The common denominator in business today is high-stakes change.
It always starts with strategy, whether you're talking about rapidly-growing companies, who are racing to scale a concept and disrupt, or about incumbents, who are seeking to leverage their position into new value propositions and business models.
Ultimately though, the nexus of change is the leadership team and the premium is on agility– how quickly you can overcome inertia, geographic distances, functional differences, and the constraints of organizational structure.
There is no silver bullet. Not a book, not a cookie-cutter program, not a guru.
There are dozens of very good books, rooted in excellent frameworks, touching on priority-setting, empathy, personality frameworks, crucial conversations, change mindsets, meeting effectiveness – you name it.
You want to accelerate building cohesiveness, lock-in on the most strategic focal areas, address any real relationship or mindset barriers that could hold you back.
And then you want to mobilize disciplined, coordinated action 2 and 3 levels down, course-correct and keep moving forward. This needs to be effective, sustainable and accelerated, much more than checking the chartering box or having a nice team-building event where you get to know each other's personalities and do the ropes course.
Your situation is unique, and you need to own your path, together.
That’s where we come in.
We build on our experience in hundreds of pivotal offsites to
get teams aligned and ready to execute
Benefits
Build a solid foundation for an executive and their leadership team to inspire, align and mobilize on a new direction:
- Rally Team: Provide a bully pulpit for the leader to assert the direction of their leadership– burning platform, early priorities, and leadership team guardrails. Ensure the heart is engaged and committed, bringing the team together
- Same Page: Leverage diagnostic techniques for a shared understanding among the team as a foundation for an aligned first path forward. You can only get to "B"if you agree on where you are, right now, at "A"
- Strategic Path: Craft first pass vision, strategic focal areas, 1-year goals, as well as a 90-day plan for how they will create a more robust, detailed strategic plan
- Cohesive Team: Accelerate empathy, familiarity and kinship among the leader and their team, using disclosure activities and personality frameworks. Use activities and frameworks to instill qualities and mindsets of effective teaming, as well as build relationships through shared experiences and common terms
- Define Culture: Officially co-create the team charter, including team purpose ("what's our role" as a team that is greater than functional roles as "team of leaders"), principles of conduct ("how we roll"), and essential structures (cadences, scorecards, KPIs)
- Mobilized Action: Effectively mobilize the team on near-term change projects with clear roles, tactical plans and coordination mechanisms. Prepare the team to activate and inspire the next levels of the organization
Principles
- Go For the Real Conversation: Too often, the best laid plans on paper flounder on "elephant-in-the-room" issues. The strongest teams are forged through candid dialogue. They achieve better answers while proving that they can handle anything together
- Every Team is Unique: At this point there is a wealth of excellent IP on mindsets, practices and skills of effective teaming. We practice and infuse many of these, but we deeply believe that there is no single template
- Teaming in Service of Business Goals: Boiler-plate teaming conversations, absent a strategic imperative, usually fall flat. Even if bona-fide strategy work isn't needed, it is still essential to recognize that vision, goals and change imperatives are the juice that gives meaning and passion to teaming
- Team Insights Trump the Consultant: The most important insights about strategy, teaming and relationships should emerge from the team. It is best to create optimal circumstances for the team to review key facts and discover in dialogue with each other. This deepens commitment and ownership for any "so what" and "now what"
- Leverage a Broad Toolset, but Slaves to None: We have an eclectic approach. Rather than being beholden to a single ideology or a narrow approach, we prefer drawing on a broad toolkit that includes frameworks for strategy, problem-solving, decision-rights, personality and leadership development
- Power in Shared Jargon and Experiences: Teams grow through shared compelling experiences and by speaking a shared language. Memorable experiences deepen cohesion and act as a touchstone for future reference
- Partnering with Operating Leaders and Business Partners: We know our stuff, but so do our clients. While we provide extensive diagnostic and design support, we collaborate to iterate and fine tune the approach. At our best, we are instruments of our client's and they don't experience "getting processed". We do this efficiently, taking guidance to shape the agenda while being extremely economical with our client's time
- Get In, Create Momentum, Get Out: We seek to be high leverage. Rather than hanging on, we believe in client ownership of execution. We see our value in one or a series of high-impact workshops, where deliverables are clear. Each workshop includes structures to ensure follow-through and we can come back, as needed, at critical junctures for co-creating the next phase of growth
Case Studies
Accelerating Team Cohesion
Marketing Leadership Team of $1B+ Media Entertainment Leader
A Unifying Identity After Years Of Change
CMO of a $1B Software Company
Hear What Our Clients Say:
“I want to thank Exember for doing an amazing job. You were able to help us in such a deep, meaningful way. I want you to be a part of our ‘first team’ family. You were amazing. This will be a career-defining group and we’ll accomplish some great things together.”
Interested in our services?
