CASE STUDY: DEVELOPING FRONTLINE LEADERS

After a series of acquisitions, a plastics manufacturer had many frontline managers within the organization who was put into leadership positions without much prior development – a concept we sometimes refer to as “riding your good horse.” They realized that these leaders had the technical capability to do the job but lacked the management skills to lead other technical performers.

Soon, quality, productivity, and retention started to become an issue, and the company was concerned about their ability to fill orders and retain critical technical talent to operate their manufacturing and distribution operations. Additionally, the organization was growing and wanted to build and reinforce a culture of quality, efficiency, and customer services, as well as instill the foundational competencies required to lead others.

The CEO identified a leadership program for frontline managers as a priority, and stated that, “We need a solution that can adapt to multiple shifts and really gets our supervisors and managers to create a new experience for our associates so they believe in themselves, their leaders, and can develop and grow our critical frontline workforce.”

Solution

The organization partnered with LAK to run a pilot of our Frontline Leader Program using a combination of in-person workshops, microlearning, and group coaching sessions. The workshop was nearly five months and covered the areas we felt were important for leadership who manage individual contributors. We also wanted to adapt the approach as the leader varied in experience with some having years of management experience and others having less than 2 years leading others. The solution covered included topics including, but not limited to:

1. Coaching others
2. Trust and psychological safety
3. Leadership presence and communication
4. Handling difficult conversations and conflict
5. Providing effective feedback
6. Helping others transition through change
7. Setting clear expectations
8. Managing multiple priorities

The Impact

The organization added four additional groups to the development process after the pilot. Not only did they see engagement and retention of both frontline managers and associates improve, but they also experienced the following:

1. Ability of frontline leaders to manage mindset, personal brand, and the impact they have on others.
2. Discuss how communication helps to create high-performing teams.
3. Effectively managing teams through change and transition.
4. Increased ability to set goals, manage performance and handle difficult and crucial conversations.
5. Improved ability to provide effective feedback, recognition and coaching to increase effectiveness in developing and maintaining the performance of team members.

Additional measurable benefits have been evident in the results gathered from post-program surveys.

• 87% feel their leadership has been positively influenced by this course.
• 89% are successfully applying the skills they have learned to their jobs.
• 90% found each course module relevant to their current role.
• 99% would recommend this course to colleagues.

Some of the comments we have received include the following.

“Workshop was very well organized. The pre-work proved to be very helpful to me. Getting the feedback from my direct reports was helpful.”

“Excellent class that is needed across the company to all levels of leadership. Too many times, we promote someone to a leadership position but fail to give them the proper tools to do the job effectively. This class should be mandatory for anyone in a leadership role.”

“One of the more useful and relevant programs I have attended. I learned so many great skills and gained a lot of awareness in my current leadership style, [including] things I need to adjust and improve upon.”

“One great thing about this class is that it forces leaders to step back from being busy with their usual duties to evaluate the problems of their organizations, [keeping] ‘best leadership practices’ in mind.”

“Exercises were spot on; the group took them seriously so it was really worth my time.”

We are here to help you prepare your leaders to excel in challenging times and grow your organization into the future. Give your leaders the tools and language they need to succeed with the Frontline Leader Impact online leadership development program.