Ithaca Leadership was privileged to bring its deep experience in relationship systems while working alongside global strategy management consultancy Customer Diagnostics in a recent engagement with a Malaysian-based client.
The intention was to assist the client – a large ferroalloy manufacturer – to develop a cutting-edge focused corporate strategy, while simultaneously building a strong, fully-functional leadership team capable of propelling the company forward successfully.
This required the unique skill sets of both Ithaca Leadership and Customer Diagnostics.
Functional Team Needed to Deliver on Strategy
The client’s executive leadership team comprised of individuals with substantial experience and talent who were not performing well as a team.
As a first step, Customer Diagnostics’ mandate, under founder and Managing Director Alan Kirschner, was to help the client develop a clear corporate strategy and vision year-on-year for the next three to five years, with defined focus areas and accountable action plans. These plans would form the basis of a meaningful and inspiring corporate purpose and a shared approach to ‘getting things done’. This was supported by using the common language and process framework of the Achievement Process ©.
The second defined intervention, intrinsic to this goal, was the building of team ‘skillsets’, ‘toolsets’, ‘mindsets’ and ‘heart sets’ to execute the strategy. Alan invited Creina Schneier of Ithaca Leadership to work with him in addressing the essential aspects of ‘ways of being together’ and ‘engaging with one another’ that would enable this.
Ithaca Leadership lent its expertise in working with executive team members to catalyse the awareness necessary to both consciously and intentionally create a ‘space’ or ‘atmosphere’ within the group that would encourage members to think both individually and collectively.
The corporate leadership team was also enabled to hold the robust conversations necessary to execute on plans when things become difficult.
Collaboration Delivers Unique Results
“The process evolved over the three memorable weeks that we spent in Malaysia working with the executive team. As joint facilitators and coaches, it became clear that the collaboration and aligned vision of Ithaca Leadership and Customer Diagnostics could deliver exceptional results for the client’s business,” says Ithaca Leadership founder Creina Schneier.
At the same time, the team, which included Corne Schoeman, invested substantially in its own ‘relationship system,’ deepening it by being open, transparent, direct and having candid, robust discussions.
“We realised that we needed to role- model the change we wanted to see in the client. If team members were unable to do the hard work themselves, the results in the room would be lighter and more superficial,” Schneier adds.
The result was a high performing internal team, fully aligned and genuinely interested in supporting one another to deliver on the client’s needs.
Benefits of South African Experience
“As South Africans, our experience of working within our country’s cultural complexities prepared us to be mindful of the different dynamics and sensitivities at play within Malaysia’s own diverse culture,” Alan Kirschner says. “I believe that this also helped the team deliver results successfully at the highest level.”
Despite the immense distances, both physical and cultural, between the respective teams and the two countries, for everyone involved it was a liberating, instructive and meaningful exercise.
Subsequent client feedback indicates that the process is continuing and there is conscious intentional practice to use what was learned in the workshops.