Excellerate's Instructional Design Client's Stories

Level: Managers and Team Leaders

Resource: The Team Toolkit with Powerpoint

Purpose: A self help resource for managers and team leaders to help them navigate the changes and manage the challenges of leading their teams.

What was the situation?
The OD manager recognised that managers and their teams were dealing with  significant organisational change. They needed support but with so much going on there was little room and even less time for the teams or leaders to attend any form of training but then training isn't the only solution to developing skills and improving performance.

What was the solution?
The Toolkit for Teams in Transition was designed as a performance support resource for managers and team leaders. Leaders access it online anytime, print copies and use the toolkit to:

• Learn more about leading and developing workplace teams
• Integrate some of the strategies into their existing initiatives
• Use it with their teams to diagnose, design and implement their own team development
• Partner with their internal HR consultant and work through the process together

The Toolkit included simple explanations and illustrations of fundamental team development and performance principles along with diagnostic questionnaires, checklists and relevant team building activities. The powerpoint was another resource that leaders and/or internal HR consultants could use in conjunction with the toolkit for quick focused coaching sessions.

Level: Managers and Employees

Resource: Facilitators Guide, Powerpoint and Participant Workbook for each level.

Purpose: The course enables:

Managers to lead more effective performance planning, development and review conversations

Employees to prepare and participate more confidently in performance planning and review converstions

What was the situation?
The HR Manager identified an opportunity to improve one on one coaching conversations between managers and employees, particularly in relation to reviewing performance, giving feedback, career planning and development. They invited Excellerate to deliver a series of short workshops for their managers and staff prior to the next cycle of performance reviews.

After the initial analysis it became evident that it would be much more practical and cost effective to provide the HR team with the tools so they could facilitate these sessions themselves.

What was the solution?
Given the timeframe and HR's commitments Excellerate delivered the first series of workshops (10 in total) while HR Advisors observed. HR Advisors then used the resources to facilitate small group workshops for newly appointed managers and employees as part of their routine induction process.

Separate three hour sessions were designed for managers and employees. These involved short presentations, quick quizzes, role plays, discussion groups and self paced exercises. Templates, planning sheets and step by step guides were included in the participant workbooks. HR also included a section which explained the Performance Review cycle and relevant procedures, so managers and employees had a quick reference guide as they prepared and planned for their one on one meetings.

Level: Super User and User Training

Resource: Facilitators Guide, AVA resources, powerpoint and workbooks for each user group.

What was the situation?
The internal learning consultant needed to train a network of super users throughout the country who in turn would train staff in the new system.  There were several user groups. Each group required their own version of training so several different courses were required. The project involved hundreds of staff and a looming go live deadline.

What was the solution?
Working closely with the Learning Consultant and SME (subject matter expert) Excellerate developed the super user and user training materials for the pilot group. Following the pilot and futher system changes Excellerate developed the final version of the training resources - super user facilitator guides, AVA resources and user workbooks. The first user training got underway while the internal learning consultant and SME used Excellerate's templates to produce the training materials for the final two user groups. Mission accomplished!

Level: Managers

Resource: Facilitators Guide, Powerpoint, Participant Workbook

Purpose: The course enables Managers to

Develop Behavioural Based interview questions for technical, specialist and generic competencies included in job descriptions

Apply Behavioural Based questions and supporting question strategies to elicit relevant evidence from candidates

What was the situation?
The organisation required Behavioural Based Interviewing (BBI) training for managers who conducted recruitment interviews. During the first meeting with the organisations Recruitment Manager it became clear that it would be much more effective if the manager led the BBI training. She had a great deal of organisation and job specific knowledge, and most of the interviews involved specialist positions. She participated in all interviews so had established relationships and credibility with the managers who would be attending the training. The number of managers and the 24/7 working environment also meant the logistics of scheduling workshops would be difficult and more expensive with an external facilitator. It was highly likely too that the need for this type of training would continue beyond the initial group of managers.

What was the solution?
Working closely with the Recruitment Manager Excellerate produced the resources and tools that enabled her to facilitate a series of 1/2 day workshops.

The workshops involved coaching participants through practical exercises and role plays. Managers rehearsed the necessary skills as they produced a series of effective BBI questions for competencies in various job descriptions. These questions were collated from each workshop and fed into the Recruitment Managers question bank.

Level: Managers and Employees

Resource: Facilitators Guide, Powerpoint, Participant Workbook and training aids.

Purpose: An internal course designed for on job trainers to enable them to develop and deliver effective and engaging on job training.

What was the situation?
Excellerate had delivered several Train the Trainer courses for different on job trainer groups throughout the organisation. Participant feedback and results had been extremely positive. When the organisation recognised that the requirement for this training would continue, instead of developing their own course, (and reinventing the wheel) they bought Excellerate's Train the Trainer.

What was the solution?
Excellerate developed a detailed facilitators guide and made a few adjustments to the learning materials before handing over the rebranded resources to the OD Advisor responsible for delivering the training.

The feedback from the on job trainers who attended the internal programme was equally positive and the OD Advisor rated it as one their favourite courses to facilitate.

Level: All employees

Resource: Facilitators Guide, Powerpoint, Participant Workbook with suporting Training Aids

Purpose:

Cultural Connections was developed as a full suite learner and facilitator resource to enable the organisation's Maori Liaison Officer to run the programme for Council staff.

What was the Situation?
For Tauranga City Council consultation and engaging with the community is at the heart of their existence however, the skills, experience and confidence of staff to work with tangata whenua (local Maori) varied greatly throughout the organisation.

What was the Solution?
Partnering closely with the Council’s Maori Liaison Officer (MLO) Excellerate designed a 3-part “Cultural Connections” programme to develop the ability of staff to confidently participate in consultation forums with tanagata whenua.

Cultural Connections enabled the MLO to run the programme independently, the flexibility to respond to staff needs as well as the opportunity to build relationships between council staff.

Utilising the MLO's expertise and building the capability to deliver the programme in house has proven to be a sustainable long term and highly cost effective approach to ongoing staff development. Hundreds of council staff, including mayors and elected members have completed the programme and others continue to graduate. It rates highly with staff and draws keen interest from other organizations. As a result, Excellerate assisted another local government organisation to implement a similar programme for their staff.

Level: Managers and Employees

Resource: An interactive powerpoint module with supporting Checkpoint Guide

Purpose:

A self paced learning resources for new managers and new employees to introduce them to the Performance Appraisal process

What was the situation?
The HR team provided Performance Appraisal workshops to familiarise newly appointed managers and employees with the organisation's process, policies and documentation. Getting the timing right was difficult though. New staff would either just miss a session or have completed the performance appraisal cycle before the HR team had sufficient numbers to schedule another workshop.

What was the solution?
Excellerate developed two interactive powerpoint presentations - one for managers and one for employees. They introduced the performance appraisal system and stepped them through the main points. New employee could view the presentation at their own pace. If they were familiar with the content, they could skip ahead to the next topic with a simple click.

The presentation also included checkpoints that prompted employees to think about their manager's expectations, their job objectives and professional development needs. They recorded their checkpoint notes and questions in the printed guides that accompanied the presentations. Once they had completed the presentation employees would meet with their Manager to review their questions and initiate their performance plan.

The resources were made available online to provide all staff with easy access for quick refresher training if required.