If You Need People Engagement, We’re Here to Help.
Here’s How.
Here are brief descriptions of services that Arceil has provided to clients, typically large corporations at or near the top of their industry in rankings of either size or peer respect. Although most of our clients are sizable companies, we often work with a single division or region, or even with a single operating facility or management team; and we are comfortable working with mid-size companies. While the services described here vary, they all come back to the challenge of enhancing leadership and building strategic engagement.
Case Study: Red T-Shirts on the Factory Floor
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A global manufacturer of agricultural and construction equipment wanted to improve its relationship with hourly employees. At the time, most of the workers were wearing red T-shirts emblazoned with their labor union’s logo. The company had prided itself on a constructive relationship with the union, but certain contract concessions were necessary to ensure the company’s competitiveness, and the union was in no mind to compromise. As if to foretoken the trouble ahead, an executive refused to halt production when a fierce blizzard paralyzed the region and employees couldn’t get to work. That penalized the most loyal of employees, who missed their first day of work ever. Many employees said later that they would never forget it.
Our Response / Solution: If ever a situation cried out for servant leadership, this was it. The new general manager of the most troubled production plant immediately recognized the value of our approach. He arranged for more than two hundred managers, supervisors, and union stewards to undergo our three-day workshop, which emphasizes servant leadership. So that no one was offline for more than one day at a time, we scheduled the workshops over a three-month period—the first day for everyone was in the first month, the second day the next month, and the third day in the final month—in groups of twenty-five at a time. The social climate of the factory changed so dramatically over the next year that most of the workers began wearing the company’s green T-shirts. The negotiations proceeded smoothly. The factory manager was eventually promoted, and one of the first things he did on his new assignment was to bring our program to the four factories he was now managing. Other plants and staff departments followed suit. We have been under contract ever since to provide our program throughout the corporation.
Case Study: Expiring Patent Protection and Loss of Tax Subsidy
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A global pharmaceutical company, facing the expiration of patent protection for its blockbuster drugs and the loss of a tax subsidy for offshore production, realigned its operations and closed several manufacturing plants. Three remaining plants nearby experienced a dramatic loss of workforce engagement. Key employees were defecting to competitors, and more defections were feared.
Our Response / Solution: On the basis of dozens of executive interviews and focus groups, along with scores of confidential emails, we analyzed the management culture and employee relations at the three plants. Our final report offered twenty-seven practical recommendations, all supported by detailed documentation and explanation. Most of the recommendations were implemented. The three plants survived a reduction-in-force. The long-term results were very positive.
Case Study: Rapid Growth in Food Service
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A rapidly growing chain of 1,600 quick-serve restaurants sought to professionalize its corporate communication function and align the function’s work with the company’s growth trajectory, while also maintaining servant-leadership principles at the company’s cultural core.
Our Response / Solution: We designed and facilitated a best-practice benchmarking focusing on the structure and reporting relationships of organizational communication in dispersed, national retail companies. We enlisted Walgreen’s, Nordstrom, and Starbucks as our strategic partners; in return for hosting site visits, each shared in the findings. The client implemented the recommendations.
Case Study: Fears of Outsourcing
Client’s Situation / Challenge: Perennially voted by its peers as the industry’s most respected firm, a mutual life-insurance and financial services company was introducing a new mission of customer service in a companywide staff function, to stave off talk of outsourcing the function. Management wished to ensure that all internal staff consultants were “on the same page.”
Our Response / Solution: We customized our two-day management workshop in leadership communication for this situation and provided eleven sessions to a total of 225 senior managers. Then we developed a half-day short course and conducted train-the-trainer workshops for eight staff trainers, each of whom was certified to deliver the short course to managers and supervisors. Finally, we wrote a 90-minute interactive online seminar that any staff employee could use. Satisfaction with the staff function is increasing, and discussion of outsourcing has waned.
Case Study: African Conglomerate Wants American Perspective
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A global conglomerate based in Johannesburg, South Africa, desired an American perspective on best practices in leadership communication for strategic engagement.
Our Response / Solution: Our founder traveled to South Africa and provided a full-day seminar to the top seventy-five operating executives. His session introduced our proprietary structure and process, based on extensive benchmarking. Evaluations of the session averaged above 9.0 on a 10-point scale (despite competing with televised national cricket championships!).
Case Study: Dissension in the Ranks
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A Fortune 500 manufacturer was experiencing poor and declining product quality at a California plant. Workers seemed uninterested in improvements and generally disengaged.
Our Response / Solution: We explored the situation in a balanced dialogue with employees. We identified sources of discontent, persuaded local management to address them, and then turned our attention to restating the vision in clear, relevant, practical terms that spoke to typical workers. We subsequently built support for the new vision across the management team. Workplace engagement grew, and product rework and returns decreased.
Case Study: Union Activism in Consumer Products
Client’s Situation / Challenge: A worldwide producer and marketer in a key segment of the broader beverage industry faced intense union activism and the threat of a strike. Management desired a new approach that put a premium on respectful collaboration with unionized workers. The starting point was bleak. At a Colorado plant, threats of bodily injury and worse were left on voice mail, and the plant manager had 24/7 protection from the county sheriff. When the company’s CEO (and scion of the founder) last visited, the union loudly marched out of an all-employee meeting. The plant manager offered to resign, but the CEO refused to accept it.
Our Response / Solution: Consulting with the management team of the Colorado plant, we developed a strategy that overcame the hostility. We then customized and delivered seminars for senior, middle and front-line management at five production facilities in advance of union negotiations. The workshops focused on collaborative, candid, timely, credible communication. Subsequent labor negotiations were peaceful and uneventful. The company continued to use our leadership-development workshops for more than a decade. The plant manager made a high priority of using our services at his next two assignments, in Georgia and Florida.
Case Study: Measuring People Engagement
Client’s Situation / Challenge: An iconic American manufacturer desired reliable, robust data on its internal-communication function’s support for cultural change and the execution of business strategy.
Our Response / Solution: We revised the prior survey instrument so that we could collect a valid baseline. The new instrument posed questions cued to the four stages (awareness, understanding, acceptance and commitment) and three voices (formal, semi-formal, and informal) of the Arceil Rainbow. We then developed and facilitated a cross-functional, team-based process to identify creative, practical solutions with broad support addressing issues brought to the surface by the survey. The process was so successful we were asked to repeat it.
CONTACT US
You can reach us in multiple ways:
By email, we're at info@arceil.com. Our days are typically full, so please allow us time to respond.
By telephone, we're at +1-650-464-1770. It's wise to email us before calling. That way, we will have your contact information in writing, and we can schedule a convenient time to talk.
Please note that we're usually in the Central U.S. time zone. Leave a clear voice-mail message if we don't answer.
On LinkedIn, we're at www.linkedin.com/in/leadershipexpert.
On Facebook, we're at www.facebook.com/arceil.leadership/. That's @arceil.leadership.
On Twitter, we're at www.twitter.com/LeadAloud. That's @LeadAloud.
Many of your preliminary questions may already be answered in the About, Speaking, and FAQ pages on this site.
