Case Study: Role of the Manager @ IBM
By Drew Morton

IBM Learning believes that management development is a transformational and extended process, rather than a classroom event.

The global, technology-enhanced marketplace is transforming the manager’s role. Managers require more skills: accommodating an ever-changing matrix environment of shared leadership and report-to roles; leading teams that are geographically dispersed and mobile; creating an environment that encourages continual innovation vis-a-vis rapid market changes, and more.

Managers at IBM are no different. So, how could we get managers the skills they needed?

At IBM, managers work 10 to 12 hours per day, sometimes longer. The option to increase the two-day off-site class time for skill-building and networking was unfeasible. IBM needed a new approach to create dialogue, collaboration, individual development, and action plans. IBM Learning responded by creating the Role of the Manager@IBM program.

RM@IBM is guided by four main objectives:

• use the learning process to address business-unit priorities and define action plans
• create new e-approaches to align teams on key business objectives
• target managers’ individual development needs in leading performance through people
• provide a learning and communications initiative that would support peer learning and shared objectives.

Enter blended learning

Enhancing leadership and management skills in a time-efficient way is of critical importance to managers. Moreover, being able to fulfill managers’ individual performance-support needs in a just-in-time manner is equally compelling. The task was to create an instructional model that uses our network infrastructure to allow managers to make best use of resources, both collaborative and online, to fulfill their organizational unit’s learning needs and the skill-building needs of our individual managers.

RM@IBM blends four tiers of delivery in the tradition of a learning hierarchy. Each tier builds upon learning developed at the previous tier, beginning with information transfer and progressing on to skills development and collaborative person-to-person interaction. The tiers together comprise a system of tools and applications that constitute a continuing process of learning, instead of such events as one-time classes or workshops.

Tier 1: Online information transfer and performance support

Online resources are available to the manager via the company intranet anytime, anywhere—before, during, and after the two-day RM Learning Lab. The primary purpose is to prepare managers for the Learning Lab. Best thinking on 150+ leadership and people management topics are available, including customized materials from Harvard Business School Publishing. Printable worksheets and checklists for specific action issues and links to important external Websites are highlighted. As we team globally, managers need access to policies and practices in different countries. Tier 1 allows managers fast access to all global HR material.

Tier 2: Interactive online skill building and simulations

Managers enhance their knowledge and skill development by engaging in immersive simulations of issues presented in Tier 1. The online Coaching Simulator comprises eight different scenarios with more than 5000 screens of actions, decisions points, and branching results. More than 30 other simulations and QuickCases cover other people management skills:

• motivating employees
• eetaining employees
• enabling employee high performance
• creating an environment for innovation
• team leadership
• multicultural issues
• work-life issues
• employee business commitments.

Tier 3: Online collaboration

Tier 3 features ManagerJam and Manager ActionNet, which has managers participate in organizational groupware spaces to discuss and solve critical leadership issues with peer managers and their executive teams. Collaborative spaces using same-place, different-time communication enable a global learning environment, eliminating problems of time zones and travel, and creating networks that live beyond the RM@IBM initiative.

Tier 4. Face-to-face, classroom learning lab

Face-to-face human interaction is arguably the most powerful learning intervention for developing manager skills. Workshops of management teams create and commit to shared learning action plans to drive change. The two-day, classroom-based experience requires the learner to master the material contained in Tiers 1, 2, and 3 so that the precious time spent in learning labs can target deeper and richer skills development.

