Why Maureen chose The Grilled Cheese Coaching Co – in her own words
Meet Maureen Kaplan – cofounder of the OpenText Women in Technology network. Her growing community is supporting hundreds of women to advance their careers within the IT space and shows no sign of slowing down. Despite this success, Maureen knew more work was needed to support women in the technology sector.
OpenText Women in Technology Network
Categories:
Women in Tech
Location:
Worldwide
Completed:
Ongoing
Maureen sought a learning partner capable of engaging with her growing community by delivering compelling content. The chosen partner would need to foster a sense of inclusion and improve collaboration across multiple geographic boundaries. Maureen decided to consult her team first, to ascertain their requirements. Their response was loud and clear: they wanted the training to focus on leadership development and general networking.
That was when she picked up the phone and spoke to us.
From the moment we met Maureen, we were excited by her mission and the opportunity to support her amazing community – both professionally and personally.
We initially invited all 300 participants to participate in a Whole-Mind™ Manager Assessment and Debrief, before joining a five-part Whole-Mind Me leadership development workshop – all delivered virtually.
In Maureen’s words: ‘It was a wonderful experience for all of us – a very light touch when it came to planning and organizing and outsized, powerful impact for each of the people that participated.’
Here’s how we did it…
Whole-Mind Manager Assessment
No two managers are the same. Each will have their own way of thinking and implementing - with most drawing from either the emotional or logical hemispheres of their brains.
Our Whole-Mind Manager™ Assessment and debrief helped participants recognize their default leadership preferences, then flex their leadership style in response to different situations.
By the end, all participants felt confident using both the creative an analytical sides of their brains to achieve optimal outcomes - no matter what the challenge.
Monday Bites Email
Support
Participants were invited to subscribe to our weekly Monday Bites emails, which provided them with additional written and video content, along with links to further reading, to allow them to dive deeper into the topics explored during the live sessions.
This ongoing support outside of the monthly sessions helped to maintain momentum and allowed for continued self-paced learning.
Whole-Mind Me™ Virtual Workshop Seires
Coordinating learning for a 300-strong community spread across multiple time zones presented a challenge. How could we focus on individual participants'' needs in a group this large?
By breaking sessions into small discussion groups colleagues could work collaboratively. What were their career goals? How effective were they at decision-making and working with allies?
these focused hour-long sessions allowed participants to reconnect with old knowledge while exposing them to new ways of thinking - providing them with a wider perspective of their leadership journey.
We were delighted to receive such positive feedback from participants. That we were able to support them at such a critical stage in the community's development meant the world to us. Participants exited our Whole-Mind Me™ program equipped with the knowledge and tools needed to think creatively and work collaboratively with peers and other stakeholders.
The Grilled Cheese Coaching Company has supported me in a couple really overt ways as a Partner Manager. They have provided new tools and insights that have really affected a more deeply creative and collaborative approach to partner management for me, but also they’ve allowed me to reconnect with some really good information and wisdom I had already been exposed to previously, years ago, providing a much needed refresher.
Broke teams into small groups to encourage reflection and help participants develop perspectives around their leadership journey.
Refreshed group knowledge and provided innovative tools and insights to encourage creativity and collaboration across the global team.
Successfully coordinated and ran a series of virtual workshops for Maureen’s 300-strong community spread across multiple time zones.
Maureen remains committed to developing her growing community of Women in Tech. We’re delighted to be part of this ongoing plan and can’t wait to support team members in the next step of their career journey.
I would just highly recommend. And I look forward to participating in anything else that is offered through, especially through my company OpenText. So grateful for the Women in Technologies group to have brought this to us and like I said, just good, good job all the way around, thank you!