Kellogg’s purpose is to educate, equip and inspire brave leaders who create lasting value. Provide a recent example where you have demonstrated leadership and created value. What challenges did you face, and what did you learn?
In my role at Company X, I curate course catalogs for corporate giants like MegaWidget and MegaEmployer, which are committed to helping their employees expand their career pathways. Recently, Company X began serving a new sector: hospital systems like Oswego General and Kaiser Montana. For healthcare, however, online-only programs would not be sufficient: fields like nursing require in-person, hands-on experience. This made my job harder because there were more pitfalls to avoid: state-specific regulations or additional fees could make an in-person program a tougher fit for employers or students.
As the healthcare catalog strategy lead, I needed to identify these roadblocks for students and employers before they selected in-person healthcare programs. I built a project plan outlining analyses that would fill gaps in Company X’s understanding of in-person components, and processes for communicating this information with employers and students. I then recruited a six-person taskforce, drawing people from different teams to conduct program-level analysis. I managed every aspect of this project, from delegating work and setting deadlines to presenting our findings to the leader of healthcare at Company X. We had finished adding program details to student-facing course catalogs when we were confronted with our biggest challenge: layoffs.
Four months into the project, Company X restructured our entire organization, laying off thirty people, including four of the six on my taskforce. The impact was devastating: my recommendation had been approved and healthcare specialists were about to launch approval processes with teach employer. Now, however, my healthcare specialists were gone, and new healthcare employers were still clamoring for in-person programs.
Meanwhile, Company X had created a brand-new division to coordinate in-person learning experiences for healthcare-industry employees. I assumed this team could replace my missing healthcare specialists, so I sent a lengthy email to the new team lead, Francine, detailing our work-to-date and asking her to share her staff with me. My assumption was wrong: that team had a completely different mandate, and Francine bristled at my assumptions. To solve the crisis , I met one-on-one with Francine, and we spoke honestly about the challenges facing both of our teams. We soon found common ground: ongoing collaboration would increase the impact of both teams. We finalized a new approval process for in-person programs, with Francine’s staff leading as “Employer Quarterbacks.”
Today, three months later, prospective healthcare clients are 80% of Company X’s sales pipeline, with six new hospital systems signing up for our services this past week. Francine and I are actively collaborating to bring this part of the business to life. Through this process, I learned that offering to support other teams works better than assuming they will support me. By framing our collaboration as beneficial to Francine’s team, we both achieved our goals.