Partnerships inside and outside the organization   All instructional materials comprising the RM@IBM intervention have been designed and developed in concert with other organizations, within and outside the company. For example, the online Coaching Simulator was co-designed with our Executive Development division; the simulator contains four manager scenarios, and four executive scenarios. Both groups together bench marked the coaching field and, for the purpose of alignment up and down the company, agreed to adopt the same coaching model.   The Role of the Manager Simulator was developed with cooperation of Harvard Business School Publishing (HBSP). For the first time in its history, HBSP permitted a client to customize its flagship product, Harvard Business Review (HBR) articles. Our company revised the HBR articles for our audience, re-purposing seven selected HBR articles to serve as the instructional content for the Role of the Manager online simulator. We licensed an HBSP book (Winning Through Innovation) for use in our Learning Lab, and it forms the basis of the in-class case study.   The Manager QuickViews were co-developed by HBSP and us. As HBSP was building its Harvard ManageMentor and we were building our Manager QuickViews, we mutually shared our design ideas, feedback from users, and interface insights. Thus the two tools work in similar fashion, and the HBSP content fits perfectly within our interface, allowing us the advantage of easily adding HBSP content appropriate to our needs.   Meanwhile, our company’s Focus Team, charged with identifying critical line issues, was accorded the role of decision maker on what QuickView topics would be written and incorporated, in order to align these performance-support tools with real business issues and concerns of managers.   Finally, our Multicultural QuickView and Website was co-designed with the Intercultural Business Institute of the University of North Carolina, Charlotte. The cross-cultural model and all 300 interactive cross-cultural scenarios were co-developed with the director of the Institute. Other QuickViews are written by subject-matter experts from across the HR and Policy functions.   We participate in professional endeavors to share knowledge with thought leaders in the field, cosponsoring benchmarking studies on e-learning with Brandon Hall and professional associations.

Managers learn in phases

The 4 tiers—online information, online skills practice, online collaboration, and face-to-face action learning and skill building—are delivered over four phases.

Phase I starts with ManagerJam, which is an enterprise-wide online conversation hosted by our CEO. In short, it’s a massive companywide dialogue for all 30,000 managers worldwide. Company managers discuss six key management issues, each with its own discussion forum. The objective of this dialogue is to begin nonhierarchical conversation among managers and improve manager behavior change in collaboration, networking, and open sharing of ideas. In addition, we want to start building a sense of community among managers, as well as start to create a knowledge library based on manager insights.

The launch in 2002 was the largest conversation on management topics in our company’s history: more than 7,002,000 total page reads and 4,554 responses within the six discussion forums. The solutions, ideas, and success stories rated by participating peers as having most potential have been made available permanently to the global management team on our KM Website.

In Phase II employees interact with Edvisor, a patent-pending online tool that creates a guided path for each of our managers, including those working remotely. Edvisor prepares the manager for the RM Learning Lab through the use of several tools:

• a blend of e-learning (online performance support, online simulations, virtual collaboration) to enhance the Learning Lab classroom experience
• a personally-customized career-learning path for each individual manager
• customized reports based on business-unit and individual manager survey data. 

After some face-to-face instruction in the learning labs, employees were able to access Manager ActionNet, which is a Web-based community that enables focused, organization-wide discussion, work, and knowledge sharing.

Evaluating success

To ensure objectivity, an outside intervention-analysis firm was hired to define and implement an independent 3rd-party evaluation of the program’s effectiveness and business impact. This firm conducted a two-phase evaluation strategy over nine months.

Various data collection and analysis procedures were used, including

·         observation of Learning Lab sessions and reviews of program components to assess program readiness

·         surveys immediately following Learning Lab sessions to assess participant satisfaction and achievement of learning objectives

·         surveys of imperative leaders 45 and 90 days following learning sessions through Manager ActionNet and email to assess behavioral changes and application of action plans

·         interviews with participants to assess the business impact of the program

·         reviews and analyses of Global Pulse Survey (GPS) results to assess the impact of the program on employee attitudes

·         targeted interviews with selected executives to assess their perception of the program and its impact.

During both phases, various procedures were used to collect data at four levels:

• Level 1 – Participants’ perceived value of the program.
• Level 2 – Participants’ self-assessment of how well they achieved the learning objectives.
• Level 3 – Actions taken by participants to implement action plans defined in the Learning Lab portion of the program, as well as barriers to implementation in the work environment.
• Level 4 – Business impact of actions taken during implementation of action plans.

To date, the program has been delivered to nearly 29,000 executives, managers, and leaders worldwide. Here are the measurement findings in the following areas: participant satisfaction, achievement of learning objectives, actions taken, business impact of those actions, impact on employee attitudes, and executive perspective.

Satisfaction with Role of the Manager@IBM. Surveys conducted with all participants immediately after the Learning Lab showed that 92 percent of participants were satisfied with the program. Since program’s inception, the rating of overall satisfaction has averaged above 90 percent for all business groups and geographies.

