Research has shown that employees who receive regular, constructive feedback are more engaged at work. Unfortunately, the University of Notre Dame’s employees were missing out on this critical opportunity. HR tried out multiple performance management processes and software solutions, but eventually realized something very important — if you don’t fix the core issue, any system will prove ineffective.

With CCL’s help, Notre Dame realized that employee performance and development is a function of organizational culture, not just human resources. Through CCL’s Better Conversations Every Day^TM solution, Notre Dame’s leaders learned how to have constructive conversations with employees. And by training facilitators from HR and other departments, CCL helped ensure this new approach became a scalable, sustainable program embedded throughout the unversity’s culture.

Mars has big plans for the future. With a new vision, smart growth, and a whole new management structure, the 100-year-old organization found itself in a unique position: there was a shortage of internal talent ready to grow into the senior leadership roles needed to fulfill its vision for the future.

To solve this global challenge, CCL partnered on an Accelerated Leadership Program (ALP) designed to prepare Mars’ most promising people to step into critical leadership roles in the coming years. Building on the company’s internal programs, the ALP has enabled Mars to confidently promote more well-qualified people into senior leadership roles — and into the future.

An ambitious expansion and globalization plan left Barclaycard with an unexpected challenge: today’s leaders, while high-performing, were not ready for the challenges that lay ahead. The company’s Executive Development team realized that, for the plan to succeed, leadership needed to improve their skills around influencing without authority, coaching, global awareness, and translating strategy into action.

To accomplish this, Barclaycard partnered with CCL and Ashridge Business School to create the Executing Strategy Program. Two separate 3-day sessions focused on individual coaching and action-learning projects. These elements helped participants integrate lessons learned into their personal development, sparking them to create plans for converting strategy to operations and build stronger relationships within their departments and across the company. Now, key leaders are better equipped to face complex challenges and drive innovation — and that impact is cascading throughout the organization.

With roots going back over 100 years, Oslo-based Yara is the world’s largest supplier of plant nutrients. Historically, the organization’s culture was heavily focused on rules-based compliance. However, as the organization’s compliance culture matured, it became clear that leadership needed to create a more intentional shift toward collaboration.

Making the change from a rules-based culture to a values-driven culture is not an easy feat. Any change had to be embraced by nearly 15,000 staff over 60 countries. CCL worked with key Yara stakeholders on a 2-day retreat, where leaders clarified the new vision. The team also leveraged CCL’s Change Leadership Framework, which encourages leaders to think about leadership as a social process through which all members of an organization can participate. With this new lens, the group was able to not only anticipate the concerns of others, but also roll out the new vision and culture in a way that made them feel heard and valued.