Top Executive Development

Another concrete example shows how individual solutions of consultancy cope with different problems that PAB HRConsulting clients may have.

Starting Situation

BestServices is a pan-European service company for business customers with more than 2000 employees and a registered office in Munich (name and registered office changed). The company has been family run for generations and basically shares the European market with three other competitors. The company is exemplary as far as technology and workflow are concerned.

After the Head of Finance and Accounting retired, this division was restructured and a Controlling Manager was appointed. On his initiative, several controlling instruments were implemented, including an internal benchmarking system allowing detailed comparison of efficiency of single departments, profit centers and subsidiary companies.

Although the numbers were basically OK with no indication of any reason to worry, some freak values attracted attention. These discrepancies were to be analyzed in an independent company taken over years before.

The ten top executives of this company were employees from day one, excellent specialists but with the management style of the old owner. There was room for improvement as far as the teamwork of these top executives was concerned, characterized by a departmental way of thinking. Interviewing the employees soon showed that there were obvious deficits in the management. The employees found that mistakes were occurring in normal business, because the top executives were not communicating with each other effectively. Regular meetings of the team were not being held at the time. Target of the Consulting Project Objectives of PAB HRConsulting for increasing the efficiency of this company include: Employee potential should be better used Cooperation should be optimized Communication should be improved Management quality should be developed Employee satisfaction should be increased This should achieve a higher efficiency overall.

Top Executive Development

Consultancy of BestServices is structured as follows:

Step 1: Definition

We start with exact definition of target, time frame and target group, followed by an intensive getting-to-know phase of all parties concerned in the process and coordination of a detailed training plan with our client.

Step 2: Current state

Group work: What has changed in view of the employees, where is there a need for action, and where are possible future problems anticipated at this stage? Deficits, approaches for improvement and expectations are identified.

Step 3: Communication training

Various levels of communication are considered on the basis of concrete facts. Subjects such as feedback, conflict and stress management or sender/receiver behavior are dealt with. Communication styles and non-verbal communication are discussed.

Step 4: What is leadership?

On the basis of the real facts of the situation, subjects including mission statement, vision, targets of the company and management style are considered: Which requirements are important or required by the line manager? How far is a management by agreement of a target practicable? How can this be delegated and how can it be improved? Which factors involving motivation are not implemented sufficiently? Are there hygiene factor deficits?

Step 5: Moderation/Presentation

What makes a good moderator? What are the required tools? How can difficult situations be moderated? How can meetings become more efficient? How could different types of media be used effectively?

Step 6: Teamwork

What is the role distribution in the team and how is this distribution controlled? Which are the group dynamics? How can integration processes be improved? How efficiently does the team work?

Step 7: Supervision

How will training issues be applied in practice? An exchange of the experiences of the people involved in the different steps follows. Refreshment of knowledge gained, more detailed consideration of specific subjects and definition of further effective steps, …