Nestlé Papua New Guinea Case Study

When the business doubles, the leadership needs to double too.

Nestlé Papua New Guinea is a $200m-plus business with big ambitions. They have doubled their size in the past decade and plan to do it again. Growth on that scale needs more than a strategy. It needs leaders with the tools and confidence to lead well as the business expands.


Purpose 

  • Support building leadership capability to manage and sustain rapid growth. As people grow, organisations grow

  • Better understand what CliftonStrengths results mean for the leadership team and how to apply them daily with their teams in everyday conversations

  • Equip local HR leaders, already trained as CliftonStrengths coaches, with more tools to roll out CliftonStrengths approaches across the wider PNG team


Process 

  • Ran two facilitated workshops through team-based coaching sessions for the country leadership team and the Lae factory leadership team

  • Adjusted facilitation style to local culture: allowed more time for responses (8–10 seconds), sat at participants’ level, kept the tone conversational, leveraged buddy conversations before sharing back with the group, and framed the day with “I need you to talk because that helps everyone else”

  • Created opportunities within the workshops for local HR to practise facilitating the process

  • Delivered a comprehensive development plan for each team leader, plus a dynamic reporting tool showing each other’s Strengths with customised guides, and self-guided resources - including exercises, reference guides, desktop name tags, and wallpapers - to embed the Strengths language in daily work


Outcome 

  • Recognised as the best training they had ever had

  • The Lae factory manager noted it was the first time he had seen his team contribute so actively

  • Positioned the HR leader as the local voice and go-to after the sessions, with local leaders set to continue the Strengths work and embed it into how leaders grow, how teams operate, and how results are delivered


Here’s what people had to say  

“Thanks again Jase for making a difference. You are now part of the Team PNG story here at Nestlé, and are welcome back anytime. I am really looking forward to seeing Moses and Joyce build on this week and share Strengths with the whole team.”

“Very interactive training, learnt a lot about myself and my colleagues… the buddy review of our strengths stood out the most. This set the benchmark for others to follow.”

 
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