Case Study
Background
A highly visible company was bringing a new, revolutionary technology to market. This meant accelerated company growth, with headcount scaling from 500 to 2,500 over four years. It also meant intense pressure and demands on the CEO and leadership team. In “rocket ship” mode, how could the CEO’s leadership grow at the same blistering pace as his company? And how could he ensure his team was also growing to keep pace?
Approach
Over a seven-year period, Eric provided CEO coaching as well as coaching for other members of the leadership team. He acted as a confidential sounding board for the CEO, partnering on key areas of development such as listening, fostering dialogue and debate within the leadership team, decision making and focus. In addition, Eric coached a majority of the members of the leadership team, helping them grow in their C-level roles. He attended leadership team meetings, providing real-time feedback and helping establish and track behavioral norms that resulted in measurable improvements. Eric also periodically conducted team workshops to enable better communication, collaboration and trust; and observed monthly all-hands meetings and provided feedback to enhance executive communication.
Results
Through our engagement, the client experienced:
- Progress in the CEO’s ability to listen and foster debate, which was explicitly confirmed by members of the leadership during a follow-up assessment
- Improvements in key areas of team performance. During one period focused on team development, they achieved in 3-6 months:
- A 21% improvement in candor and willingness to openly disagree
- A 23% improvement in team alignment, execution and ownership
- A 27% improvement in team well-being
- Individual members of the leadership team grew significantly into their C-level roles through ongoing 1-1 coaching