The task here is for participants to define what they have to do to improve the overall performance of their departments.  They analyse the existing performance of their department using a model of best practice designed by the faculty.  This begins with defining a departmental strategy, which has to be ALIGNED with the corporate strategy.  This includes identifying customer requirements, defining service level agreements, critical success factors, key business processes and key performance indicators.

The next step is to audit all aspects of operational performance (e.g. supply chain, organisational design, process effectiveness, resource productivity, leadership capability, team performance and the approach taken to measurement).  This diagnostic journey, which includes benchmarking against best practice, will identify a list of problems that have to be prioritised and put into a Business Improvement Plan (BIP), which has then to be implemented during the programme.  The success the participant has in implementing their BIP is assessed, as is what and how they learn from the activity.

The TUTORIAL process is an integral part of the project.  The Programme Director will give each participant individual tuition and will encourage the participant’s boss to play an active part in supervising the project and mentoring the participant.

The primary aim of the project is to improve the performance of a department.  We also suggest the participants encourage colleagues, not on the programme to follow the approach.  Where a group of managers come from the same organisation as the programme, then the impact of a series of projects can be profound.  That is, the aim here would be to establish a “critical mass” of managers able to drive performance improvement forward.