What Have We Done And What Were The Results?

We work with entrepreneurial leaders in growing service businesses, nonprofit agencies and community organizations who want to become dominant players in competing for customers, clients, funding or public awareness. Take a look at our recent projects.

Lead by Design, not Chance

1.  1. A community blood center, having to manage in a more competitive environment, requested a Create Your Future retreat for its executive team to develop targeted strategic initiatives. The results were a three year plan, consensus on their key priorities and more effective communication focused on work demands and not "turf" issues.

2.  A fast-growing religious organization, wanting to avoid the potential "we" (the founding families) vs. "them" (newer members) attitude sponsored a young leadership retreat looking at the congregation's history, present programs, and future plans. The focus was on developing community, communication and commitment.

3.  A social service agency, realizing that it needed to slow down the merry-go-round to ensure they had adequate funding, staff and programs to meet the growing needs of its client base. Create Your Future board retreat resulted in a three year strategic plan, a decision to partner with other agencies for supplemental services and a change in fund raising methodology.

4.  Because of the sudden resignation of the executive director of a performing arts organization, the board chair assumed leadership during the four month search process. Provided coaching on board relations during the transition time; personal productivity including delegation and project management; performance evaluation and termination of a support staff. 

"Now that we understand what we're good at and where we're good at it, it makes it easier to say no the things that don't make sense for us. We became focused and began to direct all our time, energy and attention toward a clear purpose."
        --- President, Community Blood Center

Drive Teamwork Up, Down and All Around

5.  The CEO of an economic development agency had coordination breakdowns and unresolved conflict with his executive team. A team building retreat developed consensus on the team's mission and priorities; clarified roles, responsibilities and decision authority and dealt with "personality" issues resulting in less tension between the CEO and his team.

6.  Two departments of a major metropolitan hospital and trauma center needing to quickly deal with low employee morale before it affected patient care. Focus groups surfaced issues with leadership practices, the recognition program, inter-departmental communication and workflow. Follow-up coaching with department heads led to increased employee satisfaction and reduction of turnover.

7.  A large cross-functional, multi-national technical team wanted to ensure it met quarterly milestones for a product development project. Facilitated problem-solving team building on crucial team issues: competition for resources; lack of clarity regarding priorities; cultural and style differences; and the efficient flow of information between sub-teams. All target dates were met even with rapidly changing market needs

8.  25 customer care teams of an in bound call center struggling with poor customer ratings on response time, billing accuracy and general service. Process improvement sessions led to changes in call-taking procedures, a process for better communication between shifts and the need for frequent, but short, training sessions to keep everyone current. Follow-up indicated a definite shift from individual to team accountability for meeting their monthly goals.

"At a time of tight budgets, Quick Easy Wins was viewed as evidence that we valued our workers as important assets. It was an immediate hit, a big morale booster and created many great ideas so that we could deliver better, quicker patient care. Thank you Marcia for all your help."
        --- Human Resource Director, Metropolitan Hospital and Trauma Center

Manage From the Outside In

9.  A community outreach agency, celebrating its 25th anniversary, wanted to refocus their efforts to meet the growing and changing needs of the region. Through our Reality Check program, we met with key stakeholder groups that resulted in a targeted outreach program and a three year capital campaign to fund a one-stop shop center.

10. A performing arts organization, whose founder had retired and a new executive director was onboard, wanting to expand its brand identity and customer base. Our Reality Check program gathered satisfaction data on pricing, programming, and packaging from six different patron groups that led to more options for subscribers and a change in marketing communications, a new seasonal brochure and information packet and more focused community outreach.

11. A federal agency, promoting the growth of local minority owned businesses requested a Discovery Program presentation at its regional conference. "Always Serve Extra Hot Fudge" delivered the key principles on how to turn employees into service champions and sharpen their staff's teamwork, problem solving and customer care skills.

12. A social service agency, providing short-term emergency services to residents of four cities within a large metroplex, wanted to create greater value for all their customers --- their direct-service clients, individual donors, various funding sources --- as well as to better align their services with their customers' needs and expectations.

13. A workforce development provider, wanting to expand its visibility and services to regional employers, discovered, through Reality Check, a mismatch between the agency's services and the employers' expectations. Therefore, programs and procedures were changed so that service excellence became the #1 priority at each center.

"This training was the best we have had since I've been director in 2002. We had two big "ah ha" moments. The first was when we looked at all the different clients we have at the agency and realized the different expectations. The second was when we began to see better ways to serve them."
        --- Executive Director, Three City-wide Social Service Agency

Contact us to explore how Leaders at All Levels can work with you and your organization to be a Force for the Future!

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