on actual deliverables after the month of learning