Situation

Corporate Team team’s mission was to be “the catalyst for science based decision making” at Company. Team of data, behavioral, and computer scientists worked with other sections of Company to address business opportunities.

Team frequently came up against resistance to change or innovations at the beginning of joint projects. Though, saw that their work was having a huge, positive impact throughout the organization. Team wanted Board support in expanding the team’s influence as a change agent throughout the organization.

Approach

We realized that key to helping Board understand Corporate Teams’s ability to create and guide change throughout Company would be for Board to hear testimonials from partners and to demonstrate real business results. Team decided:

• Speakers should be partners, not just Team members
• Board members should EXPERIENCE the before and after situations of projects, not just hear about them

Set up:

• Breakout rooms with posters explaining business challenges, approaches, and business impact with posters, props, and coached external speakers
• More cutting edge work to be presented by R&D scientists in board presentation, with recorded demos of technology

Impact

Corporate Team was offered a larger budget at the end of the session.

Next quarter, Board unilaterally decided that best approach for transforming company in line with then CEO’s vision was to seed Team’s talent throughout the organization. Team members were moved into senior leadership roles throughout organization, including: Chief Commercial Underwriting Officer, Chief Customer Officer, Deputy Chief of Staff for CEO, Transformation Office, and the Commercial Technology Innovation Office. Support has extended to new CEO as members of Corporate Team are now being utilized by next CEO as facilitating an external JV and a tech startup.