In addition, follow-up interviews were conducted with random samples of participants several months after attending the Learning Lab. When managers were asked whether investment in RM@IBM should continue given the cost constraints that IBM is facing, over 90 percent believed that the program should continue.

Achieving learning objectives. Surveys conducted with all participants immediately after the Learning Lab showed that an average of 87percent of participants indicated that they had achieved the learning objectives of the Learning Lab. The following list shows participants’ ratings for each of the five learning modules in the program:

·         apply motivation theories to improve individual employee motivation: 91 percent

·         take greater accountability for their actions and describe the benefits of this behavior: 91 percent

·         apply conflict resolution and negotiation principles to effectively collaborate with individuals in their network: 83 percent

·         use boundary management to foster innovation and change in their team: 77 percent

·         provide clear direction and support to their team on their business and customers in order to achieve business results: 87 percent

·         use the GROW model to coach others on improving their performance: 96 percent.

In follow-up interviews conducted with random samples of participants several months after attending the Learning Lab, a majority of the participants (ranging from 61 percent to 80 percent) perceived the program to be a valuable learning experience.

Behavioral change on the job. In surveys conducted with all participants immediately after the Learning Lab, 97 percent indicated that they intended to take action based on their participation in the program. Intention to take action has remained high for all geographies (ranging from 96 percent to 99 percent) and all business groups (ranging from 94 percent to 99 percent) throughout program deployment.

A follow-up survey conducted with a sample of imperative leaders, however, showed that only 64 percent of participants have taken action. A number of factors contribute to this drop. Some action plans are too ambitious and require action by other teams and organizations. Some action plans fail to address fundamental needs, and thus do not garner the needed support. Some participants mentioned barriers within their own teams, including a lack of discipline, competing demands and priorities, and a lack of resources—not to mention time constraints. Many of these factors are also connected to the last group of barriers: a need for stronger executive support and sponsorship, and existing metrics and measurement and reward structures, which do not provide sufficient motivation.

Business impact. Follow-up interviews with random samples of participants from various business groups and geographies showed that implementation of team or individual action plans has had considerable impact in a wide range of areas. Benefits have included improved communication among extended team members and increased employee motivation, engagement, morale, and empowerment. Employees have also demonstrated increased awareness of business strategies and imperatives.

Implementation of some action plans has resulted in more effective use of employees and other resources, as well as greater accountability. Implementation of other action plans has resulted in increased collaboration among various brands and groups, operational efficiencies, such as cycle time reduction and process improvement), and improved productivity.

Not surprisingly, the result has been improved relationships with customers and business partners, and increased customer satisfaction. The cumulative effect has been the achievement of IBM’s strategic objectives, including selling solutions rather than point products and an emphasis on On-Demand Business, with associated cost saving, cost avoidance, and revenue enhancement.

Based on interviews with random samples of imperative leaders, 111 individual cases have been identified that demonstrate the impact achieved by participants who have implemented their action plans. In addition to the impact on operations and the work environment, these cases show that significant revenue enhancement has resulted from implementation of relatively few action plans. According to imperative leaders of these cases, RM@IBM has been a “contributing factor” in helping them achieve an estimated US$335 million in new revenue and $1.5 million in cost savings and avoidance. These estimates are very conservative and are based on a small number of action plans identified in random samples.

Analysis of GPS results. GPS data was used to assess the impact of RM@IBM training on employee attitudes. The results showed that business groups with more participants in RM@IBM have had more improvement in employee satisfaction, clarity, and leadership ratings than units with fewer or no participants in RM@IBM. Although causal relationships cannot be proven from this research, the data does provide strong support for a relationship between the program and improvements in workplace climate, leadership, and manager behaviors.

Executive perspective. A select number of executives were interviewed to gain insight into their experiences with RM@IBM and their perception of its impact. These executives praised the program for its ability to engage managers in a process of learning and action planning that has enabled IBM to achieve strategic business priorities. They appreciated the fact that RM was not just a training event, but that it engaged the managers in their organization in a number of learning, communication, and collaboration activities over a period of time. They felt RM@IBM created an environment for managers to spend time with their colleagues away from everyday work to plan and to work on business- and people-related issues in the context of IBM’s and their group’s business imperatives. Finally, they cited a number of benefits that the organization has achieved through implementation of action plans initiated in the program.

 Published: November 2004