Cranfield Executive Development

Open programmes

CASE STUDY - Belmond British Pullman Talent Development Programme Why did you choose the Talent Development Programme? The reason I chose the Talent Development Programme was because I wanted to take the opportunity to break out and spend time with fellow professionals from different industries. I knew it’d be very interesting to spend some time on the challenges that we had in common because I was sure there’d be a lot of commonality across the various industries. I wanted to discover more about how they dealt with their own challenges and the different applications they brought to the challenges. This is what I could implement in my organisation. What did you hope to achieve from doing the Talent Development Programme? There were challenges in my career at the time as I was transitioning from one role to another so the programme came at a good time. I was taking a fairly significant step forward in my career. Going into the course, I really wanted to be able to step into my new role with a different frame of mind. Doing this course was about learning new skills and new business practices but also an opportunity to learn more about how I functioned as a leader and manager, and what lessons I could take so that I could start my new job in the best possible way. How did the programme develop you as an individual? I realised fairly quickly that I was developing throughout the programme, I could feel the changes in myself, in the way I was thinking about things. It was also interesting to watch other people take that journey with me. There was a complete transformation. People were engaged in the value of the course, in being taught how we could better look at ourselves and our own personal development. What were the key takeaways from the programme? The Talent Development Programme became an interesting journey. I knew from various past participants that there’d be a surprise at some point so I went into it expecting the unexpected. During the group project work I learnt a lot about group dynamics. I also learnt about leadership, and self-reflection, and looking at how you function with a group and potentially do it better moving forward. What advice would you give to someone thinking about doing the Talent Development Programme? If I was going to advise someone who was thinking about joining the course at Cranfield, I’d say don’t be intimidated. It can seem quite difficult at a first glance but what I learned was, be honest with yourself and who you are. And it doesn’t matter if you have an amazing level of experience, as long as you have a passion for what you do, and you have a definite reason for wanting to further your education you’ll be successful in the process. You need to make the time to invest in yourself. We give a lot of time to our companies and developing the business but it’s important to take a step back. We can become a better asset to our company by taking an important step back to become a better professional for ourselves, our network and the people we work with.

22 www.cranfield.ac.uk/execdev T: +44 (0)1234 754500 E: execdev@cranfield.ac.uk