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English National Ballet Shares Learning and Development Secrets
November 04, 2009
At the English National Ballet, it's not just the dancers who get trained.
"Flexibility is key for any learning and development we implement. The development needs to fit around our dancing tours as these are our bread and butter," says Philip Maddock, English National Ballet's HR director. "We strongly believe in offering all our employees the opportunity to further develop their skills, be it artistically or in a business capacity. Our organization's success is attributed to our team. This approach seems to work as development opportunities are not only embraced but frequently requested."
In 2009, English National Ballet focused on developing communication and cooperation among its employees. "Two key organizational skills needed to ensure a tour is successful are departmental cooperation and communication," says Maddock. "Every department needs to make sure they not only complete their jobs to the best of their ability but also realize how their departments affect others throughout the company."
Maddock says the ballet's learning professionals saw a need for greater consistency in the performance of its business divisions. "While every department was working well individually," he says, "we recognized a real and urgent development need in ensuring the team improved their understanding of how each department is interrelated, as well as building on communication skills and practices."
Righttrack Consultancy, an international learning and development specialist, won the project to design and deliver an interactive training program for the ballet. The program removed participants from their day-to-day roles to give them an opportunity to experience and explore a different situation in order to fully appreciate the importance of internal customer service, cooperation, and organizational understanding.
"We wanted to design a fun, yet practical event that would challenge every participant," says Kasmin Cooney, Righttrack's managing director and project manager for English National Ballet's development program, while highlighting the power communication and cooperation plays in organizational success. "Many people learn by doing, which is why we incorporated a scenario into the development program, as they provide great, 'real' experiences that help to hammer home the learning, as participants have first-hand experience of their natural approach in a difficult and trying situation."
"The group reacted well to the scenario, and the reflection activity was incredibly powerful and well received," says Maddock, "which led to many of our employees leaving with positive suggestions and ideas to put in place to improve internal communications and cooperation, which is exactly what we wanted the development to do!"
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