Leadership development built around your organisation
Programmes, workshops and facilitated sessions, built around the problem you are trying to solve.
Bespoke, not off the shelf
Generic leadership training is easy to buy and hard to defend twelve months later. Think DVC starts with the commercial problem instead. The retention gap. The promotion bottleneck. The layer of managers who were promoted for technical strength and never developed as leaders.
Programmes are built in your context and your language. Where it helps, cohort work is combined with one-to-one coaching and mentoring, so that the learning gets applied instead of just attended.
How an engagement runs
- Discovery with sponsors and a sample of participants
- Design of the programme, cohort structure and measurement
- Delivery through workshops, coaching and mentoring
- Application against live business challenges
- Review against the outcomes agreed at the start
Advancing Career Skills, Johnson & Johnson
A four-workshop programme for members of the African Ancestry Leadership Council, designed after individual conversations with every participant about their ambitions, their workplace challenges and what was actually in their way.
What the programme covered
- How to show up as a leader
- Communicating with greater confidence
- Building a visible and authentic personal brand
- Setting meaningful goals for career advancement
Practical frameworks alongside leadership assessments, reflective exercises, public speaking, networking practice and SMART goal setting. Participants left with personal and Chapter action plans, and individual review sessions built the accountability to follow them.
What changed afterwards
- Participants put themselves forward for stretch assignments and promotions
- A marked increase in speaking up and self-advocating in senior meetings
- Stronger, more consistent engagement with the Chapter and its action plans
- Participants proactively sought out mentors and sponsors
David facilitated the programme with warmth, energy and credibility. He created an environment in which participants felt comfortable speaking openly, reflecting honestly and learning from one another. He brought a strong understanding of leadership, career development and the experiences of diverse talent within large organisations, and I would readily recommend him to organisations looking for a facilitator who can translate leadership development into practical action.
Rhoda Steel, Global Health Equity Director, Johnson & Johnson
Five starting points, every one adapted
There is no fixed curriculum. Each one is shaped around the organisation commissioning it.
For people who need to be listened to in front of clients, boards or teams. Covers confidence, credibility, communication, executive presence and personal positioning. The outcome is clearer positioning and more influence over decisions.
For advisers building long-term client relationships. Client conversations, trust-building, professional positioning, referrals and difficult discussions. Outcome: advisers who can hold the conversations that matter.
For professionals moving towards greater responsibility. Leadership fundamentals, influence, stakeholder management, decision-making and self-belief. Outcome: a pipeline that’s ready before the vacancy appears.
Practical capability for leading, sponsoring and progressing diverse talent, tied to the decisions where progression is actually made.
For a specific talent or leadership objective that no standard programme quite addresses. Cohort work, coaching, facilitation and mentoring combined as the objective requires, measured against outcomes agreed with sponsors.
Start with a conversation
Thirty minutes, no preparation needed. The first thing I work out is whether this is a good fit.