Past Challenges

“In working with OAA, it is evident that they not only have a firm grasp of the business environment, but they also display keen insight into the challenges we face.”

A global consumer goods firm was seeking an executive coach for its CEO. It was the board’s feeling that he needed to be more “heavy-handed” with his leadership team. The diagnostic interviews uncovered a complex set of pressures on the executive team that were impeding the organization’s ability to respond to different pressures in different markets, set priorities, develop new products, and reallocate resources to support those priorities. The behavior of the team at the monthly meetings had disintegrated into turf wars and unproductive bickering. OAA developed an approach that led the team through a series of discovery, clarifying conversations that resulted in better alignment on both decisions and the corresponding implementation of those decisions.

A small human services agency found themselves in a downward spiral of worsening outcomes, morale and readiness to meet the turbulent state and federal regulatory changes in rules and funding. The chief executive found herself needing to be more involved in the day-to-day operations while also trying to manage the political and regulatory landscape that was threatening their very existence. OAA provided executive coaching for key leaders, created a process to improve engagement and leadership skills that helped the agency re-position itself for a more productive future in line with their personal, professional and organizational aspirations.

A large tech firm in Silicon Valley found themselves experiencing the same pattern: annual goals were set, plans drawn up and executed at the beginning of the year and yet every year something went “off the rails” and the firm would reprioritize, restructure, recalibrate – much to the consternation of the senior and middle managers. OAA helped the top team identify its contribution to the pattern then facilitated a new approach for middle managers to help build and implement the approach. Working with the two levels simultaneously, OAA helped interrupt the pattern, focus the work of the executive team on the strategic choices they had to make and supported the middle managers assuming responsibility to drive plans and outcomes.

A newly named CEO sought out OAA as a thought partner while he re-framed his role of chief executive and shifted the 60 some odd year-old culture to speed up responsiveness, stabilized the organization through the transition while changing how the senior management population operated – at individual and organizational levels. OAA’s role was to help pace the work, generate insights and provide feedback with relentless realism.

A global financial services firm developed an extensive set of executive development experiences for all levels of the company. One element missing was leadership skills for leading in times of rapid change. OAA was retained to develop a concise, high-impact learning experience that helped selected high-potential executives make progress on real challenges from their current assignments. The key elements included a three-day training program, preceded by weeks of pre-work engaging the executives and their managers, follow up small group meetings to support their ongoing work on their selected challenges, webinars and culminating with a “skip-level” meeting with their boss’s boss to outline what the accomplished and learned about the firm along the way.