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vestas

Strengthening a continuous learning culture

I have often stopped and admired the amazing ecological sweep of the windmill sails in my travels across Scandinavia. There they grace the shoreline and the countryside and provide a powerful energy source nationwide.

I was delighted therefore to be asked to support the learning culture of one the most creative and inspiring manufacturers of such blades based in the Isle of Wight off the south coast of England. The Human Resource Manager there was a graduate of NLP training and was aware of the thinking that this kind of training could reinforce and stimulate. Also given the importance of this technology across the world NEG needed to be able to understand and work with many different cultures including that of their parent company at that time in Denmark and one of their manufacturing sites in Chennai in India – cultures that could not in some ways be more diverse.

The programme that I was invited to facilitate was to support the already flourishing programmes based on their pillar of values and learning and to work especially with the people who were members of the learning groups in the company.

The programmes were developed by

Dear Sue,

At the time of writing this, I am looking forward to the next series of ‘Sue Knight’ workshops in July, August and September and I know these are eagerly anticipated by our people. The events we have held with you over the last year have really captured the imagination of our managers and have provided us all with many helpful and practical ways of understanding the personal difference we can make as leaders to the success of our business. To have our leaders working with a high level of personal awareness and valuing the skills of rapport and feedback is very important to us.

Senior Manager

  • Meeting with the HR Director and the Managing Director to understand and agree the outcomes for the training.
  • Visiting the site on the Isle of Wight for a day and meeting with key personnel there to get their perception of the development needs. This day included a chance for me to have a site tour to get to see the work in action and to have a series of one to one session and to participate in one of the shop floor team leader meetings. I was impressed with the site, the people and the business. So often I find that companies think that they need training and development when they have problems whereas the most effective time to engage in such activity is when the only problem is the rapid growth and success of the business.
  • The presentation of a one day sample programme to get feedback and buy in to the eventual form of the 2 programme that we were proposing
  • And eventually the delivery of the 2 day programme with the following outcomes – for delegates to be able to:-
    • Understand the unique culture of the people with whom they were doing business both inside the business and elsewhere
    • Relate to those unique cultures in a way that created and built long term quality relationships
    • Align their everyday behaviour and attitude with the core values of the business
    • Give and receive feedback openly and honestly as a way of deepening the learning culture in the business and learning from everything that they do and as a way of encouraging the teams to learn from each other on an everyday basis
    • Develop the thinking that supported everyday negotiations towards a WIN/WIN culture
  • Each of these sessions were also used to apply the thinking and facilitate actual changes and issues in the business at that time. This included the take over of the business by Vestas.
  • In addition to these programme I also facilitated team days and Directors meetings in developing the strategy for the business and Directors personal development.
  • All of the programmes were supported by the availability of my book NLP at Work which some of the employees have read cover to cover!

Sue Knight

"Above all else guard your heart for it affects everything that you do."