At Webhelp, our motto is “Think human.” That means putting our people first. It means helping them to make the most of their individual talents, to innovate and take risks, and to help each other grow and thrive. To become passionate game changers, and the future of our industry.

Digital adoption is a huge part of that. We believe that a shift to digital ways of working, properly delivered, serves to assist our people in finding their potential. With that in mind, over recent years the Organisational Development team has transformed our management development programmes, with digital enhancements at the centre, to enable our leaders to be the best they can be.

Virtual Classroom

Back in 2018, we upskilled our Management Development Consultants to design, develop and deliver virtual classrooms using virtual software. The goal was to shift the Management Development modules – traditionally only delivered in a face to face environment – into a virtual classroom approach.

To date, the team have facilitated over 160 Virtual Classroom sessions to an audience of over 1000 managers, translating to 2468 hours of learning investment. Not only did this allow us to swiftly pivot our approach when the Covid-19 crisis forced organisations to embrace remote working, the shift to digital training has led to a far greater reach of management development consultants to our managers, which has in turn increased the volume of development available. And we are seeing the results.. Over the past 4 years, the rating of our managers by our front line advisors has increased year-on-year, and is one of the highest rated responses across all sections of our annual employee survey.

We continue to refine and improve our offering and are proud to say that  our people can now receive the same industry-leading training with a 50% reduction in learning investment time.  They also have more flexibility in when and how they access the learning they need.

Virtual Roadshow

One perhaps less obvious impact of lockdown has been on how we can communicate with our people. It’s incredibly important to us that our people feel informed about the learning opportunities that are open to them, and with our usual face to face opportunities off the table, we needed a new solution.

And that is where Virtual Roadshow comes in.. To create awareness and excitement about the ehancements the Organisational Development team have been making over the last couple of years, we will be talking virtually to all operational leaders and support colleagues over the course of the next few months. We have complemented this roadshow with an innovative, interactive digital booklet, complete with informative videos on all programmes and learning opportunities breaking down all the important developments across the business. This allows colleauges to digest this and reflect on what it means for them as and when they chose.

We are proud to be transforming the learner experience, and have already seen the benefits it’s bringing. Taking a unique approach to showcasing our management development products through our interactive booklet truly demonstrates the digital capabilities we have developed.  I’m excited for the new possibilities that this gives us, as we continue to grow and transform.

Judith Ferguson, Director, People Business Partnering & Organisational Development – UK, South Africa & India

Social learning

As part of our Leadership Development Suite, we set out to revolutionise our learning & development proposition, by providing high-end, blended and self-directed learning options for our people. When COVID hit in March 2020, we wanted to find a way to support our managers rapidly, and enable not only open communication, but a community approach to solving problems. We wanted managers to support other managers, and learn from each other.

Our solution was to provide open access to our Leadership Development suite, with over 85 learning programmes currently available. We’ve created a fully virtual solution in the form of a Social Learning community, enhancing communication, and allowing over 900 colleagues (and counting) to find and organically share their learning and information. This allows for years of experience to be fed right back into the business, for those who know to share with those who want to know.

We’ve made some significant changes, both before and during lockdown, to our ways of working. We’ve changed how we develop our people. We’ve changed how we engage with our people.

These changes have helped us to keep connected through learning during lockdown. More significantly, though, they’ve given our people the tools they need to help each other grow. They’ve helped make personal development open and available for everyone, regardless of their role or location.

Interested in finding out more about our journey?  Please don’t hesitate to get in touch.