Global Professional Services Firm Case Study

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Customized Training Program Start to Finish

On an enterprise scale

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Deloitte

INDUSTRY: Finance/Banking

EMPLOYEES: 25,000+

Situation
Deloitte has received high recognition for its acclaimed Women's Initiative, which dramatically changed opportunities for women. The company considered the demographics of its workplace and customer base and determined that a diversity initiative would be a key factor in remaining a leader in the financial services industry. Deloitte interviewed over 30 diversity consulting firms and selected ProGroup to work with them.

Process
Our job was to design a customized diversity program that would be launched to the company's 30,000+ employees throughout the United States. This was a first for the firm. Never before had Deloitte committed to having everyone, from senior partner to mail clerk, go through any program - especially together in mixed groups, and especially for an entire day.

Deloitte has a unique culture and work practices and we needed a new approach to education. ProGroup's internal designers and practitioners created a highly interactive, one-day diversity awareness course setting the stage for a skills and behavior modification course to follow.

ProGroup began the relationship by conducting a full cultural audit. Two years later we worked with the company's National Diversity Office to create a comprehensive strategy by establishing a business case for diversity that was presented to the organization's top leaders. Working with the executive management committee, ProGroup gained a commitment to the diversity efforts.

A key component of the diversity initiative was to design a pilot program and implement diversity training firm-wide. To prepare employees for the training, a communication plan was created that included messages from key leaders on why diversity is important to the firm and information about the upcoming training.

ProGroup conducted a targeted needs assessment to confirm results from the earlier audit and to identify any new issues. The data collected in both efforts was used to customize the diversity training program.

Solution
ProGroup put together a team to partner with Deloitte to design a program. The result of this effort, called "Diverse Perspectives, Common Goals," included many of ProGroup's existing tools for increasing diversity awareness and skills, as well as a business case activity, a simulation for experiential learning, video components, self-assessments, and action planning.

Once the design for the program was complete, ProGroup conducted an extensive Train-the-Trainer workshop for 45 facilitators. We prepared them to deliver the "Diverse Perspectives, Common Goals" program consistently, throughout the country. In addition, the 45 facilitators learned the Deloitte culture, the company's language, and many of its hundreds of acronyms.

Results
The entire project was managed by one of ProGroup's multitalented senior consultants, and was rolled out at a rate of up to 95 team-facilitated sessions a month.

The program was well received. In fact, the independent organization that Deloitte contracted to gather and tally program evaluations informed Deloitte that ProGroup's program and facilitators got the highest overall and individual scores of any training rollout in its experience.