Case Studies
Royal Holloway
Royal Holloway is one of the UK’s leading universities and remains within the Top 25% of all UK universities for research, with 88% assessed as 4* and 3* in Research Excellence Framework (2021).
Background
RHUL had launched “Discover Our Future” Strategic Plan which set out a number of goals including:
Increasing student intake
Building on its reputation for academic research
Developing a high quality diverse and professional workforce
Identifying new leaders from Royal Holloway’s existing staff.
RKB Coaching Consultancy Ltd was approached by the newly appointed Director of HR to design a leadership development programme to build the capability of senior leaders to deliver the Strategic Plan. The then Director of HR commented that:
“RKB Coaching Consultancy’s style of facilitation and approach with academics, as well as their willingness to tailor the programme to meet the College’s requirements, within the available budget, provided a good fit for us.”
The Challenge
The programme was launched with senior managers and leaders from across academic and professional services with the HR Director being one of the cohort. The aim was to have first-hand experience of the programme and ensure it met the agreed expectations.
The programme consisted of 8 one-day Modules on a monthly basis including action learning sets and as well as one-to-one coaching for participants.
The different modules focussed on different aspects of leadership – from leading self to leading others including:
Understanding the organisational culture
Reputation Management
Influencing where you do not have formal authority
Building networks and relationships to deliver outcomes.
The focus was on applying theoretical knowledge/models/frameworks to the College’s current context and challenges.
The Action Learning sets were highly valuable as they developed “allies in learning” all seeking to support and challenge each other – well beyond the duration of the programme. The session facilitated cross-departmental co-operation and enabled academics to better understand the challenges faced by their professional services colleagues and vice versa.
The participants undertook Leadership Tasks designed to enable them to raise their profile, enhance their reputation by applying actively learning to business-critical challenges.
The Impact
Following the success of the first cohort the programme was re-commissioned with an increase in number of workshops and coaching sessions. The HR Director at the time said:
“I would recommend RKB Coaching Consultancy Ltd due to their breadth of knowledge and experience and flexibility of style. They are able to engage with both professional services and academic managers and to challenge in a non-threatening way.”
