IAD Case Study: British Telecommunications

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PRD works closely with BT providing assessment tools and events leading to individual development plans. We design processes to suit the needs of individual business units in the light of organisational plans and resource constraints.

For instance, BT Retail decided to develop existing General Managers in its Major Business division, previously responsible for sales volume and value, into Market Managers for vertical market segments, with full bottom line responsibility for the lifetime of contracts.

Obviously, senior management wanted to participate in the assessment process. Equally obviously, the traditional two-day assessment centre would have tied up far too much expensive senior management time. So we designed a process involving online self-assessment tools, tailored specifically to the role in question, and a half-day workshop session.

In the workshops - a mixture of presentations and intensive interviewing - two highly experienced psychologists worked as assessors alongside a BT senior manager. Detailed reports were produced, which revealed some development needs that were common to a majority of the participants, and others specific to individuals or small groups. The results fed into the design and delivery of an intensive development programme implemented by MIT in conjunction with BT's own management development specialists.

The project is regarded as having been highly successful, and similar processes have already been developed for other parts of BT. Said one participant: "I went in feeling very apprehensive, but came out having had the best three hours of my life." The side-effect on morale of serious attention being paid to the individual's career is valuable in its own right.

First, we design and deliver all aspects of the process to suit the client's needs: everything is customised, down to the fine detail of software design, by us from within our own resources. Our team is world class, we deliver on time and to budget, usually on a fixed-price basis.

Second, we have a pool of highly experienced assessors with superbly honed interviewing skills to draw on, who work across the whole range of business, industry and government.

Third, we have models and methods that focus on deliverables, real capabilities, actual skills, knowledge and experience, not vague competencies.

And finally, we're rather fun to work with - most of our clients have been with us for many years and welcome our willingness to take on challenging assignments.

BT Market Managers concerned a population of around 40 sales general managers, and similar projects would be highly cost effective with similar numbers of participants. Because we tailor the self-assessment tools in very detailed ways to suit roles and organisations, there is a minimum size of cohort of around a dozen below which it might be more cost-effective to use a less customised process.

For larger populations, we can design systems entirely delivered to the desktop, with high-quality reports automatically produced using our unique Scirocco report-writer generating system.