THE GLENMORANGIE COMPANY
Glenmorangie - INTRODUCTION TO MANAGEMENT: EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAMME
Client Requirements
The Glenmorangie Company is one of the most successful of Scotland’s Whisky companies. In early 2002 it was recognised that with a history of rapid growth and profitability over the previous several years the company’s success had placed increasing demands on the executive and management cadre. A first step was required to increase their competence in people management and commercial awareness. Taylor Clarke was brought in to help develop both the Executive team and the company’s middle managers.
Our Contribution
A comprehensive management development programme, jointly designed between Taylor Clarke and the company, was started in the summer of 2002 and ran, in several tranches of 10 –12 managers until the spring of 2005.
The programme involved a number of elements including a 3 day residential course based on Taylor Clarke’s TurnAround model. This course was preceded by the gathering of comprehensive 360 degree feedback and this was used to help focus managers on the areas they needed to build on, or develop. Taylor Clarke also devised a Management Grid model to suit the demands of the company’s particular culture.
The overall nature of the course focussed on self-awareness and ‘soft’ skills development such as motivation and communication but also included inputs on management.
Following the residential course the learning in the course was reinforced and supported by a series of 5 facilitated action learning sets. These sessions started with a brief review of what tools and techniques participants had been using and then spent the rest of the time working on real life problems. A final review day some six months after the residential course revisited the 360 feedback and allowed participants to look at progress made and to consider their on-going development needs.
Taylor Clarke’s involvement was supported by a series of targeted training inputs, both face to face and optional online e-learning, provided in-house by Glenmorangie.
The company’s Executive team (Board of Directors) have also experienced a version of this programme, though their particular needs have also resulted in 1:1 coaching sessions and executive team-building.
Some 60 managers and 10 directors went through the programme.
The Impact
A major evaluation study was carried out by Taylor Clarke after the programme had been running for approx. 2 years. This involved analysing the before and after 360 results, video diaries were created through individual interviews with a random sample of delegates, and a series of focus groups with the staff of managers who had attended the programme.
Findings from the evaluation included sustained levels of enthusiasm for, and reported use of, the tools and techniques by delegates even after many months or longer, and continued networking with colleagues in other departments who people had met on the programme. Some less positive results centred on the staff of some of the delegates who reported their managers as reverting to old behaviours a few weeks after the programme. However there were some examples given of where managers felt the training had equipped them with the skills to deal with difficult employee issues. One such example was in preventing the dismissal of an employee.
This evaluation study pointed out the critical importance of spending time clarifying the objectives of a management development programme and actively seeking to collect evidence as to its impact. The need to keep the senior managers engaged and to integrate the management development programme more fully with the business was also recognised
The key tool that came out of this for Glenmorangie was 360 feedback and in fact they have with our help developed their own in-house tool which is used with people managers as part of their competency review.
The programme enabled managers to be more open to feedback and listen and reflect on how they could improve their team’s performance by using their enhanced people management skills. Re-visiting original objectives and linking these to business results would lead to further improvements. It was also hoped that senior management would more actively drive the programme and remain engaged throughout.
