MCI Solutions - Leadership Development Program transcript

Denise: Welcome Michael, fabulous to have you join us today. I know you have a long and illustrious career in learning and development. Won't you tell us a little bit about yourself and also your role within the organization where you work.

Michael: My role has been focused on looking after to everything from talent acquisition, through to talent management, workforce planning, engagement, and obviously learning and leadership development.

Denise: But what was so unique about the MCI offer?

Michael: I've been able to watch MCI grow over the years. I've been able to watch you and others in give back to the learning community through the sessions that you hold, where you share information from conferences and other activities that you've been to. And you've done that freely over the years, and it's shown that you're actually prepared to give back to the community and you want to build partnerships with people who are in this area. That's what we wanted when we were looking for a provider, we didn't want just a provider who was going to come and deliver. We wanted somebody who wanted to partner with us to design the outcomes that we needed to deliver the skills into that leadership space.

Denise: And certainly as part of that journey and that process, Michael, what did you see with some of the participants?

Michael: Yeah, so we saw growth. We saw growth through them. We were able to hear their stories at graduation, not only about what they learned through that 12 months, but actually what they put into practice. And they were not only sharing that with you and I, but they were sharing that with the CEO who turned up to these graduations. So they were proud of what they were doing and proud of what they were able to show. But not only that, as we were walking around over the last two years, I've been hearing them talk about their experiences at leadership essentials. Not only with me, but with others through that process. How do we know it's successful? I've got people queuing up to get into the cohorts we are delivering next year. So we are really pleased. We've had over 250 people complete the program. We've got another 84 in cohorts now, and we're going to run another six cohorts next year.

Denise: Michael, maybe explain to people watching this. What we would you suggest if they were setting up their own leadership management delivery program? What advice would you give them?

Michael: My advice would be start talking, have a discussion. Look for a provider, such as MCI, who's going to give you a partnership where you've both got skin in the game and bounce ideas off, and don't be afraid to take a risk.